http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/280725/can-cain-do-it-robert-costa

Interesting. 

Yeah, the gaffes have not hurt Cain…yet.  Timmy Treadwell also thought Grizzly Bears were his friends. 

So did Snack the giraffe.

So, Stacy, how does Cain walk back his Abortion, Liberty, Foreign Policy and other gaffes and stay in the top tier of the race?

Not to mention the fact that loads of fiscal conservatives are seeing the pitfalls of the 999 gimmick…

Herman Cain’s statement on his site explains it clearly, and concisely.

He’s got to be able to state that in a live interview, but it’s a solid statement.  He won’t suffer the kind of problems Rudy suffered for failing to bring clarity on the issue.

If it’s really just a cover for union busting I’m for it. The fact that Trumpka has already condemned it does speak well of it. How he gets any votes in Rustbelt cities is beyond me.

I was thinking it was a push for Qdaffy today, being a lion of Libya or Ohio. 

I have a feeling that the speech tomorrow in Detroit is going to be epic.

I believe Herman Cain is a decent pro-life person. However, when he says “he is personally fully against abortion but doesn’t think that the government should tell women what to do.” he either expressed himself very poorly or lumped himself in the “personally opposed but government shouldn’t tell women what to do with their bodies” idiots. I’m all for personal freedom and government keeping out of our business. However, there are limits to everything. Government shouldn’t tell me how to build a shed in my yard or tell me I can’t spank my kids if they misbehave. Heck, I think it is outrageous that we have to get government permission to fish. However, even as much of an advocate of personal freedom as I am I realize there are limits to freedom and there are appropriate time for government to intervene when one person’s pursuit of happiness impacts another persons basic human rights. There are many, many things our laws tell us, regardless of gender, that we can not do. One of those things is kill another human being. A mother should have no more authority to kill her child than I have to kill some jerk who cuts me off in traffic.

No big.  Cain means abortion should be neither legal nor illegal, but rather, unthinkable.  The great majority of Americans and everyone else believe just exactly that.  It’s as ill-conceived to want it illegal as it is to want it legal.  Life begins at conception.  Abortion should be treated as murder, but not as illegal.  Big difference.

I think I missed something here.

Saw on the tele that to qualify as an empowerment zone or whatever his new name for it is, a city would have to agree to be a right to work city and abolish the minimum wage. I’m not sure what that qualifies them for. Since all cities that need that kind of federal help are union towns with unionized city workers, who I assume are covered by the right to work clause the unions will howl. I was doing something else when the piece came on TV I didn’t really hear exactly Trumpka said. But at any rate I suspect he wont get any union votes if what I heard on the news is accurate.

Cain hasn’t committed a “killer” gaffe yet, but there are several minor ones.  The worrisome thing about them is that they were all unforced errors, there were no trick or difficult questions which set him up the bomb.

His problem seems to be that he is incapable of not answering a question, or trying to, even when he isn’t completely familiar with the subject, such as the Palestinian “right of return.”  How hard would it be to say, “I haven’t studied that specifically, but I strongly feel all issues must be negotiated in good faith between the parties, not imposed by outside powers.”

With abortion, a simple “I’m against it” will do.  No matter how you phrase your pro-life position, you won’t win any points with the abortion supporters anyway, so why try to blur your stance?

There is a limit to the mileage Cain can get on gaffes based on the “not a politician” theme.  As Ari Fleischer noted, “People should be careful about what they say.”

Am I the only one who’s noticed the recent unforced errors have occured since the departure of Ellen Carmichael?

Seriously!  It’s the home territory of Domino’s AND Little Caesar’s.

I’ve looked at life from both sides now
From up and down and still somehow
It’s life illusions I recall
I really don’t know life at all

HC isn’t a social issues or foreign policy kinda guy. By now he should
recognize that he’s on dangerous ground when these are discussed and
should have figured out how to deal with these when they arise.

If he has a position on a thorny issue, he should state it simply and succinctly and then MOVE ON and avoid wading into the
details like the plague. If he is asked about wonkish issues that he is
unfamiliar with, honesty is the best policy. As an example, most people haven’t the faintest idea what this “right of return” thing is all about and would hardly fault him for being equally ignorant. If he was portraying himself as a policy wonk it would be a different story, but he’s NOT.

Jobs and the economy are the issues that are most on the minds of voters today.  His 9-9-9 plan seems to have hit a nerve with the public. Even though I think it has serious flaws and that he should be pushing a flat tax plan or better yet, the FairTax instead, his appeal is obviously based on economic issues and he should stay focused on those and just IGNORE everything else as much as possible.

Well said.  I’m worried about this.  If Cain really is one of those idiots as you put it, he just lost my vote.

I’d rather have Obama.

Did he really say that 15-minutes bit? Me thinks the Post would rather Cain were not the nominee…

Cain’s answer made complete sense. He’s prolife- but he recognizes that the country is not ready to make abortion illegal. Ergo- he won’t push to make it illegal.

How is that hard to understand? It’s the same position of nearly every pro-life politician I can think of.

The majority position on abortion now in America is relatively moderate but more restrictive than the current law.  A majority would ban third trimester abortions (in most states) except if the life of the mother was threatened (that is relatively rare since giving birth at that point is usually not more dangerous than a late term abortion).  A majority would restrict second trimester abortions but not as broadly as third trimesters.  And a majority (in most states) would not ban first trimester abortions.  A majority find the practice immoral but would not want it classified as murder (they do not want to see people put in jail over it). 

I mean seriously, do you think a majority in America would make a first trimester abortion in the case of rape illegal?  They would not.  I can understand arguing the child is innocent, etc., but you would really put the power of the state to criminalize it?   I doubt that would pass in any state.    

The trouble is if that is Herman Cain’s position he will not get the GOP nomination.  Hence the reason Romney “evolved” on the issue.   Still, I would think Cain would have a simple to the point answer on this like every GOP candidate has.  It is not like you cannot see this one coming. 

I would like to see Roe gone because Roe is bad law.  As Scalia says, there is neither a right or a ban to abortion in the Constitution.  The Constitution is silent on it and abortions (while rare) existed in America at the time the Constitution was ratified. 

Maybe they should hire Stacy. 

I was hoping that that bad idea died with Jack Kemp [RIP].