Done Fighting

From 23% to 8% support in Iowa in one month, Herman Cain’s race for the presidency ends. Herman Cain suspended his bid for president on Saturday, claiming there was too much “hurt caused on me and my family”.

Cain had been rising in the polls since late September, gaining a large amount of media attention. From the increase in media attention came a large amount of criticism on his political views and an increasing amount of allegations that proved to be too much to beat. As he said in his speech suspending his campaign, it is “not because I am not a fighter”.

When Cain suspended his bid he was at 8% support in Iowa, tied with Representative Michele Bachmann. If that isn’t a reason to suspend his campaign I don’t know what is. 

Although Herman Cain was not the best candidate for the presidential nomination, the candidates we are left to choose from are not exactly the best choices either. With that said who will Cain choose to endorse? 

In September, when the candidates were asked to hypothetically say who they would support if they were not in the race Cain said he would support speaker Gingrich, whom he “has the greatest admiration for in all seriousness, because of his history and his depth of knowledge. With Gingrich at the top of the polls this seems like a possibility for Cain. 

(go to 9:58 seconds or use this link:  http://youtu.be/qVMa1rVv7XA?t=9m58s)

Although Cain joked about supporting Romney if he were to throw out his jobs growth plan and replace it with 9 9 9, it doesn’t seem like Cain would support Romney whether he did that or not. Let’s get real, Cain is a tea party, very conservative republican and Romney has been criticized for being too liberal. However, Romney has surprised us by gaining the endorsement of high-profile conservative Ramesh Ponnuru. Although saying Romney’s “health care plan in Massachusetts was Obamacare in one state. He’s a flip-flopper. Inauthentic”, Ponnuru also said, “[Romney] is the candidate that should be elected” in the primaries. 

We have seen almost everything in this race for the republican nominee. We have seen a candidate forget his reform plan, inappropriate jokes about electric fences and foreign policy, unsupported accusations towards certain drugs, candidates acting drunk at a speech and much more. As we have witnessed so much in this race even before the primaries have even started, anything can happen. Cain may surprise us all and endorse a candidate we wouldn’t have even have thought about.

Sources and articles used for quotes and pictures:

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/12/04/us/politics/herman-cain-suspends-his-presidential-campaign.html?ref=politics

http://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/12/02/high-profile-conservative-endorses-romney/?scp=1&sq=romney%20endorsement&st=cse 

http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2011/11/30/us/politics/ups-and-downs-of-the-cain-candidacy.html

Who will it be?

It seems, just as Herman Cain’s campaign dramatically comes to an end, Newt Gingrich took Cain’s spot at the top. Nearly 1 month ago Cain was 23% support in Iowa, while Gingrich was at 7% support. Now the tables have turned, putting Gingrich at 25% and Cain out of the race. 

What could this mean for Romney who is now at 18% support and in third place, less than one month before the Iowa caucus? 

Romney has lingered near the top of the polls for nearly the entire race, never really reaching front runner status but always staying in the line of sight. Now, as we approach the Iowa caucus, Romney is being beaten out by Ron Paul and Newt Gingrich. 

Many have claimed that Romney is most likely to gain the nomination for the republican candidate, although he has always been near the top and in the media, but never the number one. It seems Rick Perry with 6% support and Michelle Bachmann with 8% support in Iowa, have almost no chance of winning after the many stumbles both have had throughout their campaigns. 

Seeing as almost all of the candidates have had their day’s in the sun, I had though John Huntsman might come out from nowhere and rise to the top of the polls, just as Michele Bachmann, Herman Cain, Ron Paul, and now Newt Gingrich have done. With only one month till the Iowa Caucus it doesn’t seem like this will happen. Seeing as, Huntsman is at only 2% support in Iowa as of November 30^th. 

Will Gingrich maintain his spot at the top through the primaries and gain the vote from republicans or will Romney be the republican choice in the end?

What surprises me is the fact that Herman Cain got so much criticism from allegations of a 13 year affair and dropped in the polls, later suspending his candidacy. However, Newt Gingrich had an affair as well in the 90’s and is now married to the woman he had the affair with. It is not the affair that surprises me as much as the fact that he was on the committee to impeach Clinton for lying about his affair, while at the same time he had hypocritically carried out affair as well. Why this hasn’t hit the media beats me. Maybe because it is old news, or maybe the media will pay more attention the longer Gingrich stays at the top of the polls. 

Seeing as most of the candidates have only stayed front runner for a month or less maybe Gingrich being at the top of the polls now is not such a good thing. We will just have to wait and see what the outcome will be. 

Sources:

http://caucuses.desmoinesregister.com/2011/12/03/iowa-poll-gingrich-leading-the-pack/

The Politician and the Person

Forget his complete lack of understanding of foreign policy, his many ignorant comments, and the fact that he has little political experience. After, almost a month of being the front runner, Herman Cain is only now being pressured to step out of the race. 

Herman Cain’s alleged 13 year affair is what is causing some to rethink their view on Cain? An affair should be the least of anyone’s worries. How Herman Cain even became the front runner is what baffles me. 

 

When I think of a politician or a presidential candidate, I want to support them or oppose them based upon whether their political views and stance on topics is similar to my positions and whether or not they have actually done anything noteworthy as a politician. I also factor in whether or not they seem capable of achieving what they want to achieve. 

Throughout his campaign Herman Cain seemed to speak before going over in his head what he wanted to say. Herman Cain hasn’t seemed to take this campaign seriously, making a plethora of inappropriate jokes. Talking about an electric fence on the border, claiming democrats are brainwashing blacks, and much more. 

Why Herman Cain was ever a serious contender in the race for the republican nomination still surpasses my understanding. 

In my opinion there are two parts to a politician; the politician and the person. The politician is who we vote for; their views and policy positions. The other half of the politician is the person, their personal life and what they do outside of politics. It is possible to like the politician but find the person irresponsible and unethical. One example would be Bill Clinton. Although, I like him as a politician, he would not exactly be the kind of guy I would want to be friends with. Many always said the opposite for George W Bush. He’s the kind of guy everyone wants to be friends with but they don’t necessarily want him as a politician.  

It should not matter that Herman Cain had a 13 year affair with someone. If he wants to ruin his personal life, that is his own prerogative. When choosing a presidential candidate we are not voting for the candidate we think is the best person, we are voting for the best politician. 

Herman Cain’s run for presidency should have been questioned long before the affair allegations, and even before the sexual harassment allegations. 

Now, my question is, will this turn into another John Edwards situation? Four years ago during the 2008 run for president John Edwards was found to have had an affair leading to investigation of how his campaign funds were spent. The biggest question was if he in fact was using campaign funds to cover up the affair. Now with everything that has happened with Herman Cain and all of the allegations that keep popping up out of the blue, you never know.

Campaign Ads.... Bob Dole

Here are a few campaign advertisments used for the Bob Dole campaign against Bush. Are they effective or not? This video shows four Dole advertisements and talks about the effectiveness. I think the one comparing and contrasting the two is somewhat effective however, who wants to read  words on the television. The first ad appeal to emotion a little more and to me seemed an effective ad at getting people to like him as a person and the second one is better at show who he is as a politician. Together they work well but who is going to watch both together? They can both be effective but in different ways.

Campaign Advertising

Is 30 to 60 seconds enough to persuade a person onto one side or the other in a presidential campaign. This video talks about the time of campaign ads and if it is better to have multiple 30 second ads or maybe just one 2 minute ad. Although two minute ad's may get more information in, in today's day and age everyone likes things quick and concise. We have talked about the media sound bite and it is true. No one will pay attention to a two minute ad unless it is really intriguing. 30 seconds is quick and to the point. It could go either way. To me it is all about the execution of the ad versus the time of the ad. If it is an interesting two minutes than it is effective but even a 30 second ad could be ineffective it is not properly executed.

Campaign Ads- Mike Dukakis

It is interesting to see in these ads that education is an important topic even in the 90’s. The first ad seems relevant and seems like it would be effective, seeing as education has always been an important topic for a lot of people. Here they are talking about how they are the type of ads that are engaging. It is interesting to see how engaging ads then, most likely would not be as engaging now mostly because of the rise in technology and what we can do with it now.

More Shockers....????

As much fun as the presidential debates are, as I commented in my last blog, I got through about 30 minutes of Wednesday night’s debate and had to shut it off and finish it later. 

The first answer by Herman Cain in the debate in Michigan, should have told me that this debate would, once again, reinforce the opinions I have about the republican candidates. 

In his answer to the first questions, Herman Cain continued to reinforce the fact that we need to strengthen the American economy. How exactly does he plan on doing so? That, I am not entirely sure. 30 seconds of his first answer continues to repeat that we need to strengthen the American economy and the second half of his answer stressed the fact that a “dollar needs to be a dollar”. I understand he is talking about strengthening the value of the dollar and getting back its value but he doesn’t go any further in his answer.

The question Herman Cain was asked to answer was, how would he prevent Italy’s struggling economy from effecting the American economy. To me Herman Cain did not answer this question at all. He stressed what needs to be done with the American economy, but gave no way of actually fixing anything. Obviously, Maria Bartiromo felt as if Herman Cain did not answer the question either, based on her response. She tried to bring what Herman Cain said back to the original question, although tough to do. 

Herman Cain seems to do this a lot. He says what needs to be done but doesn’t explain it well, or even at all. 

However, Herman Cain was not the only one to falter at this debate. 

About 13 minutes into the debate, John Harwood, asked Mitt Romney about his changing positions on topics, including the bail out of the auto industries, through the years. Now, Mitt Romney responded, saying he is consistant and steady, using his long “marriage of twent…. Excuse me I’m going to get in trouble, 45 years”. Honestly, I don’t care that he and his wife has been together for 45 years. That is great and all, but I want him to use examples of the policy positions that have stayed the same throughout the years. 

His explanation about his view on the auto bailout contradicted the statement that he is steady and consistent because his view, once again, changed from what he had said before. 

 

On top of all that, there is Ron Paul, whose extremist positions make him not a viable candidate either. I agree that the debt from students coming out of college is extreme and ridiculous. However, due to the increasing demand for college degree’s in the workplace it does not seem like an option to get rid of all federal student aid and the federal department of education. I agree, maybe it needs to be fixed, but getting rid of it all together would cause more problems than it would help. If people can’t afford to go to school, then more people would be unemployed because they are not educated.

Let's just say the candidates need to go over their ideas a bit more, until they remember them or actually make sense in terms of everyone in our country.

Kennedy Nixon- First Televised Presidential Debate

First televised presidential debate. This video shows clips of the Kennedy Nixon debates that changed the presidential debates forever. Looking at the debate setup, it is almost exactly the same. It is funny to see how similar debates more than 50 years ago they are. This clip says that the point of the debate talked a lot about domestic issues. Whereas the previous clip I posted, the women comments that they did not talk enough about the domestic issues.  It is easy to see the similarities in the 1960 debate versus the 2008 McCain Obama debates and the many differences as well.

John McCain and Obama debate versus the 2011 Republican Debates

This clip talks about a debate for the 2008 election between President Obama and Senator John McCain. I found it interesting the similarities and differences in the thoughts about the debate from 2008 and the debates between the Republican Candidates going on right now. They talked about how the debate was dull and not interesting enough, however, I would say for the Republican debates going on right now, they are a little to interesting. The policies and political thought are not necessarily what has been making this years debates animated and interesting. Maybe the reason the debates going on right now are interesting and animated is due to the fact that it is all republicans fight against each other versus a republican and a democrat running for the presidential seat.

I can’t remember the title to this post......

To be fair, I did not watch the whole debate on Wednesday. The first 30 minutes was enough for me to shut the television off and walk away. I had no idea why everyone was talking about Rick Perry until I forced myself to finish the debate to see what all the comments were about. This spared Rick Perry a good day of criticism by me, before I began to really ask myself, why? Why is Rick Perry still running, how was he ever front runner, and how is he still taken seriously? 

Everyone makes mistakes. This is a concept I understand all too well. Everyone has made a comment about something to someone and later realized, wow did I really say that? It happens to the best of us. All we can say is dust off the embarrassment, get back up, jump back in and make up for it with a stunning next performance.

Now, Rick Perry has not seemed to grasp the concept of making up for his stupidity, and instead reinforces his stupidity. 

http://youtu.be/b8jcis-0dr8 (CNBC interview with George Stephanopoulos... Everybody makes mistakes).

Why am I now calling Rick Perry’s screw ups stupidity and not mistakes? 

Mistakes are made once or twice, within a couple months. Some mistakes are bigger than others. However, in the past two weeks Rick Perry is batting two for two. He first acted outrageous and out of control during his speech in New Hampshire making me believe he couldn't top that with anything more unprofessional. Low and behold he proved me wrong!

When I plan a speech in front of class, I practice it a few times, have some notes, know exactly what I want to say. Now, a debate is a little more challenging, not knowing what exactly is going to be asked and what is need to be said. However, the concept, of practicing for a debate is very similar to practicing a speech. you must memorize the main topics that you believe and practice the key points to your beliefs, or in Rick Perry’s case, his federal government reform ideas.

We all know the tax plans, health care plans and plans to regulate the federal government are not written by the candidates. They have advisers and staff to help with the expressing of their ideas. I am not saying the ideas are not the candidates but they are expressed by someone who knows the candidates ideas. This is understandable. The candidate has the ideas and knows what they need to do to fix the government (in theory), and they pay someone to write them into a plan that someone may actually want to believe in. 

In college, if someone writes a paper for someone else to hand in, that person should really read the paper before handing it in, to know what exactly their “stance” really is and knows answers to questions a teacher may ask. In politics you would think this same idea would apply. For Rick Perry apparently not. 

How can a politician forget the third federal agency they want to shut down? If it would really impact the United States and help job creation, it should be important enough to remember. The more shocking thing, is one of the other candidates says in a joking manner, “the EPA” is the third agency and Rick Perry laughs out a “yeah”, although really meaning, no!

This was not a laughing matter, although Rick Perry seemed to think it was. I do not want my president to say, ‘I am going to shut down three federal agencies that are killing jobs’ and only know two of them and randomly pick the third by the next one that pops to mind. 

The question is now, was this a "death blow" to Rick Perry's campaign? Well have to see.

So what have I learned from this debate and Rick Perry’s stupidity? Be sure to watch the whole debate next time, you never know when you’ll miss a good laugh.

CSPAN and social media

This video talks about C-SPAN being a part of social media. This however, also, talks about how social media is becoming more and more important in congress and the politics.

52% Popular Vote….. Where is the Media?

I realized I have been focusing on Rick Perry, Mitt Romney, Herman Cain and Michele Bachmann. They seem to be the ones that alternate off and on with either the frontrunner status or the most publicity. Although some now, more than others; Michele Bachmann’s popularity has been plummeting for a while.  

There is another nominee that not only I seem to have been ignoring in my posts but the media has been ignoring as well. Ron Paul has been steadily near the top of the polls and seemingly popular with voters but not so much with the media. Why is this? Maybe because of his age, or maybe he is just not as interesting as the other nominees.

Let’s face it, everyone wants some type of controversy or interesting story when they turn on the news at night. Who, other than the politicians, wants to sit and watch a two hour debate by 8 or 9 republicans on views you may not agree with, wearing suits of all similar colors and no changing facial movements? No one.

Now, watching the debates and the banter back and forth from Rick Perry and Mitt Romney actually adds a bit of interest to the presidential debates. This puts the focus on Perry and Romney, also giving them more media attention. 

Herman Cain, has his 9 9 9 plan which enacts a lot of controversy and interest from voters, making him an interesting target for the media to cover as well. His not so understandable explanations for why his 9 9 9 plan is so great and not to mention his lack of proper grammar makes him an interesting candidate to watch in interviews and debates, if not for anything more than to hear a couple of his not so clever jokes. Cain seems to be the funny man in this election, making inappropriate jokes about electric fences and claiming blacks are brainwashed. Herman Cain is a journalist’s dream come true. He puts himself in situations that warrant media attention. Somehow, Cain also managed to be front runner and high in the polls for over a month gaining major publicity. 

Michele Bachmann gets media attention due to her lack of common sense and her racist bigotry. Is that good publicity? In the presidential election it hasn’t seemed to make her anymore liked. If anything, it has sent her down in the polls. Now, who says no publicity is bad publicity? 

This weekend however, Ron Paul gained 52% of the popular vote in Illinois. None of the front runners have managed to gain this high of a popular vote yet in any other straw poll. My question is, why do I barely every hear about him. I know of him, and I watch him in the debates, but the debates usually seemed to focus on Romney, Perry and recently Herman Cain with a comment from Bachmann every once and a while. Although Ron Paul talked for about the same amount of time as Perry and Romney minus a few minutes it seemed like most of the debates have a focus on them. Whether that is just the way it is taped I don't know. But it is not a mistake, nothing in media is.

Why are Ron Paul’s voting rates so much higher than the other candidates; who knows? Maybe it is because Herman Cain is in the middle of a sexual harassment dispute, Rick Perry acted drunk during his 30 minute speech, Michele Bachmann doesn’t know what she is talking about, Mitt Romney flip flops his stance on topics and the other candidates don't really make a dent at all. Now, who wants to vote for people like that?

With Ron Paul gaining 52% popular vote you would think he would get much more media attention. Sadly, the fact is he is just not as interesting, meaning media worthy, than the other candidates. Although it is wrong and should not be the case, that’s the way, it is.

Are they serious?!

This past week a lot has happened within the realm of the republican candidates. Now people ask me why I am not a republican. If you watched the news last week at any time, there is my answer!

First, there is Herman Cain and the sexual harassment claims. I mean come on. First off, the sexual harassment case has been settled and happened more than 10 years ago. It is time to move on. However, do I trust Herman Cain after hearing the allegations; not really. Need I reiterate the fact that Herman Cain does not know how to explain things properly or defend himself without putting himself into a deeper and deeper hole?

First he says he had no idea about any settlement, then he says he knew about “an agreement” but not a settlement changing his story. Although sexual harassment is not acceptable in any way shape or form, the fact that Herman Cain may have sexually harassed a woman is not what makes me frustrated. The fact that Herman Cain’s explanations and stories always change from day to day, and he doesn’t seem to know what he is talking about. 

When he was trying to explain the 9 9 9 plan all he did was reiterate the fact that state and federal taxes was mixing apples and oranges. I did not get a full explanation of why the Washington posts’ analysis of his tax plan was wrong, he just said it was with little to no proof. Herman Cain may be a business man and able to run god father pizza, but to run the country you need a little bit of a mix between business and politics. Most politicians are too much like politicians and not good business men, but Herman Cain is a business man and not really a politician. The fact that he is also needing to even defend himself against a sexual harassment claim, that in fact did end in a settlement or “agreement” as Cain puts it, is also unsettling but not the straw that broke the camel’s back.

Herman Cain however, does not take the cake as the most unrespectable candidate. Rick Perry managed to win that one this week with his outrageous display during a speech in New Hampshire. Now there is a fine line between being “passionate” about his view points, as his advisors had called it, and being unprofessional. His voice mumbled at points and his facial expressions where extremely animated. Now, was he drunk? I can’t say. To me it sure looked that way. He giggled unprofessionally and his body movements didn’t seem to make sense. 

When I look for a politician to run the country that I am a part of, I expect them to be a bit animated but not overly so where they come off as if they are on a comedy show. When he tried to point out multiple points, he was not able to count them properly on his fingers. Now, if that was not enough, at the end of the speech, he oddly played with maple syrup and seemed a little too excited about the gift. Whether or not he was drunk, it was unprofessional and it seems no one would take the United States seriously if our president acted like that at an important meeting. I know I wouldn’t take him seriously.

I am all for a little bit of fun, but come on, that was just too much. To me, it doesn't matter if he was drunk or not. Frankly, I would preferred if he had been drunk, because then I would know that he would not act like this at any meeting or address that he had.

Here is the whole video:

Here are just clips of the video: 

These both portray his out of control behavior. Some may not want to watch the whole 25 minute speech so there are the shorter clips of about 8 minutes as well.

Congress Tweeting?!

 

Tweeting on the floor of congress?! Social media is really playing a part in politics now and days. Congress and the media can tweet their opinions on the floor of when listening to the state of the union speech. We can get peoples reactions from the speech, during the speech.

Social Media Use During Campaigns

http://www.c-spanvideo.org/program/SocialMedia/start/505/stop/823

(8 30 to about 14 minutes )

Although this video cannot be embedded, it talks about social media during the campaigns and is a great video to explain this. This is interesting, because they not only talk about twitter and Facebook, but blogs and YouTube as well in the political campaigns. It is talks about how most people using the social media to follow the campaigns are younger. Does it work well, is now the question.

Media from a Journalist's Point of View

http://www.c-spanvideo.org/program/Snea/start/188/stop/514

  This video is very interesting because it from Alexandra Pelosi who is a journalist. She talks about the relationship between the media and the presidential candidates. This is interesting because she talks about not the politics but how the media changes things so much that the journalists and the media are really the only ones who know the truth, where as regular people do not always know the truth. I liked how she talked about how different they are in real life compared to how the media portrays them. I really liked the quote she says, "I don't think the media really serves the American public". I thought this was interesting because she is a journalist and part of the media, so it was weird that she had this stance. This was not able to be embedded but I really liked this video and thought is was worth showing. Clicking the link should bring you to a link that has the times already edited in. If not the clip I am emphasizing is from 3:00 to 8:31min.

Now we have two tax plans to criticize!

Debate after debate, Rick Perry kept saying he was coming out a plan for a flat-tax while criticizing Herman Cain’s popular 9 9 9 plan. After weeks of waiting and receiving nothing, Perry finally came out with a flat tax as part of his economic plan. 

Now, unlike his immigration stance, this flat tax idea is very republican! Essentially it is raising the burden on the middle class while making it easier on the wealthy. Although I don’t think that the wealthiest people should pay substantially more in taxes, if they are able to why not put the burden on them more while letting some of the pressure of the middle to lower class. 

According to President Obama’s advisors “many flat tax proposals also eliminate all taxation on capital gains and other investment income so that the wealthiest, who generate much of their income from investments, rather than work, see huge gains”. 

Although it is hard to come up with a perfect tax plan that will bring our economy back, can’t these candidates at least come up with something remotely plausible and smart.

If we continue to take from the poor and middle class, the gap between the wealthy and the poor will continue to increase. The economy will continue to suffer if the gap between the wealthy and the poor continues to become larger. 

Now, Herman Cain’s tax plan does not seem any better of an idea either. Whether that is because he does not seem to be able to explain it properly or if he simply just doesn’t understand it himself, I have not found very much good with his plan. It seems as if all other sources find that his plan will generate less revenue than more and he simply says they are wrong. To me it is not very convincing. 

It seems that Herman Cain’s plan has managed to keep him at the top however, while Perry is still drifting lower and lower in the polls, dragging behind even Michele Bachmann in the recent Iowa poll. Now, what I do not understand is why so many people seem to support Herman Cain’s 999 plan, which seems to make no sense, and President Obama’s jobs bill makes complete sense and cannot get passed. The buffet plan seemed to make so much sense, while Herman Cain just continues to repeat the same answers with his 999 plan that just raise more questions.

Website used for quotation above:

http://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/10/25/obama-attacks-perry-on-flat-tax/?scp=4&sq=perrys%20tax%20plan&st=cse

Pizza explanation of Herman Cain’s Tax Plan

http://www.wnyc.org/articles/its-free-country/2011/oct/17/explainer-herman-cains-9-9-9-tax-plan/

Herman Cain... still on top?

I think we are all surprised by the Iowa poll results released on Saturday. Herman Cain is still in the lead! 

Although essentially in a tie with Mitt Romney, Herman Cain came out on top leading the Iowa poll with 23% support from republicans. Most people, namely me, thought that Herman Cain would fade in and out of the spotlight within one or two weeks just like most of the other candidates. 

Rick Perry, former governor of Texas, was the frontrunner in mid-September leading the race with 30% of support after his second debate in the run for President of the United States 2012. With a few shaky debates and his unpopular immigration views there is no wonder his status as front runner did not last long. Perry was front runner for a little over two weeks during September with his popularity decreasing with every day. My opinion, he was only frontrunner because he was the new nominee, not because of his abilities, and this obviously showed with the decrease in his support. In the recent poll from Iowa, Perry only received 7% of the votes tying with Newt Gingrich. Perry even came out behind Michele Bachmann who received 8% of the votes. 

Coming out behind Bachmann must have been a blow for Perry. Even Tea Party supporters as calling her campain a joke, and she a Tea Party Republican! Michele Bachmann has actually become so unpopular with the one group of Tea Party activists, they want her to resign her campaign.  Michele Bachmann at one (very short lived) time was frontrunner as well. In the Iowa poll at the end of August she received 22% of the popular vote while Romney received 23%. They essentially were tied making her the front runner, receiving a lot of the media attention. Her popularity, however, dropped so much to where she was dead last in the Florida straw poll, only a month after being at the top. 

I expected Herman Cain’s popularity to decline just as did the other nominees. About a month later and he is still on top. Herman Cain has never held office, does not always use proper grammar, and can never seem to explain his messages properly to a point of understanding. How is he still on top? Well looking at the other nominees there aren’t very many other viable options. 

Mitt Romney to me seems the most capable and most appropriate option out of the republican nominees but for some reason just can’t catch a break. His religion seems to be a big issue with a lot of voters and he is always getting bashed in debates by Perry. Perry and Romney seem to always fight back and forth dominating the debates but Romney still always seems to be over shadowed by another one of the candidates. Michele Bachmann was a fresh female Tea Party republican, Perry was the new guy and Herman Cain has his 999 plan. Each one of the previous frontrunners had a reason for being front runner and Romney is just there, but consistent. He always seems to come out in the top three for the polls. This poll he essentially tied with Cain, and in the very beginning of the debates he basically tied with Bachmann. Although not always getting the spot light he still manages to stay consistent and in the end will that be enough? Who knows?

But at this moment Cain continues to stay frontrunner gaining a lot of the media coverage. Will the same thing happen to Cain that happened to Bachmann? Well they did both tie with Romney with almost the exact same statistics. Bachmann received 22% of the vote in the Iowa straw poll whereas Romney received 23% and in the Iowa poll conducted Saturday Romney received 22% and Cain received 23%. Will Cain be able to prevent what happened to Bachmann from happening to himself? Well it has been a month and he is still on top so we will just have to wait and see.