El Cid - November 29, 2011 | 11:37 am · Link

Shouldn’t that be 45 accusers?

ET - November 29, 2011 | 11:38 am · Link

Wow. Two weeks ago people were talking about him being a serious player and today this. The fortunes of GOP candidates do hit the extremes. I say the Gingrich wave peaks before Christmas.

Villago Delenda Est - November 29, 2011 | 11:40 am · Link

The rending of garments amongst his fanbase will cause schadenfreude explosions all over the blogosphere.

smintheus - November 29, 2011 | 11:40 am · Link

@ET: Newt could have the same problem as Herm and just as quickly.

smintheus - November 29, 2011 | 11:46 am · Link

I’d like to point out that Cain told us in an op-ed 5 years ago who his ideal presidential candidate is: Tiger Woods.

The real absurdity of course, once you get past the part about not being able to keep one’s pants on, is that neither of them has the slightest background, knowledge, or understanding needed for the job.

Yutsano - November 29, 2011 | 11:47 am · Link

@ET:

I say the Gingrich wave peaks before Christmas

“It’s beginning to look a lot like Gingrich…”

(shamelessly stoled)

Comrade Mary - November 29, 2011 | 11:49 am · Link

Nice one, John. I will now shed a tear for the Number Nine we may never know.

El Cid - November 29, 2011 | 11:51 am · Link

Another good Bloomberg article on how Hank Paulson made sure that hedge fund managers had a better idea of what might happen to FannieFreddie than everyone else.

After a perfunctory discussion of the market turmoil, the fund manager says, the discussion turned to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

Paulson said he had erred by not punishing Bear Stearns shareholders more severely. The secretary, then 62, went on to describe a possible scenario for placing Fannie and Freddie into “conservatorship”—a government seizure designed to allow the firms to continue operations despite heavy losses in the mortgage markets.

Paulson explained that under this scenario, the common stock of the two government-sponsored enterprises, or GSEs, would be effectively wiped out. So too would the various classes of preferred stock, he said.

The fund manager says he was shocked that Paulson would furnish such specific information —to his mind, leaving little doubt that the Treasury Department would carry out the plan. The managers attending the meeting were thus given a choice opportunity to trade on that information.

There’s no evidence that they did so after the meeting; tracking firm-specific short stock sales isn’t possible using public documents.

And law professors say that Paulson himself broke no law by disclosing what amounted to inside information.

This is all Barney Frank’s fault, except nothing went wrong, because probably no laws were broken, and when the rich and powerful break no laws and it has to do with their enrichment, there’s nothing really wrong being done.

The Bearded Blogger - November 29, 2011 | 11:52 am · Link

This is good news for Newt. If the not-romney people were willing to swallow Cain, they’ll swallow Newt.

Of course, swallowing Cain got you a job…

The Bearded Blogger - November 29, 2011 | 11:53 am · Link

@The Dangerman: awesome

Brachiator - November 29, 2011 | 11:54 am · Link

Seeing reports on twitter that Herman Cain spoke to his staff that he was thinking about whether or not he should stay in the race. Apart from all the reasons that DougJ has pointed out in the past, I think this is a tragedy because I was dying to find out whether or not by the end of the campaign there would be 9 accusers.

and

@4tehlulz:

I was waiting for 999 accusers myself.

Come on people. It’s “I Got 99 Problems, but a b>tch ain’t one. In the Hermanaor’s case, it’s I got 99 tax cuts …

Also too, in the Hermator’s case, the latest person is not an accuser, but apparently a mistress who is stripping the covers off of Cain’s family values guy masquerade. Another conservative hoist by his on purity petard.

I wonder how Limbaugh and company is trying to clean this mess up.

Villago Delenda Est - November 29, 2011 | 11:57 am · Link

@El Cid:

As I like to point out, the actions that constituted the Holocaust broke no laws of the Third Reich.

All perfectly legal under Reich law.

Comrade Mary - November 29, 2011 | 11:57 am · Link

@Yutsano: Oh, that’s WAY better. I doff my toque to you.

trollhattan - November 29, 2011 | 11:58 am · Link

So sad. Another victim of the lie-brul medier. They were obviously vewy, vewy afraid of Hermentum.

The good news: sold out seminars for old guys on how to score with the laydees. Hermie got his mojo workin’.

Samara Morgan - November 29, 2011 | 11:58 am · Link

@Brachiator: looks like hes out

Redshift - November 29, 2011 | 12:01 pm · Link

@handsmile:

“Cain spoke to his staff…” Yeah, the two go-fers beside him in the limousine or hotel elevator.

I get a completely different image from “Cain spoke to his staff…” in this context…

LAC - November 29, 2011 | 12:04 pm · Link

I think Cain needs to rethink his “jobs” program. He seems to fail to understand that an exchange of bodily fluids is not what we would consider a reference.

Brachiator - November 29, 2011 | 12:06 pm · Link

@JPL:

They will say he was railroaded and then spend the next 40 minutes discussing Clinton’s anatomy.

What I despise out the media is how they talk about these women’s financial woes. So, the media stories point out how Ginger White had a bankruptcy filing and other problems. Sorry, you can’t just connect the imaginary dots and turn all these women into gold diggers.

@Samara Morgan:

looks like hes out

hell, he was never really in it.

General Stuck - November 29, 2011 | 12:08 pm · Link

Cain’s share of the whackadoodle wingnut faction, have already started going to Newt, and Cain dropping out will send the rest that away. The only question is if the timing works out that the Gingrich onion gets peeled soon enough before the voting, that he is unelectable in a GE.

But the GOP has left themselves with another option.

The GOP needs a brokered convention
New rules mean Romney’s rivals can save the party from an unpopular nominee

Failsafe device that if triggered will maybe start the Apocalypse, finally.

RossinDetroit - November 29, 2011 | 12:09 pm · Link

Come on, Herman! Hang tough and show no weakness. The country needs you right now like it needed screwball comedies during the Great Depression.

Mino - November 29, 2011 | 12:10 pm · Link

@El Cid: And even more revolting, the hedge managers Paulson spoke with were GS alums, but not hedgers of so many worker retirement accounts. A lot of 401ks held Fanny/Freddy positions, supposedly because they were so safe .

The 1% must be protected, you see.

RossinDetroit - November 29, 2011 | 12:12 pm · Link

TPM:

But Herman Cain, according to a report in National Review, opened that door in a call with senior staff this morning.

In a real campaign that would have been a conference call.

Comrade Nimrod Humperdink - November 29, 2011 | 12:13 pm · Link

Can you feel the Santorumentum? Heh…

Certified Mutant Enemy - November 29, 2011 | 12:15 pm · Link

@Comrade Nimrod Humperdink:

Can you feel the Santorumentum?

I’d rather not.

Roger Moore - November 29, 2011 | 12:15 pm · Link

@feebog:

He’s still behind Gary Hart in the “how not to carry on an affair while campaigning” derby.

Keith - November 29, 2011 | 12:21 pm · Link

Cain should talk to his other staff and ask it why it screwed up his presidential aspirations.

Samara Morgan - November 29, 2011 | 12:23 pm · Link

@The Bearded Blogger: Petraeus has turned them down a hundred times.

Samara Morgan - November 29, 2011 | 12:24 pm · Link

@Cole
AllahP says second look at Pawlenty.

this is brilliant—Cole’s tweet.

Johngcole John Cole
It appears Herman Cain was the victim of a high-tech lynching by his pen1s.

Punchy - November 29, 2011 | 12:35 pm · Link

He gets to keep his campaign fund money. So why keep blowing more scratch on fruitless campaign ads and appearances when all that money could go to productive things, like hookers and blow?

Nice racket he ran. I bet his donors feel screwed, and they should. What a con job.

jayboat - November 29, 2011 | 12:37 pm · Link

#1 genius-level funny.

I look forward to Herm’s memoirs on this period of his life.

Samara Morgan - November 29, 2011 | 12:38 pm · Link

@DougJ: the THIRTEEN YEAR affair blows up his family values chops.
those other hoochies were just asking for it, and anyways its easy to tear them down.

jayboat - November 29, 2011 | 12:40 pm · Link

@Punchy:
nah… for the big money it was all part of the gamble. sprinkle around the fertilizer and when one of the clowns gets real traction, open the $$$ funnel. for the sheeple- memory span akin to a goldfish.

The Bearded Blogger - November 29, 2011 | 12:43 pm · Link

@Samara Morgan: They’ll find some right-headed general who won’t.

Snarki, child of Loki - November 29, 2011 | 12:45 pm · Link

@feebog:

How stupid do you have to be to make the decision to run for President with all this crap in your closet.

Well, I think we now know exactly how stupid one needs to be, but for the GOP that’s a “feature”.

Huge, walk-in closets in GOP-land. It’s only a question of which candidate gets to play Fibber McGee next, and have everything come cascading out.

Bubblegum Tate - November 29, 2011 | 12:46 pm · Link

@Jewish Steel:

I think it might be possible that Newt’s indiscretions are such old news that elicit only yawns from the GOP base.

Actual exchange on a wingnut blog after one wingnut claimed that Newt is “courageous”:

“How much courage did it take to run out on two wives?”

The response? To quote verbatim: “zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz”

So yeah, you’re exactly right.

Bokonon - November 29, 2011 | 12:50 pm · Link

But … but … but … BILL CLINTON

RossinDetroit - November 29, 2011 | 12:50 pm · Link

I thank the FSM daily that Obama is squeaky clean. If he did 2% of the dirty deeds that some of his GOP opponents managed to incorporate into their private lives they would shred him.
Because IOKIYAR and shut up, that’s why.

Pococurante - November 29, 2011 | 12:51 pm · Link

@feebog:

And he was stupid enough to think he could get away with it.

I guess he didn’t pull out soon enough…

Samara Morgan - November 29, 2011 | 12:52 pm · Link

@The Bearded Blogger: AllahP says Pawlenty. Sully lieks Huntsman. Nate Silver says watch NH to see if Huntsman starts eating into Romneys vote.
there arent any rightside military brass with enough name recog.
McC wont do it.

what are the odds of a brokered convention?
or Palin being tapped as someones VP?

trollhattan - November 29, 2011 | 12:53 pm · Link

@Punchy:

This. He’s basically Sarah™ in trousers and while he was surprised, perhaps even pleased by his leap in the polls, never intended anything beyond fattening his wallet and, evidently, touring the nation in search of more nookie.

Middle school boys across the nation are now considering politics.

Cheryl from Maryland - November 29, 2011 | 12:55 pm · Link

This thread is so full of win.

RossinDetroit - November 29, 2011 | 12:58 pm · Link

GOP Primary Campaign 2012: All schadenfreude all the time.

The Bearded Blogger - November 29, 2011 | 1:00 pm · Link

@Samara Morgan: I can see Pawlenty, Huntsman not so much (“moderate” + mormon)... Palin’s big plus in 2008 was novelty, but I’m sure the next VP will be a Palin of sorts… Maybe JC Watts:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/J._C._Watts

Amir Khalid - November 29, 2011 | 1:04 pm · Link

A lot of us have been speculating that the Cain campaign is just a book/self-promotional tour in disguise. If Ginger White’s claims kill his chances of nomination, might the Hermanator then decide, “Hey they’re never going to nominate me now, i can really give this campaign the full Hermanator Experience!” ?

RossinDetroit - November 29, 2011 | 1:07 pm · Link

The last round of harassment accusations paradoxically gave Herm a big boost in fund raising. I wonder if we’ll find out if this affair helps or hurts him.

Paul in KY - November 29, 2011 | 1:10 pm · Link

@Brachiator: Interesting that the Breitling Corp. now seems to have their own fighter jets. Pretty soon, Microsoft will have their own aircraft carrier.

Roger Moore - November 29, 2011 | 1:14 pm · Link

@General Stuck:

I don’t expect to see a brokered convention. If all of the primaries were proportional it would be likely. But there are enough winner-take-all delegates that the most popular candidate is likely to be able to get a majority by combining delegates from the proportional states with the lion’s share of the winner-take-all delegates. The only way not-Romney can block Romney from rolling through the second half of the calendar is if all of the not-Romney people get behind a single candidate, in which case whichever not-Romney they get behind will win.

As I see it, the most likely scenarios are:

1) Not-Romney can’t settle on a candidate, they split the vote, and Romney gets enough delegates from the winner-take-all states to win the nomination.
2) Not-Romney does settle on a candidate, who gets the combined not-Romney delegates from the proportional states plus the vast majority of the delegates from the winner-take-all states.
3) Romney does badly enough in the proportional states that he drops out and the leading not-Romney wins the nomination in a cakewalk.

The only scenario I can imagine that leads to a brokered convention is that not-Romney only manages to settle on a single candidate after Romney has gotten most of the way to a majority, but that Ron Paul (and possibly some other non-compromising fringe candidate) has enough delegates to prevent either Romney or not-Romney from winning outright.

Samara Morgan - November 29, 2011 | 1:29 pm · Link

@Roger Moore: The othersides take on a brokered convention.

I’m sure this sounds exciting to a lot of base voters who may be disillusioned with the current crop of candidates. Who knows what might happen in a case like that? (The author exhibits the requisite restraint to avoid mentioning Sarah Palin riding into the convention hall on a polar bear, wearing a necklace made of the teeth of the Democratic leadership.) The scenario is designed to be exciting, much like one of the final episodes of The West Wing. But as Doug Mataconis points out, it’s probably not nearly as probable as Megidal imagines.

licensed to kill time - November 29, 2011 | 1:52 pm · Link

Anybody link to the new poll on The Borowitz Report yet?

Heh.

Hoodie - November 29, 2011 | 2:04 pm · Link

I doubt Herman actually thought he could win the nomination, he was just milking it for the money and attention, because that’s what he craves, not the presidency itself. Watching Cain is to see a genuine, clinical-grade narcissistic sociopath in action. He shows all the signs: grandiose self-importance despite complete ignorance and incompetence as to the substance of the job; manipulative behavior (a common theme of this and the Bialek episode is that his “helping a woman with financial problems” invariably involves inserting his dick in some orifice as a quid pro quo); and the ability to lie without remorse when cornered. Evidently, being the head of the National Restaurant Association offers a target rich environment for a sexual predator.

Dream On - November 29, 2011 | 2:17 pm · Link

And Jeb Bush makes his entrance…

Brachiator - November 29, 2011 | 3:03 pm · Link

@Hoodie:

Watching Cain is to see a genuine, clinical-grade narcissistic sociopath in action. He shows all the signs: grandiose self-importance despite complete ignorance and incompetence as to the substance of the job; manipulative behavior (a common theme of this and the Bialek episode is that his “helping a woman with financial problems” invariably involves inserting his dick in some orifice as a quid pro quo); and the ability to lie without remorse when cornered.

Goddamm, Balloon Juicers need to stop playing Junior psychoanalyst. There appear to be more sociopaths in America than there are vampires in a Twilight flick.

Evidently, being the head of the National Restaurant Association offers a target rich environment for a sexual predator.

I’m really not seeing how getting a lover or mistress is anything near being “a sexual predator.” This kind of BS also infantilizes women and their choices. Ginger White doesn’t sound like a victim or a fool, or someone who was exploited.

It was something that took me away from my humdrum life at the time

Quite frankly. I can imagine that a lot of women (and some men) can relate to this, even if they would make a different decision.

Hoodie - November 29, 2011 | 3:35 pm · Link

@Brachiator: I’m talking about his motivations, not hers. I’m not criticizing her, she may have had her own reasons for having the affair. As for relieving the monotony of her life, it can be entertaining to hang around with a sociopath; a lot of them are quite entertaining until they don’t have any use for you.

I’m not one to throw around “sociopath” as a label, it usually is just normal ego. But with Cain, I think you have something more profound. Cain seems to be a pathological liar and a fraud. His first instinct appears to be to discredit women when he gets caught.

Brachiator - November 29, 2011 | 4:33 pm · Link

@JGabriel: Point taken.

@Hoodie:

I’m not one to throw around “sociopath” as a label

Surely, you jest.

Cain seems to be a pathological liar and a fraud. His first instinct appears to be to discredit women when he gets caught.

To be fair, with the most recent accusation, in his interview with Wolf Blitzer, Cain called Ms White’s claims baseless. He did not appear to try to personally discredit her. This kind of crap has been the work of conservative pundits, some of whom have been quite despicable (yeah, I’m talking bout you, Limbaugh).

And there is something just wrong about the words “Cain” and “profound” used in the same sentence.

Roger Moore - November 29, 2011 | 5:00 pm · Link

@Samara Morgan:
I hadn’t known the detail about mixed proportional and winner-take-all delegates, but that just reinforces the idea that the brokered convention is unlikely. It looks to me as if the process is designed to give a process that gives a good length shake-out period followed by a coronation for whomever is left standing after the early rounds. That’s a reasonable approach if the goal is to give an opportunity for something like democracy to prevail while minimizing the chances of a brokered convention. The only criticism I can think of is that the real decision tends to take place in the early states, which are slanted toward Republican strongholds rather than battleground states, so it leans toward ideologues rather than centrists who might have a better chance in the general election.

elftx - November 29, 2011 | 6:38 pm · Link

oh noes..comments were not left at 99 which was sooo poetic.
we must continue onward to 999

and Cain is an arrogant prick..

that is all

Christopher Duva - December 2, 2011 | 1:42 pm · Link

It’s Beginning to Look a Lot Like Gingrich! Merry Gingrich and a Happy Newt Year!

http://youtu.be/OcV4EaSElfw