The Cain Bonfire

At WSJ:

Lesson one of the Cain mess is that running a campaign for the Presidency of the United States is unlike anything else in politics, or anything else in American life for that matter. Mr. Cain's remarkable success so far, riding to the top of the GOP preference polls, is a testament to his skills at communicating and his willingness to offer bold policy proposals.

Mr. Cain has proven there is a hunger in the public for roiling the political status quo. If he has disappointed his supporters, which remains to be seen, it is because he hasn't displayed sufficient self-awareness of the requirements of being a top-tier presidential candidate.

Anyone who makes it to the front of the candidate line is going to come under close—make that withering—scrutiny. If in one's past exist two sexual harassment suits formally settled by one's employer, that is going to become public. It is a certainty. Allowing oneself to drift through a campaign until the day the buried bombs go off is amateur hour. Republicans have a right to ask Mr. Cain what he would have said if he won the nomination and the news had broken after Labor Day next year. The Cain campaign would have been smarter to leak the story pre-emptively.

I raised these points days ago, but continue reading the editorial.

RELATED: At Saberpoint, "Raise the Black Flag: Take No Prisoners," and "Men's Rights Online: Reasons for False Charges of 'Sexual Harassment'."

Manners Decline in the South

This is fascinating, despite the racial grievance undertones. At New York Times, "A Last Bastion of Civility, the South, Sees Manners Decline."

With Weak Economy, Obama May Lose Key Demographic Groups

See LAT, "Obama's demographic support may not weather economy."

Actually, blacks are still enthusiastic about the president. See NYT, "Black Voters’ Support for Obama Is Steady and Strong." But check the graphic at LAT, "Key States for Obama's Reelection." White voters in Florida, Ohio and Nevada will be especially crucial, and Latinos as well, who aren't going to be as wedded to the Democrats as black voters. Colorado and New Mexico will be problematic as well, despite higher levels of college educated whites. Perhaps that's why Obama continues to ramp up the class warfare rhetoric. Polls show a lot of sympathy with the occupy movement. No doubt the White House hopes the protesters don't start turning on him, mentioning that he's in the pocket of these same big banks and Wall Street brokerages. See Weasel Zip, "Obama Uses Occupy Wall Street’s Language, Rails Against “The Top 1%”…"

The State of Black America (at Al Sharpton's March on Washington for Jobs and Justice)

The man yelling "house nigger" is pretty offensive, but the folks chanting "Obama! Obama! Obama!" are way creepy as well.

From Marooned in Marin, "Al Shaprton & Unions' Rally For Obama's "Jobs" Bill Masquerades As MLK Memorial." (Via Gateway Pundit and Memeorandum.)

RELATED: At WaPo, "Al Sharpton leads rally for jobs, justice," and "Sharpton, others rally for jobs and justice in march to MLK Memorial."

Herman Cain Surges Ahead in New Wall Street Journal Poll!

This is amazing, at WSJ, "Cain Vaults to Lead in Poll" (at Google):

CONCORD, N.H. — Former restaurant-industry executive Herman Cain has catapulted to the lead in the race for the Republican presidential nomination, as GOP voters grow disenchanted with Texas Gov. Rick Perry and remain wary of former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, a new Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll finds.

Drawn by Mr. Cain's blunt, folksy style in recent debates, 27% of Republican primary voters picked him as their first choice for the nomination, a jump of 22 percentage points from six weeks ago.

Mr. Romney held firm in second place at 23%, his same share as in a Journal poll in late August, while Mr. Perry plummeted to 16%, from 38% in August.

The poll of 1,000 adults, conducted from Oct. 6-10, comes as many Republican donors and officials have begun to rally around Mr. Romney as the party's likely nominee, despite a continued lack of enthusiasm for him documented in the new poll.

For Mr. Cain, the question is whether his newfound prominence, driven in part by his signature "9-9-9" plan to overhaul the tax code, will be a lasting phenomenon in a campaign that has seen many others surge and then fade. Since the spring, conservatives have given short-lived bursts of support for a string of contenders, including Donald Trump, Minnesota Rep. Michele Bachmann and Mr. Perry.

"Will I be the flavor of the week?'' Mr. Cain said Wednesday in New Hampshire, where reporters followed him as he addressed the state legislature. "Well, the answer is an emphatic, 'No,' because Häagen-Dazs black walnut tastes good all the time."

Mr. Cain in many ways isn't operating a traditional campaign. He was on tour promoting his new book in recent weeks, and he will make stops between Memphis and Nashville on Friday and Saturday, though Tennessee is unlikely to factor in the Republican nomination. He doesn't plan to return to Iowa, site of the first nominating contest, for weeks, his aides say.

Also at Public Policy Polling, "Cain leads nationally" (via Memeorandum).

Cain discusses the Wall Street protests around 10 minutes at the video.

See also The Other McCain, "Pundette Likes Herman Cain."

Herman Cain, America's Candidate, Catchin' the Big Mo'

Hermain Cain's catchin' some big momentum, and he deserves it.

For example, Michael Barone gives him a huge shout out: "Time to raise Cain to contender status" (at Memeorandum). And Barone points us to Daniel Henninger's piece this week, "Taking Cain Seriously":

Conventional wisdom holds that this week's Chris Christie boomlet means the GOP is desperate for a savior. The reality is that, at some point, Republicans will have to start drilling deeper on their own into the candidates they've got.

Put it this way: The GOP nominee is running against the incumbent president. Unlike the incumbent, Herman Cain has at least twice identified the causes of a large failing enterprise, designed goals, achieved them, and by all accounts inspired the people he was supposed to lead. Not least, Mr. Cain's life experience suggests that, unlike the incumbent, he will adjust his ideas to reality.

Herman Cain is a credible candidate. Whether he deserves to be president is something voters will decide. But he deserves a serious look.

PREVIOUSLY: "Signs of Rising Momentum for Herman Cain." Linked there is The Other McCain, who continues his outstanding Herman Cain coverage. See, "Herman Cain Rhymes With Hurricane: Fund-Raising Surges in Third Quarter." And click "home" over at McCain's to get his commiserations on the lack of recognition for his Cain coverage.

BONUS: From Jonathan Tobin, "Re: Herman Cain?"

Also, at WaPo, "Presidential candidate Herman Cain says Christie is too liberal for Republican conservatives."

Antonio Johnson Donates Kidney to Grandmother — After Being Killed in Drive-By Shooting

This story is sad, yet with some hope thrown in.

What's so striking is that the boy offered to donate a kidney before he died, although his mom said no. His grandmother herself "was paralyzed decades ago when she was struck by a stray bullet."

Again, these are longstanding problems, but for the life of me we never hear the president speak out on such chronic violence afflicting the black community. It's going to be one of this administration's biggest moral failings.

At Chicago Tribune, "Slain teen's kidney donated to ailing grandmother."

Obama Sets Back Race Relations Decades

Awesome, as usual.

From Victor Davis Hanson, at National Review, "Obama’s Racial Crisis." (Via Pundette.)

PREVIOUSLY: "Frustrated Teacher Walks Off the Job in Los Angeles: Metaphor for Obama's Bankrupt Education Policy."

Georgia Executes Cop Killer Troy Davis: Progressive Heads Explode

I went to bed last night upon hearing the news that the Supreme Court was granting an 11th hour review. I didn't hear anything more until I was in my office this morning reading the Los Angeles Times, "Georgia puts convict to death despite protest." And then also at New York Times, "In Death-Penalty Debate, Execution Offers Little Closure."

And see the very even-handed piece from Associated Press, which notes that all the second thoughts on witness testimony were presented to jurors at the time of the trial, "Counting down, Ga. inmate nears execution in policeman’s killing despite pleas in US, Europe."

But the best piece on this is from Ann Coulter, "COP-KILLER IS MEDIA'S LATEST BABY SEAL":

It's nearly impossible to receive a death sentence these days -- unless you do something completely crazy like shoot a cop in full view of dozens of witnesses in a Burger King parking lot, only a few hours after shooting at a passing car while exiting a party.

That's what Troy Davis did in August 1989. Davis is the media's current baby seal of death row.

After a two-week trial with 34 witnesses for the state and six witnesses for the defense, the jury of seven blacks and five whites took less than two hours to convict Davis of Officer Mark MacPhail's murder, as well as various other crimes. Two days later, the jury sentenced Davis to death.

Now, a brisk 22 years after Davis murdered Officer MacPhail, his sentence will finally be administered this week -- barring any more of the legal shenanigans that have kept taxpayers on the hook for Davis' room and board for the past two decades.

(The average time on death row is 14 years. Then liberals turn around and triumphantly claim the death penalty doesn't have any noticeable deterrent effect. As the kids say: Duh.)

It has been claimed -- in The New York Times and Time magazine, for example -- that there was no "physical evidence" connecting Davis to the crimes that night.

Davis pulled out a gun and shot two strangers in public. What "physical evidence" were they expecting? No houses were broken into, no cars stolen, no rapes or fistfights accompanied the shootings. Where exactly would you look for DNA? And to prove what?

I suppose it would be nice if the shell casings from both shootings that night matched. Oh wait -- they did. That's "physical evidence."

It's true that the bulk of the evidence against Davis was eyewitness testimony. That tends to happen when you shoot someone in a busy Burger King parking lot.

Eyewitness testimony, like all evidence tending to show guilt, has gotten a bad name recently, but the "eyewitness" testimony in this case did not consist simply of strangers trying to distinguish one tall black man from another. For one thing, several of the eyewitnesses knew Davis personally.

The bulk of the eyewitness testimony established the following...

Continue.

Of course, the progressive left latched onto this case as a way to bring an end to capital punishment in the United States. It's just routine leftist conformity to be against the death penalty, even when the inmate's the classic poster boy for it. Progressives are stupid that way.

RELATED: At The Other McCain, "The Death of a Cop-Killer." And the reactions at Memeorandum.

Negrophobia

I read but don't normally blog William Jacobson's Saturday Night Card Game. But last night's was something else: "Saturday Night Card Game (The “Negrophobia” card is played)." The "Negrophobia" card is played at Balloon Juice, "The Modern Negrophobists reaction to the President’s speech…" It's really disgusting, the cartoon and the ideas behind it in the contemporary context. But the commenters are running with it, for example:

The modern negrophobist would demand the would be rescuer bring him a large rock so he could sink more quickly.

That cartoon warms my heart. I especially like the way the artist depicted the bigot as some sort of weasel/human hybrid.

I don't even know what to say. These people are simply not my countrymen. The sentiment is analogous to the kind of anti-Semitism found in caricatured drawings of long-nosed money-grubbing Jews. In other words, it's eliminationist.

I haven't finished listening to it, but Dennis Prager, in a clip at Blazing Cat Fur, indicates that progressive ideology is so removed from the basic values of this country as to be functionally anti-American. See: "Dennis Prager's Top 10 Ways Liberalism Makes America Worse." Balloon Juice demonstrates the point 1000s of times over.

24-Year-Old Cincinnati Man Dies of Toothache After Brilliantly Filling His Pain Medication Prescription Instead of Antibiotics

Folks should probably be clear about something first: A tooth extraction is not an expensive dental procedure. Indeed, as the ABC News report indicates, "a routine tooth extraction" costs about $80.00. And while it's a horribly needless waste of life, it's no one's fault but the man's himself, 24-year-old Kyle Willis, the father of a young girl. Willis decided to ride out the pain. When he was overcome by swelling he checked into the emergency room and the doctors gave him prescriptions for antibiotics and pain medication. Willis, apparently because he was "uninsured," bought the pain killers and blew off the antibiotics. Big mistake. Rudimentary health knowledge says buy the antibiotics and take some (cheap) generic ibuprofen for the pain and inflammation. To make matters worse, Willis had family members in the area. His aunt [...] is married to a successful local musician. Perhaps he could have borrowed a little money from loved ones. That's called individual responsibility. You always take care of your own, and when you need a hand you fall back on loved ones. When all else fails, there's charity. Of course, under our socialist welfare state, the historical culture of personal responsibility and self-sufficiency has been destroyed by the patrimonial socialist handout regime. Big government assumes that people are too stupid and weak to save for a rainy day, or to plan ahead for emergencies. Tucking away a few Jacksons wouldn't have killed this man. His ignorance and lack of discipline did. So dumb is this case that even über-socialist Matthew Yglesias has to begin his essay with a disclaimer, conceding that supreme stupidity is not a rationale for increasing the size and scope of government:

Now, clearly, this man made some sub-optimal choices here he’s not purely a victim of lack of health insurance. At the same time you have right before you a no-longer-living, no-longer-breathing example of the “push the patient to the edge of financial desperation” theory of health care cost controls. It turns out that the quality of a frightened, pain-wracked young man asked to make technical medical decisions under severe financial constraints is not very high. The social cost of 24 year-old fathers dying of eminently treatable tooth infections, by contrast, is gigantic.

Oh, give me a freakin' break! "Technical medical decisions"? Doctors gave Willis all he needed to get better. It's not a "technical medical decision" to choose pain killers over antibiotics --- it's gambling with your life and the future of your child. Oh, and the man was black --- so now I'm going to be attacked as RAAAAACIST for pointing out that stupidity knows no color.



Freakin' progressive "compassion" is killing society's least well prepared for success. And that's what's really sad about this case.



More imbecilic progressive "compassion" at The Reaction: "Reconciling Conservative "Logic" Is Like Pulling Teeth."



UPDATE: Lonely Conservative links: "Walmart Sells $4 Prescriptions." Also, at Scared Monkeys, "Cincinnati Man Dies of Tooth Infection … Liberal MSM Blames No Insurance."

Althouse links. Thanks!



And Dustbury!

'Off the Liberal Plantation'

Congressman Allen West is a great guy:

And at USA Today, "Waters bites back at West for 'plantation' comments."

Black Flash Mobs

Some news agencies refuse to report the racial identity of those committing flash mob violence around the country, and political correctness prohibits a frank discussion of the issue among civic leaders and national policy makers. Seriously. Roland Martin on CNN's bumbling and blathering about "no matter if it's black or white," blah, blah. Freakin' asshat black criminal apologist. These are black mobs dick! Yet another example of how progressivism is kicking this country to the curb. See Ward Connerly, "Flash Mob Racism":

Earlier this year, the Justice Department of the Obama administration announced its objective to aggressively monitor the police departments of major urban cities. The purpose of this effort is to determine whether such departments are involved in racial profiling of blacks and Latinos and whether they are engaged in police brutality. Since that announcement, events have unfolded in some of those cities that reveal how misplaced that policy initiative actually is.



In Chicago, the District of Columbia, Milwaukee and Philadelphia, a group of “flash mobs” have unmercifully terrorized residents of those communities – attacking citizens, breaking windows of business establishments and stealing merchandise, and committing other random acts of violence. In each instance, the mobs have been overwhelmingly, if not exclusively, black youth. This fact has accounted for the failure of most of the news media to report either the events themselves or the racial background of the perpetrators. Several news sources have readily admitted that it is their practice not to mention the racial identity of those involved in criminal activity. Jim Stingl, a columnist for the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel, recently wrote, “This newspaper normally avoids mentioning the race of people involved in crimes, unless it’s part of a description to help apprehend someone at large.”



Philadelphia Mayor Michael A. Nutter is not afflicted with the same disease of political correctness as many in the media. In a recent 30-minute sermon delivered from the pulpit of his Baptist church, Nutter confronted the culture that many of us believe drives the behavior of these individuals when he said, “You have damaged your own race…Take those God-darn hoodies down, especially in the summer. Pull your pants up and buy a belt ‘cause no one wants to see your underwear or the crack of your butt.’’



“If you walk into somebody’s office with your hair uncombed and a pick in the back, and your shoes untied, and your pants half down, tattoos up and down your arms and on your neck, and you wonder why somebody won’t hire you? They don’t hire you ‘cause you look like you’re crazy,” the mayor said.



Mayor Nutter is correct. When we have young people burglarizing stores and neighborhoods and beating up bystanders without provocation, there is obviously a widespread cultural problem in the group committing these acts. That reality must be faced and the thugs responsible for these acts should not be ignored or coddled. They and their parents, if there are parents in the households, should be held accountable for their behavior.

It's racist violence. Black racist mobs attacking whites. See, "Teen girl gang assaults woman in brazen daylight attack outside Philadelphia City Hall." (At Memeorandum.) And also, "More flash mob mayhem for DC-area as band of female looters storms convenience store."

Homosexuality Is Not a Civil Right

Well, the gay extremists have Tony Perkins in the crosshairs. Bunch of ASFLs.



Turns out that the Family Research Council issued a press release hammering the Obama White House for promoting childhood homosexuality. I especially like the point about Dan Savage, who is identified as "a homosexual extremist who built a career on hatred of Christians and our values." Word.



And see this from FRC, "Homosexuality Is Not a Civil Right":

Because of our national shame at the historic legacy of racial discrimination against blacks, many people have come to think of “discrimination” as inherently evil. However, the basic meaning of “discriminate” is simply “to make a distinction.” To compare and evaluate candidates based on their education, experience, intelligence, and competence is inherently “discrimination.” The question, therefore, is not whether “discrimination” will take place—it can, it will and it must. The question for public policy is: which forms of “discrimination” are so profoundly offensive to the national conscience that they justify government action that interferes with the rights of employers and other private entities and gives special protections to certain classes of people?



In the Civil Rights Act of 1964, Congress answered that question by including only five categories of protection. As noted above, those categories were: “race, color, religion, sex, or national origin.” For instance, a banker could deny an applicant a loan because the applicant was not credit-worthy, but not because he or she was Jewish or black. What do these protected categories have in common?



While there is no definitive legal answer, the most logical answer would seem to be that the case for granting legal protection against “discrimination” is strongest when based on a personal characteristic that is:



* Inborn, involuntary, and immutable (like race and color);

* Innocuous (because it does no harm to the employer, to the individual, or to society as a whole); and/or

* In the Constitution.



Is “sexual orientation,” like race and sex, a characteristic that is inborn, involuntary, immutable, innocuous, and in the Constitution? Is it, like religion (which is not inborn, involuntary, immutable, or necessarily innocuous, but is in the Constitution), a characteristic that meets even one of these criteria?



The only truthful answer is no.

RTWT.



PREVIOUSLY: "Gay Marriage is Not a Civil Right."

Maxine Waters: Y'all 'Unleash Us' on Obama

This is the black mofos' "let my Congress-people go" moment, from James Taranto, "'Unleash Us'" (via Memeorandum).

Corey White, Target in Facebook Murder-for-Hire Plot, Gunned Down in Philly

At LAT, "Target in Facebook murder-for-hire case is gunned down," and ABC News, "Facebook Mystery: Man Killed After Ex-Girlfriend Posts Ominous Message." There's no evidence that the Facebook plot and murder are linked. These people talk like hoodlums, that's for sure:

Earlier this year White's ex-girlfriend, 20-year-old London Eley, who is also the mother of his child, posted on Facebook, "I will pay somebody a stack to kill my baby father." Police said a "stack" refers to $1,000.



Timothy Bynum allegedly responded, "Say no more ... what he look like ... where he be at ... need that stack 1st," according to police.



Eley's attorney told ABCNews.com it was either White, or one of his relatives, who saw the post on Facebook and called police...

"Where he be at"?



Damn, that mofo sho be mess up on his tawkin! Homeboy!

Very Religious White Americans More Than Twice as Likely to Identify With GOP

But religion has no effect on blacks, who identify with the Democratic Party regardless of religion orientation.

At Gallup, "Religion and Party ID Strongly Linked Among Whites, Not Blacks."

Personal religiousness makes little difference among blacks ... as the powerful partisan pull of Democratic identification among black Americans trumps any influence of religion. Only 9 to 10% of blacks in each of the three groups of varying religiousness identify as Republicans, while more than three-quarters in each group identify themselves as Democrats.

Reminds me: "The Democrat Party Has Always Been the Party of Racism."

New York Minority Parents Protest National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) and the United Federation of Teachers (UFT)

Hopefully we'll be seeing more protests like this.

At Big Government, "Inner City Parents Protest Teachers’ Union, NAACP Over Charter School Lawsuit" (via News Alert):

Michele Bachmann: Obama 'Has Failed the African American Community'

Another reason why I just love Michele Bachmann.

This has been one of my biggest criticism of the administration, one I've been making for a long time. Obama's failed minority communities all around.

At Atlanta Journal-Constitution, "Michele Bachmann: President Obama Has Failed African-Americans":

Also at London's Daily Mail, "Obama has failed blacks, says Bachmann as African-American unemployment hits 16%."

High-Tech Lynching: Progressives Attack Clarence Thomas Alleged Ethics Breach Because He's a Black Conservative

It's one of the greatest apostasies from progressivism. To be black and conservative is to reject everything about the politics of racial grievance and victimology. And for 20 years we've seen Clarence Thomas bear the brunt of the left's attack on black conservatism at the Supreme Court. I mentioned it today, the story at New York Times, "Friendship of Justice and Magnate Puts Focus on Ethics." And I linked Althouse, but folks need to go over there again, because she hammers the progressive hypocrisy: "The NYT goes after Clarence Thomas over 'an unusual, and ethically sensitive, friendship'."

And here comes the Soros-funded Think Progresss, "Justices Have Been Forced To Resign For Doing What Clarence Thomas Has Done":

Justice Clarence Thomas is an ethics problem in a black robe.

And he's being subjected to a high-tech attack in a white robe.

Despicable, but it's the progressive left we're talking about, so there you go. Just terrible people.

Via Memeorandum.