Herman Cain’s Plan; Raiders to L.A.?

14 October 2011 |permalink | email article

The Washington Post bannered a Thursday story based on a new NBC/Wall Street Journal poll suggesting that – at least for the moment – a path exists for Herman Cain, the former CEO of Godfather’s Pizza, to become the Republican presidential nominee. Cain, based on the most recent GOP debate, is now on a collision path (27 percent) with Mitt Romney (23 percent) as the two comprise the top tier in the race today. As the chatter rises about Romney’s inevitability as the GOP nominee – enough so that David Axelrod, O44’s chief strategist, decided to attack him for calling the president’s proposed payroll tax extension “a little band aid” – classic Romney speak.

But, for the moment, the spotlight is on Cain and his now famous 999 plan, applauded by some of the most conservative legions on the Republican right. But last night MSNBC’s Lawrence O’Donnell, who hosts “The Last Word,” popped Cain’s secretive balloon by revealing his bogus 999 slogan which woulddestroy Social Security and Medicare and leave all Americans with a 30 percent national sales tax. It gets worse and Bruce Bartlett, a former senior policy expert in the Reagan White House, joined the discussion to help crunch the numbers which don’t add up. What I find astonishing is the national press corps has yet to expose key parts of this hocus pocus scam. Try as he may Cain is no magician.

Raider Nation Rumors

With Raiders’ legend Al Davis gone, and Mark Davis, his son who had little role in the organization,
set to assume his father’s title as managing general partner, the talk is about the Raiders’ hope for a new stadium. Amy Trask, long at Al Davis’s side in league meetings, is rumored to entertain the thought of moving the team back to Los Angeles as two billionaires compete for an NFL franchise with different stadium proposals and battle over the price of a minority share.

Quotable

“If Herman Cain is our nominee against Barack Obama, I think he will sweep the South.“ – Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour, deciding not to seek the Republican nomination late last year, predicting Cain is a “strait talking person who calls it like he sees it.” Barbour famously said he didn’t remember the South’s Citizens Councils as being that bad in the civil rights era, but it was no gaffe.   

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