if celebrities such as Oprah will "not have any influence" on how Americans vote, then why are they even there

Question

in a previous question I expressed my concerns that Oprah is having an adverse effect on the Obama campaign because many Americans will instinctively assume that she is endorsing them simply because they have race in common due to several unspoken factors (for instance, the fact that she has never before endorsed another candidate). In lieu of my concerns, several people responded by saying that regardless of her and racial assumptions, Oprah would not be able to influence how people vote, as people would not be stupid enough to allow her to influence them. My question is, if Oprah will in fact, as people say, have no influence on how people vote, then why is she even there endorsing the Obama campaign in the first place?

And before anyone questions why I am not asking the same thing about other celebrity endorsers, note that I am specifically asking about Oprah because of the instinctive racial assumptions that will likely be brought up on her part because of her endorsing a candidate of the same race, and doing so for the first time, whereas there will likely be no such influence when it comes to celebrities endorsing other candidates.

Answer 1

First, I want to say that I don't believe Oprah endorsed Barack because he's black. If that were her attitude, she would most likely have endorsed Jesse Jackson or Al Sharpton in the past, and she never did.

Second, I think it will have a lot of influence on how people vote. In fact, I believe every celebrity endorsement influences voters.

That is because most voters are, unfortunately, uneducated on the issues, and those who are educated, are largely ill informed.

I would never base my vote on the celebrity endorsement of any candidate.

Answer 2

When Oprah recommends a book with her little book club it jumps up to a top 10 best seller. So reality will tell you that obviously she will probably influence some people.

Now we can wonder why in the hell people were not checking out Obama ( and the other candidates on their own ) and we can wonder why people were so politically unaware or inept that they chose Oprah as their political expert to lead them to their candidate.

She will have some influence, sad as that fact is. Some people are in fact stupid enough to be influenced by someone who is certainly no political policy expert.
On the other hand I think that there might be a negative reaction by others as well.

I personally couldnt care less about Oprah's endorsement.
She can endorse him, theres no law against it.

Answer 3

If I follow the "logic" of your argument, then any woman who backs Hillary Clinton would be doing so because of her gender?
I don't think so.
Oprah Winfrey is exercising her democratic right as a U.S. citizen to freely express her opinions, choices, etc. Although only Oprah could tell you how she feels, I suspect that she's enthusiastically endorsing Obama because she thinks he is the best person for the job.
Some people stuff envelopes, others canvas door to door, still others handle telephones and the wealthy give tons of money to various candidates.
Are you questioning their motives?

Answer 4

Obviously she is making an attempt to influence people politically. Lots of people showed up to see her but is that because they support Obama or because they wanted to see Oprah in person? I think a little of both.

Answer 5

Celebrities are there because they "think" they can have an influence. Thinking it and actually having it be true are two different things. And as long as they don't have a negative influence, from the candidate's perspective, what's the harm?

Answer 6

It's free publicity for the campaign so they jump on it with both feet, pure and simple.

Answer 7

It is sad when people are influenced by this when in reality if people did their research this would not matter.

Answer 8

The best publicity is FREE publicity.

Answer 9

"For more exposure, though they won't expose. Hehe!"