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    Steven Colbert, South Carolina kingmaker, being wooed for his polled 5%...

    By jollyroger on Tue, 01/10/2012 - 8:48pm |

    As the runaway train that is the Republican primary lurches south out of New Hampshire, let us review the likely field of play:

    Mitt's win (36 38%) is insufficiently assertive to make a dent in SC where he leads Gingrich only 27-23.

    Ron Paul (24 23%) is easily in til' Tampa and maybe beyond.

    Santorum can go into haberdashery full time and his SC voters (18%  will scatter to Gingrich and Huntsman)

    Gingrich (10%) will tie on the head scarf and go full tilt Divine Wind on Romney's sorry ass.

    Huntsman (17%) has reason to tap the family billions so as to boost his current 4% in S.C. (Maybe he'll promise to make Colbert his running mate, and more than double his numbers...)

    The Colbert demographic, which probably splits between Huntsman and Paul, will be up for grabs when his 5% (per the polls) get out on voting day and discover he's not really on the ballot.

    Steven Colbert, kingmaker.

    Comments

    This a.m. according to TPM (or Politico?) post, Colbert may actually 'enter' the general?!?  


    by Aunt Sam on Thu, 01/12/2012 - 12:39pm

    How cool is that?? (I bet he gets electoral college runaway votes)


    by jollyroger on Thu, 01/12/2012 - 2:03pm

    Actually, I'm not supportive of him doing this.  Don't think this does anything other than for delivering media attention to Colbert.  I'm of the those who would like to work towards rebuilding our electoral process to achieve a better, more positive result for all.  IMHO, this does the opposite.


    by Aunt Sam on Thu, 01/12/2012 - 2:16pm

    I don't know, if you've watched his show, he does an excellent job of pointing out the insanity of many campaign laws, most recently the stuff that sprung up after Citizens United.


    by Verified Atheist on Thu, 01/12/2012 - 2:21pm

    And that's a good thing!


    by Aunt Sam on Thu, 01/12/2012 - 2:35pm

    There was a study done by a professor some time back that showed the more conservative a college student was, the more likely they were to think that he actually believed the opinions he was giving on the show.  So there are probably a number of people who would vote for him thinking they're voting for a real conservative.


    by Elusive Trope on Thu, 01/12/2012 - 5:18pm

    Found a reference to a least one study on this matter

    This study investigated biased message processing of political satire in The Colbert Report and the influence of political ideology on perceptions of Stephen Colbert. Results indicate that political ideology influences biased processing of ambiguous political messages and source in late-night comedy. Using data from an experiment (N = 332), we found that individual-level political ideology significantly predicted perceptions of Colbert's political ideology. Additionally, there was no significant difference between the groups in thinking Colbert was funny, but conservatives were more likely to report that Colbert only pretends to be joking and genuinely meant what he said while liberals were more likely to report that Colbert used satire and was not serious when offering political statements. Conservatism also significantly predicted perceptions that Colbert disliked liberalism. Finally, a post hoc analysis revealed that perceptions of Colbert's political opinions fully mediated the relationship between political ideology and individual-level opinion.


    by Elusive Trope on Thu, 01/12/2012 - 5:21pm

    (open:scrapingbrainsoffwalls) I had forgotten about that, tho it crossed my radar once.  The mind boggles, the senses reel...(close:scrapingbrainsoffwalls)

     

    The best part is that the trogs still think he's funny, even when they don't get that they are the joke...


    by jollyroger on Thu, 01/12/2012 - 5:43pm

    An excellent study of Poe's law.


    by Verified Atheist on Thu, 01/12/2012 - 6:20pm

    Had not heard of that before.  For those like me, here is how the law is stated:

    Without a winking smiley or other blatant display of humor, it is impossible to create a parody of fundamentalism that someone won't mistake for the real thing.

    A corollary of Poe's law is the reverse phenomenon: legitimate fundamentalist beliefs being mistaken for a parody of that belief.


    by Elusive Trope on Thu, 01/12/2012 - 6:45pm

    I only read parts of this recent New York Times' Sunday Magazine story profile of Colbert, his on-air persona, and the related political campaign fund, because I am just not that interested in him.  But from the parts I read, it sounds to me like he doesn't want to discourage the confusion and fully intends to carry out the whole presidential run thing without clarifying anything, really intends it to be a true performance piece, with any possible reaction(s) left wide open. If he has a political effect in mind, he's not planning to say what it is, and that he's less a Jon Stewart type, and more an Andy Kaufman type, than many people might think.


    by artappraiser on Thu, 01/12/2012 - 7:02pm

    Oh, he stays in character--he testified before congress as the character!


    by jollyroger on Thu, 01/12/2012 - 7:10pm

    Pass the motherfuckin' popcorn! Could I have been any wronger? Huntsman is now the third party darkhorse, Paul is in the tank so Rand gets a career boost, and Santorum is charting at least a credible denial of pre convention closeout. And Newt soldiers on.

    by jollyroger on Wed, 03/14/2012 - 10:44pm

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