Herman Cain, Republican du jour: perceptions, the press, and the public
Herman Cain is the Republican frontrunner for now among Iowa’s voters:
A new Rasmussen Reports telephone survey of Likely Iowa caucus-goers shows that Cain is in front with 28% followed by former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney at 21%.
One Republican who has consistently polled ahead of the others has been “generic,” and each candidate has taken turns filling in his/her shoes. Remember Bachmann as frontrunner, remember Perry? It’s a bit like when a person who’s married daydreams about the perfect match; the one we can imagine is almost always better than the one we have. Then, after the breakup with Mr/Ms/Wrong, the new person seems really great when we are basking in the glow of new-found love, and before we start to know all their quirks and foibles and annoyances and flaws.
The press is cooperating in the process by doing its level best to destroy each candidate in turn. Cain is already feeling the fire, although I think he’s a tough guy who won’t let it faze or change him. Case in point is the flap about his remarks on “these small insignificant states around the world,” words that Joe Klein cited when calling Cain “a jerk and an ingnoramus”.
Take a look at what Cain actually said and the question he was answering:
I agree that it wasn’t diplomatic of Cain to have called a state such as Uzbekistan insignificant, but his larger point is true. His answer was much more about the MSM and its ways of getting at candidates it doesn’t like by asking them relatively trivial questions and then pouncing on them when they don’t have all the facts at their fingertips then it is about anybody’s foreign policy decisions.
Note that Cain adds, “When I get ready to go visit that country, I’ll know who [its leader] is.” I think that’s true. But will others believe him, especially after the MSM really sinks its teeth into the idiosyncratic and non-generic Cain? This is all just the warm-up act.
I’ve read many criticisms of Cain’s Uzbekistan remarks, and I’ve yet to see one that mentions the incident Cain is clearly referring to, where the press played an advanced game of “gotcha” with candidate Bush when he was frontrunner during the 2000 campaign:
The Republican presidential front-runner [Bush] sat down Wednesday with WHDH-TV, the NBC affiliate in Boston, and was asked to name the leaders of four current world hot spots: Chechnya, Taiwan, India and Pakistan.
He was able to give a partial response to just one: Taiwan.
That drew immediate criticism from the camp of Democrat Al Gore, which said the vice president could have answered all four correctly.
“I guess we know that ‘C’ at Yale was a gentleman’s ‘C,'” said Gore spokesman Chris Lehane, referring to the way Bush has described his academic record.
The Bush campaign brushed off the incident.
“The person who is running for president is seeking to be the leader of the free world, not a Jeopardy contestant,” said Karen Hughes, Bush communications director.
It’s ironic that President Bush, as opposed to candidate Bush, was known for his foreign policy rather than the domestic policy he probably would have preferred to focus on. And though, like Cain, Bush was considered a jerk and an ignoramus (and much worse) by the likes of people such as Joe Klein throughout his entire presidency and beyond, there’s no question that Bush learned a great deal about those leaders before he actually had to deal with them as president.
Yeah.
I remember when The Boston Globe had the integrity to disclose that hey, as a matter of fact, Dubya’s grades at Yale were higher than Kerry’s. No matter. Dubya was the dummy, and Kerry was the nuanced one. (Admittedly, Bush — both of ’em — had serious problems with articulation of ideas.)
But, yeah. They’ll “gotcha” Hermanator while when it comes to “corpseman” Obama, the guy who thought Austrians speak Austrian, welllll, he gets a pass, because we all “know” he’s the brightest guy in any room in which he’s to be found.
Obama’s media palace guard will go after Cain’s respectability as a candidate.
Meanwhile, the Democratic Party’s media palace guard will go after Cain’s respectability as a person with African heritage, insofar as Cain’s respectability as an African America constitutes a long term threat to the Democratic Party.
This week, we see NYT calling Cain “minstrelsy”. Which, I would have used “minstrelly”! John Nolte devastates NYT, here http://bigjournalism.com/jjmnolte/2011/10/19/herman-cain-accused-of-being-minstrelsy-in-new-york-times/
We see WaPo comparing Cain to Bull Connor.
http://bigjournalism.com/dloesch/2011/10/20/washington-post-herman-cain-is-bull-connor/
We see Time Magazine calling Cain a “black clown” and “the most unctuous black man alive”.
http://ideas.time.com/2011/10/20/is-herman-cain-the-most-unctuous-black-man-alive/
I think if your first response, rather than try to understand a person and their own response, is to label someone a “jerk and an ignoramus” it probably is really a reflection that you are a jerk and an ignoramus.
The Time Magazine essay also labeled Cain “the black Sarah Palin”. This goes more to Cain’s respectability as a candidate, and less to Cain’s legitimacy as an American of African heritage.
In future, I suspect that Repub candidates who generate voter enthusiasm will be labeled “the [whatever] Sarah Palin”. For years, Dems could label Repubs as Hoover or Nixon. Now, Dems will label Repubs as Bush or Palin. Fun times.
Common sense is needed. Not a jeopardy contest winner.
There is no training ground for being president of the US. No equivalent position (not even first lady as HRC seemed to think) has a similar mix of military, civil, administrative, diplomatic and national leader factors. In general ambassadors and military leaders lack the legislative and economic skills desired, while most business execs lack a feel for the necessary absurdities of government.
What you can look for is common sense, a strong and consistent set of principles, enough humility to get capable advisors/subordinates with the ability to lead them.
Who cares? They ARE insiginificant!
Uzbekistan’s nominal GDP is 38,987 million dollars.
How insignificant is that compared to the USA? In comparison of US Major Metro AREAS to nations, it’s not even close to the top 20.
Their national production for an entire YEAR is less than a single DAY’s production of the USA.
Indeed. A good way to put it.
But the media consider anyone able to win at Jeopardy to be brilliant, since rote memory recall of trivial facts is a clear sign of true intellect. Hence, one of the three most brilliant people in the world is a computer.
Now, GDP is not by any means the ONLY measure of insignificance, but it’s certainly a ballpark notion of the idea.
>>> insiginificant
“insignificant”. Getting old. My vision is going.
Cain keeps saying he will talk with his advisors and then make a decision. I would like some evidence that he has followed foreign affairs enough to pick solid advisors and that he knows what kind of questions to ask them. I would be happy if he would just say that he tries to follow what is happening abroad, but that he hasn’t had detailed morning briefings. Preparing for gotcha questions shouldn’t be his focus now, but developing a feel for the movements and concerns of foreign countries should be. He needs to be developing an awareness that his straight talk and the occasional jokes that play so well to Americans might not work so well when translated and distorted by foreign press. He has to find a more substantial way to deflect the gotchas. Perhaps the next debate will show whether he has been paying attention to more than the economy. Certainly that is our top priority right now, but you can’t assume that there won’t be a 3 o’clock phone call.
At this stage, I’m thinking anyone but Romney and Paul. Regarding Cain, he’s got that quirkiness one sees in engineers and mathematical types, but even though it’s cause for concern, because Cain has a solid core and is not all quirkiness, the concern is small and not worth getting your shorts or your panties in a twist about. What the media jerks and maroons hate about Cain is his anti-political correctness, which, in this instance, is evidenced by calling anyone insignificant. How refreshingly blunt and honest is that?
Mr. Cain is a very mature, very bright man, with an in-depth legacy of personal and cultural experience. He is neither perfect nor pretentious; one senses an authentic sense of humility in his demeanor. Triple nine may not fly, the devil is in the details, but that is not remotely critical at this point, it is just a respectable talking point for discussion of serious solutions; neither is his need to get up to speed concerning the fine details of geopolitics. What is most important now, more than ever, is that we have in the Oval Office a person with mature common sense, intellectually a cut above so-to-speak, and with indisputable respect for the special place in history, and responsibility and leadership that America needs to demonstrate on behalf of the entire planet. If there ever was a person who could, unexpectedly perhaps, step in to that position, it just might be Herman Cain.
Thanks for the post Neo, I really respect your opinion as well as the commenter’s thoughts…
Indeed, Cain in inexperienced in that his resume is only 10 times as thick as Obama’s.
Cain may not be the best candidate for President, but if there were more Herman Cains in this world, many things would be better and many people would be helped. If there were more Barack Obamas in this world, nothing of consequence would change.
Cain is probably lacking in the experience needed with regard to foreign affairs, but then again, practically everyone in the country is also. However, given his long and varied career of leadership and accomplishment, combined with his demonstrated (and not just invented by himself and the media) intelligence and expertise, magnified by the fact that he has actual principles that he bases his decisions and opinions upon means that I’ll give him the benefit of the doubt on that topic.
No doubt I want to hear what he has to say about the topic, in detail, but despite his inexperience in the subject, I would be surprised if he turned out to be a tenth of the Know-Nothing Bozo in White House now.
Cain strikes me as the kind of man who can look at a situation, appraise it, and suggest a course of action based on his principles and common sense, as opposed to just reciting a bunch of empty platitudes and letting someone else sweat the details and actually do the hard work, like You Know Who always does.
Plus, the bluntness is a huge plus in my book. I am so tired of politicians whose answer to any question is five minutes of verbal circumlocutions that distill down to nothing more than “I don’t want to offend anyone.” and we have enough of those in both parties to fill the Golgafrincham B Ark twice over.
expat: My Paulbot circuits say “who cares how it play in the foreign press.” Barry played great and they still hate us.
Somewhere (here?) someone commented that nothing prepares one for foreign policy. It has to be learned on the job, unless you’re Huntsman, who only knows about a sliver of the many cultures USA wants to dominate. And whoever mentioned Yes, Minister! can be heard here. In foreign policy there is an ossified hierarchy of bureaucrats and established channels that moderate any transient executive’s whim.
Foreign policy is an even bigger aircraft carrier than the US economy. Beyond occasional missile strikes against Sandistan and incoming Islamikazes, it may take more than one consecutive POTUS to turn the ship.
Paul’s concept of the President’s Constitutional duty appeals to me. Defense (not war/empire) and domestic issues are the charge of the office.
Yet I would still prefer someone who kills large beasts for sport to have a finger on the red button. We have no hunters in the race.
Cain is perfectly imperfect. Anybody who’s a foreign policy guru or was groomed to be President is probably by default too narrowly educated to make a good President. Al Gore comes to mind. Well roundedness wins the day. And Mr Cain is well rounded.
Don’t get me wrong. I am not saying that Cain needs to be a foreign policy wonk. I just want to know that he has thought about it and that he has some basis for choosing his advisors. There is a difference between thinking you can win the world’s favor by making an apology tour and perhaps insulting another nation when you blurt out a one liner. I want to know that he has some idea what it will be like to have our enemies turning his every word against us. I don’t expect him to be perfect. I just want some evidence that he has a feeling for the complexity. Cain has excellent instincts about the mood in America that have been developed through personal experience. His strength is that many Americans trust those instincts. I just want to know that he is trying to get a baseline of foreign affairs info so that when a tough situation arises he will be able to sift through mountains of contradictory advice to arrive at policies that reflect his values. Obama has used hi team of rivals to advise him in foreign affairs, resulting in the most incoherent policies I’ve ever seen. I’m sure that Cain can do much better. The question that remains for me is whether he is doing his homework.
Cain is like Clarence Thomas. Only the press wags and the hard left who watch his lynching came away impressed with themselves. The rest of the country saw a black man badgered by a most hypocritical mob, and in the end, we weren’t impressed with Anita Hill as a ‘victim’ .
Cain appeals on a level that transcends race. We need an anti-politician. The press is at least predictable and we know what they will do. We’ve seen it since Reagan, perfected on Bush and failed on Palin.
It’s going to be a very interesting election season. I wouldn’t put anything past the Dems.
Expat,
The judgmentalism on our side needs to cease.
Why are you imposing that he must name his cabinet or advisors this early. Never before has that pre-requisite been imposed.
Make an assessment on the common sense that Herman Cain exhibits and the executive experience that he has.
He is a CLEAR improvement over Barrack Obama.
Thank you.
Curtis said:
Do you mean all of us professional types who have designed and made the world you depend on? Like the OWS midiots you miss your own blindness.