Our political Quote of the Day comes from Mary Kate Cary, a former White House speechwriter for President George H.W. Bush. She writes on the U.S. News website that she has been defending Herman Cain amid sexual harassment allegations but will do so no longer. She sites new polls showing that Cain is starting to suffer a loss of support from women voters and says she suspects it’s even worse. She then writes:
This whole thing is a shame, because so many of us liked Herman Cain’s ideas and business experience. I’ve been defending him for the last few weeks as he spoke out against the anonymous and vague charges. But they’re not anonymous and vague anymore. There are faces, and names, and ugly stories to match. As Kathleen Parker put it, three accusers is a trend. Four is a tipping point.
Women who have worked in politics have seen his type before—casual with staff, jocular, kind of schmoozy. Fun at first, but then it becomes clear that they don’t think the rules apply to them. After a while, there’s an arrogance that sets in. Washington is full of bosses like that. I’ve worked for several.
Women don’t like to talk about being sexually harassed because it’s embarrassing. Life moves on and most of us would rather put bad incidents behind us. So for busy women—at least one of the accusers is a single mom with a teenage son—to come forward years later isn’t easy. The fact that they’re contemplating doing a joint press conference says to me they realize how high the stakes are, after they saw how Sharon Bialek’s personal finances and work history were trashed. Safety in numbers.
These accusers who have come forward are about my age, and they seem very credible to me. They’re not selling their stories to tabloids. They’re not random women from all over the country, like some of former President Bill Clinton’s accusers were. They all worked with Herman Cain specifically when he was at the Restaurant Association. They seem believable to me, and right now, he does not. I’m not defending him anymore.
I suspect that’s the reaction of many others as well. But there is another factor the GOP will need to consider in the end — which qualifies for a big “NO DUH!” but is a major consideration.
When a party selects someone to be its Presidential nominee it is a massive investment: millions (or perhaps we are now into billions) will be spent on the candidate, plus the candidate will have an impact on the fates of party members running for other offices down the ticket. There are politicians who have problems and then there are politicians who are damaged goods. And then there are those who might not quite be damaged goods but they have so many problems in a given area that if they are nominated the campaign could be gravely distracted — and the party could lose its financial investment in the candidate, candidates running for other offices could be negatively impacted. Etc.
As a former full-time journalist I did a lot of interviews with officials and business people who were impressed with their own power or bankroll and literally oozed a certain kind of confidence. This confidence could often be loveable and likable. Cain had that quality when he burst onto the scene. People truly liked and were willing to give him the benefit of the doubt– and he kind of grew on you, even if you disagreed with him.
Now he is losing some of that quality. It was a quality that had allowed him to convince and charm.
And you can see its immediate impact in other ways: reaction to his debate performance last night.
Many reactions on Twitter and elsewhere say Cain had a bad night. No he really didn’t.
Cain didn’t lose ground. He didn’t advance himself.
But his schtick is now familiar to viewers and voters. And now when you look at Herman Cain you can’t help but have the controversy that’s raging in the back of your mind. So Cain is now being judged more on his CONTENT than his STYLE — because to many his style is now suspect. And the scandal influences the perceptions of Cain.
The allegations conflict with his style and the assumptions needed to accept his style and be completely charmed and convinced by it. Many women and journalists find he reminds them of others they’ve met over the years.
Cain is starting to come across as a confident corporate bigwig who always was in control and then had a problem with an employee and when it becomes a big issu says “it’s a disgruntled employee” — a phrase that used to discredit someone but that is not as easily accepted without skepticism anymore. This time he’s saying in effect its a disgruntled liberal media, disgruntled Rick Perry, disgruntled “Democrat machine.”
I’m in a minority: I still feel Cain could put the allegations behind him if it’s handled with candor — advice the not politically dumb Karl Rove gave him weeks ago.
And I’m in another minority: I’m not a Cain supporter but do NOT feel he had a bad night.
What changed were perceptions of Cain, the context with which people listen to him and the influence those perceptions of his persona had in past evaluations of him.
He’s going to need to step up his political game because he can no longer count on winning people over with his charisma. And because Newt Gingrich is going to soon occupy his political space.
No one ever supported Newt or gave Gingrich the benefit of the doubt because they felt Gingrich was cuddly and lovable. But they did Herman Cain.
They did.
Once.
Photo via Christopher Halloran / Shutterstock.com
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.