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"Unlike the analogous literature in psychology, this first wave of scholarship on political cues and 'information shortcuts' stressed their potential value while paying little attention to the ways in which they could lead voters astray. In one of the most colorful examples of an 'information shortcut,' political scientist Samuel Popkin suggested that Mexican-American voters had good reason to be suspicious of President Gerald Ford in 1976 because he didn't know how to eat a tamale--a shortcoming revealed during his Texas GOP primary campaign against Ronald Reagan, when he made the mistake of trying to down one without first removing its cornhusk wrapper. According to Popkin, 'Showing familiarity with a voter's culture is an obvious and easy test of ability to relate to the problems and sensibilities of the ethnic group and to understand and care about them.'8 Obvious and easy, yes--but was this a reliable test? Would Mexican-American voters have been correct to infer that Ford was less sensitive to their concerns than Reagan? I have no idea, and neither does Popkin."--Larry M. Bartels, "The Irrational Electorate," Wilson Quarterly, Autumn 2008. https://wilsonquarterly.com/quarterly/fall-2008-the-glory-and-the-folly/the-irrational-electorate/

I must admit that as fond as I am of having incidents like this decide close elections, I cannot quite do it in this case. Even if we assume a Ford more proficient in tamale-eating could have carried Texas, where Carter defeated Ford fairly narrowly (51.1-48.0) http://psephos.adam-carr.net/countries/u/usa/pres/1976.txt Carter would still have 271 electoral votes--one vote more than necessary to win. And the other states with large Mexican-American voting populations--e.g., California and New Mexico--all went for Ford anyway. (Given the extreme closeness of Carter's victory in Ohio, would the small Mexican-American community there have made a difference? I doubt it. "In 1980 there were less than 120,000 Hispanics in Ohio, making up 1.1 percent of the state's total population." http://vocerolatinonews.com/hispanicpopulation.html The percentage was presumably even lower in 1976. And many of them were not Mexican-Americans; in Cleveland, at least, the Hispanic community was mostly Puerto Rican. https://case.edu/ech/articles/h/hispanic-community And no doubt many of the Mexican-Americans were not citizens or were too young to vote, and even of the very small number of Mexican-American voters, the number whose votes could have been changed if Ford had eaten the tamale properly would probably be quite small...)

Other famous food faux pas also don't seem to have changed election results:

(1) In 1972, George McGovern famously ordered a kosher hot dog and a glass of milk while campaigning for Jewish votes in New York--his handlers having apparently failed to brief him beforehand that mixing milk and meat was definitely not kosher; here too Popkin argued that it would not be irrational for Jewish voters to take this into account as indicating that McGovern "knew little about Jews and Jewish concerns." http://books.google.com/books?id=fAT-IREgyQ8C&pg=PA2 But Nixon's landslide was too big for this incident to have made any significant difference.) [1]

(2) "In 2003, while running for President of the United States, John Kerry made what was considered a major faux pas when campaigning in Philadelphia and went to Pat's King of Steaks and ordered a cheesesteak with Swiss." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cheesesteak "According to the Philadelphia Daily News, 'reporters snickered,' because "in Philadelphia, ordering Swiss on a cheesesteak is like rooting for Dallas at an Eagles game. It isn't just politically incorrect; it could get you a poke in the nose.'" http://www.statemaster.com/encyclopedia/Cheesesteak But Kerry defeated Bush in Pennsylvania in 2004 anyway.

(3) Eating pizza with a fork and knife (which is common enough in Italy but frowned on in New York) didn't prevent de Blasio from being re-elected. http://gothamist.com/2014/01/10/honeymoons_over_de_blasio_spotted_e.php

[1] Speaking of Nixon, it's too early to judge the consequences of this incident: http://gothamist.com/2018/09/10/nixon_bagel_order_barf.php
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