Is former Godfather’s Pizza CEO Herman Cain’s Republican support slipping? He seemed to have to face softening support today — hours before he holds a press conference at which he is expected to paint himself as the target of a campaign out to get him by politically or financially motivated accusers.
NUMBER ONE: A Republican Senator says he should quit if the allegations prove true. And the way this is stated is not a ringing endorsement of Cain:
– Republican Sen. Lisa Murkowski told CNN on Tuesday she is “concerned” that the most recent charge of sexual harassment against Republican presidential candidate Herman Cain “is not an isolated incident” and that he should quit the race if there is any truth to the claims.
“I’m learning about this at the same time as any of the rest of you. But I would suggest that if, in fact, there is substance to the claims – and now there are apparently four individuals that have been involved or who have come forward – if that’s the case, I think that his opportunity as a nominee are gone,” the senator said.
Nearly all of the Republican senators contacted by CNN sidestepped questions about the scandal that has rocked Cain’s campaign, saying they want to learn first if there is real evidence to support the mostly anonymous charges.
However, Murkowski made clear she was moved by the public account of Sharon Bialek, a single mother from Chicago who held a news conference on Monday to say Cain wanted sex in return for helping her to find a job.
“It takes incredible courage for an individual to come forward as this latest, as this one woman has,” the third-term Alaskan said. “So it does cause me to wonder exactly what is out there. I am concerned.”
Cain’s supporters (particularly Fox News, which is mounting a major defense of Cain) will likely dismiss Murkowski as a RINO given the way she won re-election (as an independent defeating the Tea Party establishment candidate). But they will find it harder to diss the second wavering GOPer.
NUMBER TWO: William Bennett runs out of patience.
Four women are not an insignificant number. One or two anonymous charges, perhaps. Three anonymous charges (where, as I understand the story, Cain knows of at least two of the women) plus one woman who went very public and opened herself up to all manner of investigation are a lot. It is no longer insignificant. Neither is it insignificant that the Cain campaign discounted the charges in the initial stories, saying they were based on anonymous sources, only to make a mockery by blaming other campaigns with less substantiation than the original stories.
If Herman Cain wants to be taken seriously as a public advocate for anything, never mind running for the chief executive and commander in chief of the most powerful and important and blessed country in the world, he needs to give a full press conference dedicated exclusively to this issue and these allegations.
I have watched long enough and held my tongue long enough to give him the benefit of the doubt, but can no longer say this is a witch hunt, “a lynching” to use his word, or any other euphemism. There are allegations out there that matter and they have stacked up. For we who led the charge against Bill Clinton on a number of related issues to continue to blame the media or other campaigns or say it simply doesn’t matter makes us the hypocrites as well.
Then again, there are press conferences and there are press conferences.
If Cain uses his press conference to try and discredit his accusers, to go on again about the “liberal media” (whoever thought we’d see the day when The Politico would be painted by those who have quoted to it or were interviewed by it as a hotbed of liberalism?) or raise the truly absurd red herring of journalists violating a “journalistic Code of Ethics” if they dare to ask tough questions, then he’ll only please Sean Hannity, who is essentially a combination public relations officer and defense lawyer for conservatives who appear on his show.
If Cain wants to quiet his critics and convince them that he is the target of a campaign to discredit him right when he is rising in the polls then he’ll do a press conference that is serious, addresses the issues and doesn’t try to change the subject by discrediting those who’ve accused him but, rather, detail why and how the allegations are false and flimsy.
UPDATE: And now it turns out that Cain’s campaign is going after his most visible accuser with a full court demonization pressh (authentic scrutiny is not the same as demonization that seeks to discredit):
Alexander Burns in The Politico:
The Cain campaign’s latest email blast sets the tone with the subject line: “Who is Sharon Bialek?” What follows is a lengthy attack on the Cain accuser’s personal financial issues, which reads in part:
Go to the link to read it in full. He concludes:
That’s the kind of research hit you’d expect to see against another candidate, rather than a woman whom nobody had heard of until yesterday, when she accused Cain of personal misconduct. The response strategy here is apparently to deny Bialek’s accusations categorically and attempt to cast her as some kind of gold digger in cahoots with Allred.
But Bialek and Allred have already said there’s no money on the table for them here, which puts Cain in the position of personally attacking Bialek on issues that aren’t directly related to the charges she’s made against him. Unless he succeeds in completely discrediting Bialek, Cain could find himself in a very unappealing position, particularly in the eyes of Republican women.
Not JUST Republican women. Cain’s appeal has been his likability, seeming frankness and not seeming to be one more political hack like so many in both parties. He has already come close to erasing that image.
Will his press conference complete the process?
Sean Hannity will never waver. It’s the rest of the electorate and thoughtful members of his own party that he will have to worry about.
UPDATE: Ed Morrissey writing in The Week:
Republican voters may well decide that they don’t need to settle this to a moral certainty. They like Cain. But is Cain so indispensable that voters will be willing to risk more shoes dropping in a general election? We may already be seeing evidence that they will cut Cain loose and look for another candidate. Peggy Nance of Concerned Women for America put out a statement late Monday calling for Cain to “address these new allegations head on,” clearly unsatisfied with the terse denial from him earlier in the day. Nance wrote that “Ms. Bialek appeared credible and I was very disturbed by her characterization” of the alleged incident. The Des Moines Register’s Jennifer Jacobs reported that while Cain’s most passionate supporters are remaining loyal, some of them are also calling for Cain to be more forthcoming. Bob Vander Plaats, president of the social conservative activist group Family Leader in the state and a Republican candidate for governor in 2010, called this a “tipping point for the viability of his campaign.”
In court, Cain would not have to prove his innocence, but on the campaign trail, he has to prove his superiority over the other choices. Cain’s argument for winning the nomination has always been novel — that his lack of electoral experience would be eclipsed by his problem-solving abilities and his expertise at rescue strategies in the private sector. Voters who might have been tempted to take a risk on Cain could decide that the inability to foresee or effectively handle the crises of the past several days makes that argument moot, or just figure that they don’t need to take that much risk of more scandal with an untested novelty candidate.
Joe Gandelman is a former fulltime journalist who freelanced in India, Spain, Bangladesh and Cypress writing for publications such as the Christian Science Monitor and Newsweek. He also did radio reports from Madrid for NPR’s All Things Considered. He has worked on two U.S. newspapers and quit the news biz in 1990 to go into entertainment. He also has written for The Week and several online publications, did a column for Cagle Cartoons Syndicate and has appeared on CNN.