Thank you, Mr. Cain

I don't know about you, but I have felt admiration for Herman Cain. He is articulate, he oozes confidence, he is comfortable in the limelight, he has great composure, he speaks clearly, and he is an incredible salesman. Oh, and Herman is black too. Mr. Cain has made me think that racial bias is really on its way out in this country. And that warms my heart, because I remember Little Rock, Arkansas. It was one of my first and most shocking memories of America, when in the family room we looked in shame at the TV. What was wrong with the white Americans in the South? 

I admit that I have wondered whether the rise of Herman Cain was proof of a reverse bias on the right. Were conservatives saying "he is black so he must be good"? That is what it looked like from where I view the political spectrum. If you come up with a wild scheme to lower taxes on the rich and increase them for everybody else, you are an automatic hero on the right. The good thing is that color apparently doesn't matter anymore, but that's not the only bias we have lost. As we have heard from the pundits on the left, the bar has been set really low this year by the conservative populace and the media. Don't know that China has had nuclear weapons (for about 40 years)? That's OK. Don't know what you think about Libya? No problem. Think that the American revolution started in New Hampshire? Why not! There is no premium on knowing anything. You don't get points for knowledge or being aware of what is going on in the world around you. It is authenticity that we seek. 

If nothing else, Herman, Michele, and Rick are pretty authentic. They also are or are positioning themselves as ignorant, a badge that Michele and Herman are wearing especially well. Of course, Herman is now at the end of the road, where he has made such a fool of himself that it may jump start conservative politics to the next available excited state where the candidates may actually talk about how to solve our nation's problems rather than regurgitating what we already know they believe in, namely that the government is the problem and that if we just set the entrepreneurs free it will benefit us all. When the founders said "We the people . . " were they talking about people who believe that government should benefit only them? Or did they include those of us who believe that government should serve all the people? That's the problem with those folks who believe so steadfast in the Constitution. They want to change it to make it just about them.


I will leave you with yesterday's cartoon from Matt Davis, which I picked up from the website gocomics.com. 

We are no longer suffering [pick your color or ethnicity] fools lightly. Thank you for trying, Herman Cain. You can now add charlatan to your many defining characteristics.