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Larry Bartels says not really:
Surveys conducted by the National Election Study team in each presidential year since 1980 have asked prospective voters to rate the presidential candidates on a variety of specific traits. In 2000, for example, survey respondents were asked how well the phrases "moral," "really cares about people like you," "knowledgeable," and "provides strong leadership" described Bush and Al Gore. The biggest difference in perceptions of the two candidates was that people saw Bush as considerably less "knowledgeable" than Gore -- by 11 points on a 100-point scale. (They also saw Bush as less empathetic, but most considered him a stronger leader.)How much did that matter? My analysis suggests that an undecided voter who saw Bush as 11 points less "knowledgeable" than Gore was only about 1.3% less likely to vote for Bush as a result. Comparable differences on the other trait dimensions were three to five times as consequential. Clearly, voters in 2000 were much more concerned about electing someone who was strong, empathetic, and moral, with "knowledgeable" a distant fourth. And they weren't just giving the genial anti-intellectual Bush a pass -- much the same pattern has held in other recent elections.Personality traits like "strong" and "empathic" matter far more. Looking forward to tonight, Bartels says, "the people who matter -- the voters whose minds are still not made up -- will mostly not care whether Palin can rattle off the names of Supreme Court cases or world leaders. If she comes across as strong and empathetic, that may be enough." It may indeed. The whole thing brings to mind H.L Mencken's quote that "Democracy is the theory that the common people know what they want, and deserve to get it good and hard."
