What good is name recognition if most have a negative association with the name?
There a plenty of candidates that have come out of nowhere to win nominations and the Presidents. It comes down to running a superior campaign and getting one's message out.
“What good is name recognition if most have a negative association with the name?”
Where do you get the negative association? Has she lost a vote I don’y know about? Oh, annnnnnnnnnnnnd ... there’s no such thing as bad publicity? If everyone knows who you are, you can turn things around if it is less than positive, then everyone knows who you are in a positive light? Politics can do that.
Plenty of candidates? But you don’t name anyone with a snowball’s chance. None of them. Not with a name. And in Politics, the name is the game. Unless you steal it.