How to kill your own campaign… by Herman Cain (Update)
I think everyone knows that sexual harassment should be taken seriously. It is not the end of the world or for your campaign if you are accused of sexual harassment. But, if you are going to let a story drip out little by little, it will kill your campaign. If you tell multiple different stories, you are in big trouble. If you let five days go by without clearing the air, you are sunk. Welcome to the world of Herman Cain. This is what happens when you shoot from the hip and don’t run an organized campaign. This story could have been squashed two days ago. On Monday, Cain could have said nothing all day and met with his team. They could have formulated a message and then that night on Hannity or O’Reilly, he could have sat down and told everything that he knew. He could have told his story in his way. He could have answered every question until there weren’t any more. Then he would have been done. Now, it is too late for that. He and his campaign are in deep, deep nastiness.
Herman Cain has been looking, searching for someone to blame. Conservatives love to blame the media, but that hasn’t worked. As a matter of fact, Politico, who broke the story, asked the Cain campaign for a response days before the story broke. Recently, it has been Perry and Romney that Herman Cain is lashing out at. The problem with Herman Cain is Herman Cain. He has no one to blame for not controlling this story but himself and his campaign.
Another Great column by Charles Blow:
There’s no way for me to evaluate the veracity of the claims. The details remain murky. Anyone can accuse another of anything, innocuous actions can be perceived as predatory and there can be reasons other than guilt for settling a claim. That said, the fact that there are now three accusers and only one denier must be considered. It’s not just his word again hers. It’s his word against hers and hers and hers.
Furthermore, sexual harassment charges are different from other kinds of scandals. Workplace harassment by a superior is invariably about an abuse of power. So if you aspire to be the most powerful man in the world, the answers to the questions become quite relevant.
Cain’s answers to date simply haven’t satisfied. They’ve been as ham-handed as it gets. He’s flip-flopped like a fresh-caught-fish in the bottom of the boat. Even if he didn’t remember the allegations, surely he could have gotten and read through the settlements before submitting to interviews. Right? Right?!
Such a botched response would have spelled trouble for a candidate of another stripe and in another time. But this is Herman Cain: the unorthodox candidate with unprecedented ascendance in a Tea Party age.
Cain isn’t a regular candidate, and this isn’t a regular race. He is the anti-Obama, and that absolves him from his multiplying errors and inoculates him against his enemy’s poison arrows.
The fact that Cain obviously isn’t presidential timber holds little weight with those who view the current resident of the White House as, at best, unqualified and, at worst, illegitimate.
Cain is an “American black conservative — an A.B.C.” who rejects prevailing wisdom among blacks about the racial state of play in America. He is a walking rebuff to the 400-year-old racism issue that continues to dog and drain this country. He lifts the burden of guilt from whites on the right and places it on the shoulders of blacks on the left — the ones still on “the Democrat plantation” and not willing or able to think for themselves. He is a fascinating sociological phenomenon but also an affront to some basic facts about the existence and impact of our racial reality.
Furthermore, he fits two prerequisites of the new right: he’s anti-intellectual and anti-establishment. He’s “real.” He’s a real guy with real passion who has had a real job but has no real understanding of government. Tea Party perfection.