AS ADVANCE PUBLICITY GOES, Maureen Dowd’s column on Malcolm “Steve” Forbes, Jr., the billionaire magazine publisher who announced for the presidency Sept. 22, wasn’t the best the candidate could have hoped for. Writing in the New York Times last month, Dowd described the 48-year-old Forbes as “Walter Mitty with a platinum card,” a dilettante with a “wacky streak.” “Almost everyone seems to agree,” wrote Dowd, that Forbes “is loopy for thinking about pouring his own millions into a bid for the Republican nomination.”

Dowd’s assessment isn’t far off. Like tales of the Yeti, Forbes’s run for president is pretty easy to dismiss. Then you talk to his supporters, those who’ve seen the footprints in the snow, and the idea of a Forbes presidency begins to seem somewhat less fanciful.