"With a lot of prayer and soul searching, I am suspending my
presidential campaign, because of the continued distraction, the
continued hurt on me and my family,"
~Herman Cain, December 3, 2011
Please, read
KEN RISLEY'S perspective on the Fall of Herman Cain:
ANOTHER ONE FAILS (click to link)
Information Must Come Out
By Elise Foley - Reporter for:
WASHINGTON -- Republican presidential candidate Jon Huntsman said
fellow contender Herman Cain should release more information about his
settlements for allegedly sexually harassing staff in the 1990s, saying
the matter distracts from more important issues on the campaign trail.
"We're not able to talk about jobs, we're not able to talk about our
position in the world, and that hurts -- that hurts the American
people," he said on NBC's "Meet the Press." "It's got to come out in
total. Legitimate questions have been raised, and that information has
to come forward."
Cain, who has been accused of sexually harassing three women when he was head of the National Restaurant Association, said on Saturday that he will not answer more questions about the accusations, which dogged him last week after an Oct. 30 Politico report.
During a Saturday debate with fellow candidate Newt Gingrich, Cain said the media has been nit-picky and unfair to him.
"There are too many people in the media who are downright dishonest.
... They do a disservice to the American people," Cain said, according
to the Associated Press.
Huntsman said the issue does not have to bring Cain down, but that getting more details out would likely be a good start.
"That's totally up to Herman Cain, someone I've come to know as a
decent, decent man and a good candidate," he said. "It's been said over
and over again that it's up to Herman Cain to get the information out
and get it out in total. That's important because we've got some
important issues to deal with in this campaign, and this is taking all
of the bandwidth out of the discussion."
Huntsman's bigger concern with Cain, though, is his lack of foreign
policy experience. Huntsman, who was governor of Utah from 2005 to 2009,
most recently served as ambassador to China under President Barack
Obama. He has touted that experience on the campaign trail, saying it
puts him ahead over other candidates.
Cain, meanwhile, made a gaffe last week when he said China does not
have nuclear weapons capacity, even though the country tested such
weapons for the first time in 1964. He later said that he "misspoke."
When asked about the incident, Hunstman hinted that Cain's lack of foreign policy is a major weakness.
"I think at some point the substance does matter, and you've got to
have a commander-in-chief that understands the world in which we live,"
he said. "It's complex, it's confusing, it's unpredictable, and it's not
going to get any less so as we move forward."
"It would be nice to have a president in office who actually had a
head-start and actually knew [China] intimately well," he said.
~LETS PAY ATTENTION HERE, READERS!
(MORE FOR US TO CONSIDER, ~C)
10:14 pm November 5, 2011
Political Insider Herman Cain, Newt Gingrich
And an oasis of scandal-free debate in Texas
(MORE FOR US TO CONSIDER, ~C)
10:14 pm November 5, 2011
THE WOODLANDS, Texas — Two presidential
candidates with deep Georgia roots – one a long-time survivor of a
personal life made public, the other newly wrestling with its
consequences – created an oasis of scandal-free discussion Saturday with
a one-on-one debate over how to shrink the federal safety net.
Herman Cain and Newt Gingrich greeted each other with a friendly
embrace and for 90 minutes avoided every opportunity to disagree with
each other’s plans to reform federal spending.
Not a word was spoken of Cain’s weeklong battle against charges that
he was the object of sexual harassment complaints while head of a
Washington lobbying organization in the 1990s.
The only allusion to Cain’s troubles came when the former U.S. House
speaker asked his rival what had surprised him most in his run for
president.
“The nit-pickiness of the media,” Cain replied. “I did not realize
the fly-specking nature of the media — especially when you rise in the
polls.”
In a session with reporters afterward, Cain was friendly until a
reporter attempted to raise the topic of the sexual harassment
complaints. Cain interrupted him, and called for a “good question.” “We
are getting back on message. End of story,” he said, before being urged
out of the room by aides.
In the debate, Cain and Gingrich agreed on shifting Medicaid, which
provides health care to the poor, to a block grant system that would
allow states to set their own standards and create their own programs.
Both agreed that young Americans should be offered the chance to
establish private retirement accounts as an alternative to Social
Security, as proposed by President George W. Bush.
When Cain said the privatization of Social Security would also
require his “9-9-9” plan – which includes a 9 percent national sales tax
– Gingrich demurred, announcing he would “sidestep the great
temptation” to discuss the controversial proposal.
The only return jab came when Cain — running as a businessman in no
need of government experience — declared that politicians always
underestimate the costs of federal programs.
The debate, a $200-a-ticket fund-raiser for the Texas Patriots PAC, a
tea party group, was intended as an antidote to crowded, televised
debates that have featured a large GOP field reduced to 30-second sound
bites. The two-man event was conceived this spring when few considered
Cain and Gingrich viable contenders.
But a poor start by the campaign of Texas Gov. Rick Perry has allowed
Cain to emerge as Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney’s chief contender less
than two months before the Iowa caucuses.
Gingrich is also rising. A Washington Post/ABC News poll that last
week put Cain in a virtual tie with Romney also showed Gingrich with
double-digit support for the first time since he restarted his campaign
in June.
For Cain, a debate format inspired by the famed 1858 confrontations
over slavery between Abraham Lincoln and Stephen Douglas was a
refreshing end to a tumultuous week. His campaign had been overwhelmed
by the revelation of sexual harassment complaints lodged against him
when he was president of the Washington, D.C.-based National Restaurant
Association.
The organizers of Saturday’s debate declared the topic off-limits.
“Rather than being distracted by all the gossip, we want to know
about the issues that are really important,” said Julie Turner,
president of the group.
Even without the ban, thrice-married Gingrich wasn’t the man to raise
the issue. He was the only GOP rival to forcefully defend Cain last
week as the victim of a media-driven “witch hunt.”
Despite the respite from an uncomfortable topic, the debate was
considered yet another test for Cain, a businessman who prides himself
on his non-politician status and his ability to speak without a
TelePrompter.
Until Saturday he had avoided going into detail about many of his
views and proposals. But Cain held his own, and was stumped only once,
when a moderator, during a discussion of Medicare, asked the former
radio talk show host his opinion on “defined benefit plans with premium
support.”
“You first, Newt,” Cain said.
There were no references to other Republicans in the contest. The duo
preferred to target President Barack Obama, who Gingrich said was
“about as criminal as Bernie Madoff in what he tells the American
people.”
But Cain had the last word, with a final question for Gingrich. “If
you were vice president of the United States, what would you want the
president to assign you to do first?” he asked.
Gingrich said former Vice President Dick Cheney had taught him to avoid hunting.
Several times, Cain and Gingrich made reference to their friendship,
which dates to Gingrich’s 1995 appointment of Cain to a tax reform
commission. And their shared geography was noted by many.
But in fact, their time in Georgia never overlapped. Gingrich was an
early presence in a nascent Republican party in the state, starting with
a failed 1974 run for Congress. But after his party lost control of the
House in 1998, Gingrich resigned from Congress and became a legal
resident of Virginia.
Cain was raised in Atlanta, but left after graduating from Morehouse
College in 1967. He returned in 2000. Most Republicans first became
aware of him four years later during an unsuccessful race for the U.S.
Senate, which he lost to incumbent Johnny Isakson. Cain then launched a
talk-radio career.
But the two candidates share more than red clay and a desire to remake the federal government.
Gingrich and Cain – and Romney and Perry, too — face skepticism from
women voters. In a Quinnipiac University poll released last week,
President Barack Obama led all likely GOP challengers, but his lead
expanded among female voters surveyed. Romney did best, picking up the
support of 38 percent of women.
The numbers imply that, though it was barred from the Texas debate,
the issue of personal behavior is likely to remain a factor as the GOP
race gets down to brass knuckles.
“There is a real division here between evangelical and social
conservative men, and evangelical and social conservative women. The men
are much more likely to be forgiving. The women are not,” said Richard
Land, who heads the Southern Baptist Convention’s Ethics and Religious
Liberty Commission.
It is not a universal opinion. Julianne Thompson is a co-founder of
the Atlanta Tea Party Patriots. She was at a Gingrich event in Gwinnett
last week and considers herself a personal friend of Cain, and said she
would be watching the debate on C-SPAN on Saturday night instead of the
Alabama-LSU football game.
She considers both Gingrich and Cain to be “excellent” candidates.
“I think we’re at the point that we don’t have the luxury of
connecting just on social issues. I think that’s what a majority of tea
party supporters think,” she said.
Thompson noted that, as a converted Catholic, Gingrich has gone
through the process of confession and contrition. She considers the
charges against Cain unproven, but faults his campaign staff for
bumbling its response.
“I am looking at who Herman Cain is in 2011,” she said.
- By Jim Galloway, Political Insider
HERMAN CAIN 101
 |
| HERMAN CAINS WEBSITE |
- Bachelor’s degree in Mathematics.
- Master’s degree in Computer Science.
- Mathematician for the Navy, where he worked on missile ballistics (making him a rocket scientist).
- Computer systems analyst for Coca-Cola.
- VP of Corporate Data Systems and Services for Pillsbury (this is the top of the ladder in the computer world, being in charge of information systems for a major corporation).
- Business Manager. Took charge of Pillsbury’s 400 Burger King restaurants in the Philadelphia area, which were the company’s poorest performers in the country. Spent the first nine months learning the business from the ground up, cooking hamburger and yes, cleaning toilets. After three years he had turned them into the company’s best performers.
- Godfather’s Pizza CEO. Was asked by Pillsbury to take charge of their Godfather’s Pizza chain (which was on the verge of bankruptcy). He made it profitable in 14 months.
- In 1988 he led a buyout of the Godfather’s Pizza chain from Pillsbury. He was now the owner of a restaurant chain. Again he reached the top of the ladder of another industry.
- He was also chairman of the National Restaurant Association during this time. This is a group that interacts with government on behalf of the restaurant industry, and it gave him political experience from the non-politician side.
- Adviser to the Federal Reserve System. Herman Cain went to work for the Federal Reserve Banking System advising them on how monetary policy changes would affect American businesses.
- Chairman of the Kansas City Federal Reserve Bank. He worked his way up to the chairmanship of a regional Federal Reserve bank. This is only one step below the chairmanship of the entire Federal Reserve System (the top banking position in the country). This position allowed him to see how monetary policy is made from the inside, and understand the political forces that impact the monetary system.
- Writer and public speaker. He then started to write and speak on leadership. His books include Speak as a Leader, CEO of Self, Leadership is Common Sense, and They Think You're Stupid.
- Radio Host. Around 2007—after a remarkable 40 year career—he started hosting a radio show on WSB in Atlanta (the largest talk radio station in the country).
~from the email bag
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