Whose With You Now - Mr. Cain

For all that I know about faith I have come to understand that we all have a cross to bear and I mean that in terms of the burden race. Let me make that statement more direct – being black. From the first day we were dragged upon the shores of this land people of African decent have had an intense desire that we mind our manners and avoid personal acts and activity that would make the entire race look bad. Of course, or should I say, there were those images we did allow to represent us as buffoons to entertain those of the other hue, which left an impression of our worthlessness.

You know what I mean like the bad hair thing, chitterlings, water mellows, and such! Even when we were made out to be fools on television and in the movies most of us abided by the unwritten rules of deportment. I did say most of us! Well until this year’s human, and I use that loosely, a guy who will inevitably become known as a disgrace to our community and beyond. Let me put it differently; we have progressed to the point where, in my opinion, the buffoonery of a Herman Cain will make us shudder and shrink into the shadows to hide our faces.

For him to suggest that blacks should have gone to the back of the bus and not caused no trouble. Or, to say that African Americans were brainwashed is an unforgiveable insult that has frankly relegated this guy to a place far outside of the antics comparable to Amos 'n' Andy or even a Stepin Fetchit character. He so far as to tell the world that the ultraconservative billionaires the Koch brothers were his "brothers from another mother" and describing himself as "black-walnut ice cream" only drew disdain from our community.

Then came his ignorance, and I meant to use that word, of foreign affairs. Like the most talked about event this year - the war in Libya or the fact that China has had a nuclear bomb for years and lest not forget his long pauses and poor answers to questions about policy issues that presidents confront daily which reflected solely on him and all he could say was 9-9-9! Shocking!!! Calling him an embarrassment is too kind.

And his 999 tax plan is simple-sounding enough that Mr. John Q. Average can feel secure in it because he doesn't think he needs to do the math and not realizing that he would potentially pay more than he does now. Cain sees water-boarding as an "enhanced interrogation technique" and homosexuality as a "choice". Of course he has flip-flopped on abortion depending on the day of the week he is asked the question. Frankly, he was a good ol’ uncle who did what he was told and the ideological Tea Party-esque Republican wanted to hear. He was just a man with a black face belittling President Obama.

I've found no one who pays much serious attention to his comments and behavior, certainly no one in the African American community. Maybe I should digress because “they” seems to always find someone like him who reminds me of my uncle whose name is Thomas but we call him Tom for short. Then came the “jump-offs”, which made his sorry character seem as if it came straight out of central casting for black exploitation. Negro please!!! Did you not know they would dig up all of these white women?

"He's just stupid," a black, politically savvy grandfather in Chattanooga was reported as saying. "He knew he had all that baggage in his background before he ran. He is not qualified to be president." I could not have said it better. So I guess the million dollar question is what does Herman Cain get out of it?

A lot of attention to grease his outsize ego, a lot of money from speaking engagements and book sales, and bragging rights to say that not only did he run for president, but for a brief moment, he was actually the leader in his race. But now he'll have to assess, with his family and us, whether the ride was worth it.

This clown who really had no chance for the Citizen Council to make him their candidate even though he thinks that the unemployed are in their situations because they just don't try hard enough and that blacks are "brainwashed into not being open-minded" about conservative positions; according to him racism doesn't hold blacks back. He believes that God told him to run for president, sort of like the way God told Moses to lead the Hebrews.

Being what Malcolm described as a House Negro allowed him to use his populist charisma, managed to get conservatives to anoint him the Apostle of the Negro Right. One popular conservative said, he’s one of our blacks and he is better than there blacks. I am still trying to figure that one out but where I come from that is code for uncle.

So with Election Day less than a year away the Citizen Council has thrown their boy under the bus and we are left with the prospect of the likes of Michele Bachmann, the flip flopper Mitt Romney who they call “him”, Ron Paul who would rather revisit Jim Crow, Rick Perry whose family owns a ranch called “Nigger Head” and the serial fibber Newt Gingrich. Maybe with a cast of characters like that Uncle Herman should have remained. Wouldn’t that have been a good thing? Not really. One thing history has taught us is that people who can appeal to masses but who avoid the scrutiny of individuals are dangerous. Hitler comes to mind.

There was a line in the movie Men in Black, and I’ll paraphrase, individuals are smart because they are discerning, but people - meaning groups - are fearful, nervous and easily manipulated. That, to me, explains why Cain was doing so well in the polls.

I guess that’s why I have such distain for black conservatives such as Cain. They can hold high the ideals of what America should be. But then they've got to deal with the next cringe-worthy thing they are told to say and there is no place for them when they are abandoned by those who run the plantation. Cain and all his foibles deserve to be in the place he’s in and may he find peace in knowing that he is all alone.

I seem to recall Jesus said in the synoptic gospels that “tell you, it is hard for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven. …it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God.” Matthew 19:23-24

And that is my Thought Provoking Perspective…





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