Cain Still Standing

For weeks Herman Cain has been near the top or at the top of the leader board for the Republican Party Presidential nominee.  And this is still America. ( A phrase I say with a bit of a tone when shocking,  stupid, sometimes wasteful things happen because the government,  economic, etc. systems support and allow for it.)

In case you missed it, Herman Cain is an African American who (at least not yet) no one is questioning his parentage nor his birthplace.

Oh, but I digress – which is actually the point of this blog. Every time I want to write about the anomaly of having a black man as a serious Republican contender there is a digression from the conversation, usually brought on by Cain himself.

I get drawn away by the sheer incredulousness of it all and by the caricature that he brings upon himself. 

We have heard him proclaim the virtues of being a self-made man. Yet he condemns others because, despite double-digit unemployment and market factors, they simply “just don’t want to work.”

Or we heard him explain his prescription for America’s ills, the 9-9-9 remedy plan, yet as some explain the inequities would remain.

And we can surmise just how close the National Restaurant Association and the tobacco lobby really are by the campaign ad supporting Cain with the spokesperson blowing puffs of smoke (pun intended) at the end of the commercial.

Even with the recent volley of sexual harassment accusations, he remains in a leading position, ahead or tied with Republican governors, state elected officials and even a former secretary of state. 

Each day he gets air time in our homes, recently with some very lewd discussion of his alleged approach to a white woman and he remains a contender

Yep, with Herman Cain there is no shortage of conversation points for every political pundit, columnist, comedy writer, or blogger. And with this list of topics, guffaws, quotable quotes and bravado, Herman Cain is positioning himself to be the conservative’s conservative.

Is anyone else tripping like me?  Herman Cain, a black man whose most notable claim to fame until a moment ago in time, was being CEO of a food chain, is  leading the pack for Republican nominee for President of the United States.  

And is it lost on you that he is doing so in spite of accusations of impropriety that would have gotten him killed just less than 60 year ago? (Think,  Emmett Till, a 14 year-old black man-child who was beaten, shot and killed for allegedly whistling at a white woman.)

Don’t get me wrong. I am glad that Cain can stand and defend, deny and reject the accusations. He should be able to do that because this is still America; this time with a straight tone, the America that we aspire to be of equality, choice and freedom.  And we get to decide if we believe him or not, want him or not and leave him to his own stories or become part of his story, because this is still America.

So that got me to thinking, everyone says that because this is still America that in the end, Cain will not be the last one standing with the Republicans. At the end,  if the sexual harassment chapter doesn’t take him out of contention, something else will.

But what if it doesn’t? What if Cain continues to rise and hold?

Could it be that in this democracy of ours, with lots of "lesser" parties and two big ones, he becomes Obama’s challenger?

We thought 2008 was an unbelievable year. I can’t wait to see what 2012 brings. After all, this is still America.