Herman Cain Plays The Race Card

We have tried to find some redeeming quality in each of the Republican presidential candidates.  One never knows what can happen in a year's time to make one stand out above the rest.  In 2008 no one believed that John McCain could receive the GOP nomination for president, and not only did he win it, but he introduced little known Alaska Governor  Sarah Palin into the Republican landscape, and she has left an indelible mark in Republican politics. 

Although we have established our  preference for Texas Governor Rick Perry, our main goal is to defeat Barack Hussein Obama, and to make him a one term president.  We have often stated that in the end we would cast our vote for the nominee who was chosen by the majority of Republicans. 

Of all the candidates in the Republican field, two have stood out as most difficult for us to muster our support.  One is Ron Paul, and the other is Herman Cain.  Although a successful businessman and corporate executive we felt that his lack of governing experience raised a red flag against him.

Still as the debates enfolded, we found that his likability was great, and after Rick Perry joined the race he seemed to hold back on the ambush that his other running mates prepared for him.

Since we'd written about Cain earlier, we did not want to devote another article to him, but today while reading "RS RED STATE" we came across an article submitted by a reader named  agconservative that stated what we'd wanted to say.  So without further ado, we present a post by agconservative. (We wish we knew your real name to give you proper credit.)

TWO SISTERS

The End of The Herman Cain Campaign

Posted by agconservative (Profile)

I rarely get seriously angry with politicians, but today is an exception. I am seriously angry with one politician, and he isn’t on the left. That politician is Herman Cain. The reason I am this angry with Cain is because I actually liked him before now. I liked his straightforward style, his economic acumen and his real world experience. Cain was not my first choice for the nomination because of his lack of experience, but I was happy he was in the race and pushing some common sense solutions. That feeling has completely disappeared this week.

First, I need to provide some background for what led to my anger. As many of you are aware, the Washington Post ran a despicable smear piece on Rick Perry the other day, one that I will not link to. Hugh Hewitt has a pretty good response to it here. Just to be clear, the story was not about Rick Perry using the N word or even condoning it, but instead it was about the N word being written on a rock by someone else on a piece of property that Perry’s family has spent time on. That is like someone being blamed for the thoughts of everyone who has ever owned the house or apartment they are currently residing in.

Many of us have been fighting and speaking out about media bias and the use of the race card against conservatives for years, but this is one of the worst examples I have ever seen. This really is not about Rick Perry or whether you like him, but instead the general outrage all respectable people should feel about false insinuations of racism.
Most conservatives are tired of being accused of racism for not agreeing with every leftist policy and talking point. These attempts diminish real racism and create a political environment where policy debates become impossible.

As I have said before, the left now consistently uses the term racist to actually mean someone who opposes their policies. Those same policies have created a culture of dependency and devastated minority communities for decades. Herman Cain knows this or at least he should, so I was shocked to see him joining in on the attack against Perry. Obviously, this was a media trap that Cain fell for, but that is no excuse. This morning I made the mistake of turning on CNN where they were pushing this smear against Perry and they used Cain’s comments as evidence that this would be a serious issue for Perry. Conservatives already have to fight the race card smears by the media and the left; we don’t need to have them confirmed by leaders in our own movement.

Most conservatives will not tolerate the unfair use of the race card against political opponents, which is exactly what Cain did here. I believe this is a fatal mistake for the Cain campaign and I know I personally cannot respect him after this point unless there is an immediate apology. Cain said last week that he could not support Rick Perry as the nominee “today”. Well with his comments this weekend, I cannot today support Herman Cain as the nominee. We already have one president who plays the race card against political opponents, we don’t need another one. I will reconsider what I have said here if Cain issues an immediate apology for buying into the smear and promoting it, but thus far it does not seem like one is coming.

Update: It appears Herman Cain has responded to the controversy. While I appreciate him trying to walk back the comments, that is not nearly enough in my opinion. His comments were much stronger than the walk back and have already been used by the media. He needs to issue a serious apology and go out of his way to defend Perry at this point.

Copyright agconservative 2o10  -  © 2011 Redstate, Inc., 2008 Eagle Publishing