That's some misplaced hope.
Considering he was elected I kind of assume a lot people like what they think he stands for.
Considering he was elected I kind of assume a lot people like what they think he stands for.
In 2010, 236,284 people voted in the district, of which 162,763 voted for Smith. Let's assume all voters know who he is and what he stands for, and that everyone else probably doesn't. That gives us 40% of the district's population that know what's going on. Fewer voted for him, and even fewer like what he stands for, since voting is usually a compromise.
This is an overestimate.
There are clearly some number of people who support this guy, and assuming that everyone who sees his name is also aware that he's a bad person is naive at best.
The average person on the street is has a level of understanding that's closer to "Keep the government out of my medicare!!". People typically don't know the names of their representatives, the policies they stand for and the impact those policies are going to have in practice. They have to know all of those things in order to understand the meaning of "Don't mess with the internet".
Fair enough, but it's naive to assume that simply equating Lamer Smith with SOPA is sufficient.
Or maybe they could.
I'm amazed at some of things some Arizona[0] politicians support, such as the NDAA, things that should properly outrage the average citizen. But they don't, indeed these people get re-elected, and I believe it is precisely because of the outrageous things they support.
Even if the average Texan knows that Lamar was behind SOPA they may, for whatever reason, still think SOPA was a good idea.
0: Where I live.