Our Next Black President?

Businessman Cain enters 2012 GOP presidential race

APNews
May 21, 2011

Herman Cain has run a pizza chain, hosted a talk radio show and sparred with Bill Clinton over health care. He's never held elected office. Now the tea party favorite wants to be president.

"In case you accidentally listen to a skeptic or doubting Thomas out there, just to be clear ... I'm running for president of the United States, and I'm not running for second," he told a crowd at Centennial Olympic Park on Saturday. Chants of "Herman" erupted from the crowd of thousands in downtown Atlanta.

The announcement by the businessman, author and radio talk show host that he was joining the expanding Republican field came after months of traveling around the country to introduce himself to voters.

Now the 65-year-old will see if he can use that grass-roots enthusiasm to turn a long-shot campaign into a credible bid.

Cain supports a strong national defense, opposes abortion, backs replacing the federal income tax with a national sales tax and favors a return to the gold standard. He said President Barack Obama "threw Israel under the bus" because he sought to base Mideast border talks partly on the pre-1967 war lines, and criticized the Justice Department for challenging Arizona's tough crackdown on illegal immigration.

"We shouldn't be suing Arizona," he said to cheers. "We ought to send them a prize."

Cain lost a three-way Republican U.S. Senate primary bid in Georgia in 2004 with one-quarter of the vote. His "Hermanator" political action committee has taken in just over $16,000 this year. He said he's running "a bottoms-up, outside-the-box campaign." Supporters say he taps into the tea party-fueled desire for plain-speaking citizen candidates.

Born in Memphis, Tenn., and raised in Atlanta, Cain is the son of a chauffeur and a maid. He attended historically black Morehouse College, earned a master's degree from Purdue University and worked as a mathematician for the Navy before beginning to scale the corporate ladder.

He worked at Coca-Cola, Pillsbury and Burger King before taking the helm of the failing Godfather's Pizza franchise, which he rescued by shuttering hundreds of restaurants.

He burst onto the political stage when he argued with President Clinton over the Democrat's health care plan at a 1994 town hall meeting.

"On behalf of all of those business owners that are in a situation similar to mine," asked Cain, "my question is, quite simply, if I'm forced to do this, what will I tell those people whose jobs I will have to eliminate?"

The late Jack Kemp, the GOP vice presidential nominee in 1996, once described Cain as having "the voice of Othello, the looks of a football player, the English of Oxfordian quality and the courage of a lion."

In 2006, Cain was diagnosed with liver and colon cancer. He says he's been cancer-free since 2007 and credits the nation's health care system with keeping him alive. He says it's one reason he's so opposed to the health overhaul championed by Obama.

At the speech, Cain tried to build a foundation for his run for the White House. He said the American dream is under attack from runaway debt, a stagnant economy, a muddled foreign policy and an influx of illegal immigrants. He said Americans should be infuriated because the Obama administration's $787 billion stimulus program "didn't stimulate diddly."

"It's time to get real, folks. Hope and change ain't working," he said. "Hope and change is not a solution. Hope and change is not a job."

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Online:
Herman Cain: http://www.hermancain.com

Nope. Can't vote for him. I've been labeled a racist in the past, so I have to forgo this to keep in line with the accusations.

Seriously, I kinda like this guy. Gonna be interesting on how the media treats him from here on out. Wait. I already know how that's going to turn out.

TexasBlue wrote:Nope. Can't vote for him. I've been labeled a racist in the past, so I have to forgo this to keep in line with the accusations.

Seriously, I kinda like this guy. Gonna be interesting on how the media treats him from here on out. Wait. I already know how that's going to turn out.

Yeah... we do know how the media will treat him, the second he becomes a serious contender.

By the way, this story left out one of his most memorable campaign slogans... "We need a LEADER, not a READER."

Herman Cain: 'I Can Beat' President Obama

Cain doesn't get face time til the 4:20 mark.

I so wish I could listen to these.

I really, REALLY like this guy! He is the black Chris Christie. And I think he would mop the floor with Obama in a debate! The man has degrees in mathematics and computer science (not a "law" degree but something useful), worked as a mathematician for the Navy, is a former chairman of the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City, worked extensively in the private sector (with huge successes - unlike Obama who never had a real job in his life), including rescuing and eventually buying Godfather's Pizza, is a winner of the Horatio Alger Award, has written several books, and had his own radio talk show. This guy is LIGHTYEARS ahead of Obama in his qualifications for the Presidency!!!

The two men could not be more different.

Can you imagine the media if this guy got in? Who would they call racists?

I know I'm being picky here but "next black President" implies there has already been one. Obama isn't black, he's mixed race... and is therefore not the first black President but the first President with a black parent.

The_Amber_Spyglass wrote:I know I'm being picky here but "next black President" implies there has already been one. Obama isn't black, he's mixed race... and is therefore not the first black President but the first President with a black parent.

That's correct. But we still call him black. Cain would be a true first black prez.

I guess since he's half-black, then those who are racists in regards to him can only be half-racist?

I know this is an aside, but why call him black? If his father was black and his mother oriental, which would he be?

The_Amber_Spyglass wrote:If his father was black and his mother oriental, which would he be?

Blackriental.

The_Amber_Spyglass wrote:I know this is an aside, but why call him black? If his father was black and his mother oriental, which would he be?

Seriously, I don't think of him as black. Neither do I look at Cain as black. They're just men.

TexasBlue wrote:Herman Cain: "Stupid People Are Ruining America"

Stupid people are ruining America.
I agree! Except for the small fact that the "stupid people" are not the government officials but rather the people that put them in charge (i.e. the public)

He has a point. It's those who don't do their research who get buffaloed. But that happens on both sides of the aisle. People just blindly follow. I refuse to do that.

The_Amber_Spyglass wrote:I know I'm being picky here but "next black President" implies there has already been one. Obama isn't black, he's mixed race... and is therefore not the first black President but the first President with a black parent.

It really depends on how you define "black." Since race is not an objectively real thing, definitions are important.

The US has had many racist laws in the past that followed a "one-drop" formula. Any black ancestry whatsoever made you black, which made you subject to whatever differential treatment the law of the time prescribed. In the 1850s, Obama would've been a slave. In the 1950s, he would have been moved to the back of the bus. These laws didn't give a shit that he was part white.

And it is in the context of this racist history that the status of "first black president" is even notable. For the purpose of evaluating whether there has ever been a "black president," I see no reason to suddenly change the criteria for blackness that has been in effect in this country since day one. So I think it's fair to say Obama is the first black president.

Now, if we lived in a country that historically saw race as more of a continuum than a binary distinction between "white" and "other," then I'd agree, and I'd say Obama was the 'blackest' president we'd ever had, but not the "first black president."

Very well put kronos!

When you put it in those terms it makes sense. Although black migrants and their descendants suffered racism from the 1950s --> we never had a civil rights movement over here, I guess there was no need as they were never denied the vote, segregated in society through 'black areas' on buses, their own drinking fountains etc. I grew up in the 70s and 80s and all the "mixed race" friends I had were happy to be known as "half caste", neither black nor white.

I've often wondered whether the racism that the first generation of black migrants experienced here was only half about the colour of their skin and half about them being migrants into an island nation. If our respective social attitudes are different because of the above, then I guess it would make sense why some over here are keen to point out that your President has a white parent too.

An example here is Lewis Hamilton who to my knowledge has never been described as 'the first black Formula 1 driver' or 'the first black Formula 1 World Champion'

One can also take into an account on how half-black/white folks feel about themselves. Many people who are half black will refer to themselves as black and not white.