Governing through Reason
Does It Matter?
The past week has been filled with all sorts of allegations of sexual harassment by Herman Cain against several women. And intrigue over who told whom about what and when. We’ve avoided talking about it because we haven’t considered it to be very important, but clearly much of the rest of the political media disagrees.
So, a few simple questions to you:
- Is this an important story, or is it just being used by media to collect eyeballs?
- Does it matter to you, in terms of supporting him politically, whether or not he did what he’s been accused of?
- Do these allegations make you more or less likely to support him? Why?
Related articles
- Herman Cain’s Abuse Of Power Scandal (andrewsullivan.thedailybeast.com)
- Does Herman Cain’s Behavior Really Count As Harassment? Witnesses Say Yes [Politics] (jezebel.com)
- Herman Cain Harassment Victim’s News Conference (littlegreenfootballs.com)
- Herman Cain accuser breaks silence to tell of ‘inappropriate behaviours’ (guardian.co.uk)
- Text of Statements on Allegations of Sexual Harassment by Herman Cain (blogs.wsj.com)
- Poll Shows Harassment Allegations Have Little Affect on Herman Cain’s Standing (thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com)
- Herman Cain Is Indestructible [2012] (gawker.com)
- HERMAN CAIN: Sexual Harassment Scandal Is A Rick Perry Hit Job (businessinsider.com)
- Is Herman Cain just too unpredictable? (cbsnews.com)
- Herman Cain Sexual Harassment Story Not Planted By GOP Rivals, According To Rivals (huffingtonpost.com)
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#2 written by fopplssiegeparty 1 year ago
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#3 written by shortchain 1 year ago
The story is only important in Cain’s dreadful handling of it. Back in the time this took place a certain level of sexual harassment — and charge of same by women who were just finding their way into the executive ranks — was endemic in corporate America, especially in the backwaters of business, where Cain put in his time (the companies he worked for were not exactly at the forefront of American business).
Cain never had any chance of getting my support. He appears reasonable for about the first five seconds of looking at his positions and background. After that, no.
The result will be that the right will double down on Cain, but he’ll lose independent, and especially women voter, support. The power brokers of the GOP will gravitate even more strongly into the Romney camp. (One might suspect that the person who wins in this affair is Romney, as it causes Cain to beat the dead Perry horse furiously, looking deranged and paranoid as he does so.)
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#5 written by shortchain 1 year ago
Michael,
Has he handled it differently from Clinton’s handling of Gennifer Flowers, et al?
And that’s an example of handling this kind of thing well?
Besides which, there was never a need for him to admit to sexual harassment — all he had to do was admit, in a straightforward manner, to being accused of it in the past, and assert that, although a settlement was paid, there was never an admission that the charges were valid, and this would have been a one-day story.
In Clinton’s case, he would have to have admitted to something which he could not admit to and have his political future survive. Which was the whole point of the Scaife-funded right-wing effort to dig up or trump up charges which he could neither admit nor honestly deny.
The cases are not equivalent.
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“High tech lynching” by the left is especially amusing, much like Cain himself ie who would Obama rather run against? ~ mittens? Perry? or Cain?
Whereas it is true HC never had a chance for the nomination regardless …
Again, who broke the Obama bittergate story? liberal Huffington Post ~ Why? Because it was news! Interesting Politico notified HC (10) days before they broke the story and Cain was still totally unprepared to handle it.
And the pathetic irony of fixednoise complaining about the liberal media coverage of Cain’s current problems when “they” ran a 24⁄7 loop of Rev. Jeremiah A. Wright’s god damn America! sermon for days on end trying to bury Obama when he was running against Hillary in the 2008 primary.
hmm, guilt by association would probably eliminate most everyone in America re: running for president, eh. Wright’s sermon being the god’s honest
truth notwithstanding. And the Bush family’s association w/Osama bin Laden before 9⁄11 aside.‘nuf said!
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#7 written by Mainer 1 year ago
Lets see from some points of the compass it is more than rumored that it was elements in the Perry camp that set Politico on Herman. Yup it does appear that Politico gave him quite advance notice and he and his camp blew any advantage the lead time should have given them. Since then more and more and more stuff has oozed out of the woodwork. Cain could have probably dealt with this had he gotten in front of it.…..he didn’t and now all he will be able to do is play catch up and try to make all of the versions of the story out of his camp look like they jive.
For any one on the right to take umberance of this is prety cheeky. The side that wants to play hardball 24⁄7 crying because of this.….give me a break. Oh and since when has Politico been a left wing site? Never has seemed like it to me. Or is any site or venue that dares to cast any doubt on a Republican automatically a left wing site. That would say some not nice things about their version of freedom of the press now woudn’t it?
Guilt by association would remove the whole damned Republican field from any election in a normal country, but we have not been normal for far too long in this land or none of the current crop of losers would beable to buy air time let alone be considered an actual candidate.
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#8 written by shortchain 1 year ago
OK, following up, having seen and read some commentary on the “Newt vs Herman” “debate” last night — anybody here want to opine on the worth of Cain’s angry refusal to speak about the subject?
Will this cause the story to go away? Will it bring Cain more supporters? Will it convince the all-important independent voters that he’s just the kind of reasonable, thoughtful guy they want as a President?
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#9 written by fopplssiegeparty 1 year ago
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#10 written by shortchain 1 year ago
foppls,
I agree. And it’s one reason I would consider a background as CEO of any large corporation a down-check as a candidate. People who do want a CEO type as a President, IMHO, are the kind of people who want an authoritarian government (which, they of course believe, would be to their advantage).
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#11 written by fopplssiegeparty 1 year ago
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#12 written by shortchain 1 year ago
foppls,
And I am hoping that the “CEO” type, as currently extant, disappears from the world, or at least from the USA. The CEO types I’ve brushed up against share several traits:
1. They believe, with essentially no basis in fact, in their own omnicompetence. They tend to think that what everybody else does is trivial in comparison, and the only reason they don’t do it is because they have more important tasks.
2. They believe that it’s vastly more important to be decisive rather than cautious and careful.
3. They believe that when faced with a problem, all they need to do is pick somebody, put them in charge of it, and the problem will be solved. They believe that all people (but themselves, natch) are simply replaceable cogs. It’s the process that matters (six-sigma, or whatever the catch-all mumbo-jumbo is the current panacea).
And in three separate instances, this belief has destroyed a company I worked for. The last thing we need is leadership like this for our country.
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#13 written by fopplssiegeparty 1 year ago
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#14 written by shortchain 1 year ago
foppls,
It’s not hard to connect the dots. We’ve created an oversimplified metric by which to measure success, namely the amount of money a person can amass. Give a sociopath or psychopath such a simple goal, and, as these people are largely unencumbered by the kinds of considerations that burden the normal, compassionate person, they’ll naturally excel.
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fopplssiegeparty,
Why does our society reward people who are sociopaths and psychopaths?
I think because the question is backwards: by definition, psychopaths will do what gets them a reward, regardless of the morality (or lack of morality) in the approach. So if society doesn’t reward them, they won’t do it.
Why people are unable to spot and avoid psychopaths is another question. I think because we’re inherently wired to trust, and psychopaths take advantage of that. I have found what’s called a “modified tit for tat” strategy in game theory is the best approach, but it means I’m taken in for minor amounts of money or time or emotional energy on a fairly regular basis.
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#16 written by fopplssiegeparty 1 year ago
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#18 written by shortchain 1 year ago
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#21 written by curious jane 1 year ago
The stangest thing to me is what I heard on CNN today. I was in the other room and heard one right wing commentator saying that the left wing media was playing the race card in the HC problem. They played a clip of, good-ole, Rush making a comment about media picking on Herman because he is black. He said “the next thing they’ll do is portray watermelon on the front lawn of the White House”. It caught my attention because of this comment and a cartoon appeared during the 2007 campaign, I saw the exact imagery from the right wing, in regard to President Obama. I am sure Rush forgot he got that imagery from there.
I don’t know how to copy and cite proof. I am just starting to use the internet and don’t know how to do that.
Peoples retention of facts seem to be short. I guess I have to say IMO. I don’t know what reality the right wing lives in.
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#23 written by Jean 1 year ago
The commenters at redstate have spent the entire past week in a major melt-down, with many, many articles — many condemning and others defending Cain. I’ve never seen so many pro/con articles posted on one subject at redstate, much less with the vitriol with which they have gone after each other. Each other! Other than the “Cainiacs no matter what”, the rest seem to to be in such a tizzy that they are now viewing FOX News through a different eye:
“Rush and Hannity seem to be stuck (as many conservatives of late) in ‘two wrongs make a right’ mode. If they saw this (excellent) diary entry, they’d have to admit Cain is not ready for president. They’ll never do that.
Why? Because they’d have to ‘splain why they didn’t bring Herb’s inadequacies to light much earlier. Which in a way means them admitting they were wrong. I’d have to think a long while to remember the last time they did that.”
and
“It would be nice if Rush or Hannity would
(a) quit playing ‘two wrongs make a right’. Watch/listen to them carefully. Whenever one of our esteemed candidates does something stupid or something wrong, they MIGHT make a passing comment, but they just ramp up the attacks at Obama twice as hard.
(b) call a spade a spade. They have not called out Cain for being dishonest, or uninformed or for playing the race card against Perry (well, Rush played the ‘two wrongs make a right’, MIGHT version). Hannity’s worse on this issue than Rush. Hannity is a half-way conservative who is enamored with the likes of Giuliani and Chris Christie, who hardly qualify as conservative anywhere outside of the NE.
(c) quit spending so much time whining about the double standard in the media. WE GET IT. If Conservatives would spend 1⁄2 as much time and energy actually doing something as they do whining about how unfair the MSM is, we’d get somewhere. As much as he gets on my nerves, I’ll give Glenn Beck credit: he’s gone out and started his attempt to supplant the MSM with his new TV station (no, I’m not a subscriber.) It never ceases to amaze me that legions of conservatives I’ve met, who talk about ‘whiny’ liberals who cry about ‘fairness’, love guys like these Talk show hosts, who whine about fairness (of the media) all the time. Crazy.
(d) quit coming across as partisan hacks. Both gave quiet, walk-on-eggshells interviews to that jerk Boehner when he screwed up the budget deal, and hardly will you hear either make specific comments criticizing the GOP. Sure, every once in a while, they’ll talk about the squishy GOP (Rush is better on this than Hannity), but rarely will they name names or give examples, and they’ll never call for primary challenges, etc. All of this might be accounted for by ‘timidity’ or ‘respect’ for the GOP. It’s the ‘two wrongs make a right’ game played by these guys that makes the crossover to hackery.”
and
“two wrongs make a right mode. That is the exact same thinking that made a hero of Sarah Palin. As conservatives we need to get over the reflex of thinking someone is perfect just because they were attacked by the left.
To a great extent this was also a reason that many of us, including myself spent a lot of energy defending Bush, when he let us down time after time. I am past that now. I will defend a conservative against unfair or false charges, but that does not mean I will support them in everything they do or say.”
They’ve also been very upset that Cain played “the race card”, something they say that Republicans NEVER do, but Democrats do all the time.
“The conservative talk show media is being disingeneous and doing a disservice to the voters by not discussing the discrepancies, obfuscations and outright lies in his remarks If they laid it out chronologically and and truthfully like we did, others would see it too.
They are only wailing on the Liberal media and the race card. The truth of that matter is it has nothing to do with race. Conservatives made it about race. The MSM would have done this story on any one of our candidates even the white pasty guy, the family man and the pretty woman. I think it’s disgusting that our side is playing the race card. It seems Cain is using this as a diversion: He wants to be judged on the color of his skin and obviously not on the content of his character.”
I’ve also seen and heard a fair amount of right-wing commentary that even if Cain fails, they are still “anyone but flip-flopping RINO Romney”, and if the Republican candidate is Romney, rather than their second choice Rick Perry, they would rather have Obama as President for the next for 4 years, stating that it would really be not that much of a difference anyway. Wow.
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So Jean
All teabagger whining aside … is or isn’t limbo still carrying water for the Rep party lol.
Let the winger whining continue ~ so it shall be written, so it shall be done …
The obvious: Too funny die hard conservative pundits are turning into pretzels “attempting” to defend HC.
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Wouldn’t have supported him before so this is probably a moot question.
Is the media playing games? To some extent probably bu that is when they are not trying to sweep it under the rug so who knows.
What is a little odd is how the rest of the candidates have danced around it or tried to. Cain was and is a blip in the polls some thing was bound to upend him.……you know little things like not knowing that China has nukes or negotiating with terrorists or 999/909/90214.….……what ever it is this day/week. The message was/is just too eratic.
Honestly does any one really think any of these political turkeys could lead some one out of a burning phone booth let alone a nation out of the mess we are in? Romney keeps diving ever deeper to the right, Perry is doing a disapearing man act, Bachmann is gone and still does not know it, Pawlenty may have been the smartest one of the lot by bailing, and Paul just keeps hanging on the edges hoping for a miracle. Had all the states not gone me first crazy on their primaries I think the whole damned lot would have been cast off but now they are stuck with this cast of crazies that apparently fewer and fewer want any thing to do with.
So is this Herman Hurricane real? Maybe but in the final results will it have been a game changer? Does any one really care?