My Sunday Feeling

Herman Cain may be many things.  But he's not stupid.  And since he is not stupid, how did he think that allegations of sexual harassment and infidelity would not  eventually come to light during the white hot atmosphere of a presidential campaign?  The most recent is a lady from Atlanta named Ginger White who claims that she had a 13 year relationship with him.  Even had phone records and text messages to back up the claim.

Guess Herman Cain never heard of Houston Nutt.

Let me say this again.  I could give a rip about what two consenting adults do in private, be it a romantic interlude or a commercial transaction.  As I wrote about a certain prominent Arkansan's wandering from the marital hearth, if Hillary could live with it, I could live with it.  I honestly do not care.

But really.  What made John Edwards, Bill Clinton, and now Herman Cain think they could get away with it?

We all engage in compartmentalism.  Which is to say that we tend to rationalize our faults and/or put them somewhere in our heads where we don't have to trip over them too often.  A more extreme example of this behavior would be found in the interview of accused child molester Jerry Sandusky on the front page of yesterday's New York Times which may be found here: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/12/03/sports/ncaafootball/at-center-of-penn-state-scandal-sandusky-tells-his-own-story.html?hp

As you can see, Coach continues to deny that he engaged in any deviant sexual behavior with minors.  And he reveals himself to be a whiner in the process. 

But sexual predators are a different breed of cat altogether.  In Sandusky's case, he talked himself into believing that he was helping these kids and he sticks to this story in the interview.  It is one thing to slip around on your spouse. (She's a bitch, she doesn't understand me, we're only married for the children's sake).  It is quite another thing to take a shower with a 10 year old boy.  (How the hell do you talk yourself into thinking THAT'S normal?)  So let's forget pedophiles, although it is useful to note that Sandusky actually thought he had a shot at being Head Coach at Penn State someday despite his unsavory sexual proclivities. Evidently, he must have thought his criminal deviancy would never pop up in a background check. 

But let us return to mere garden variety egomaniacs.  There is the thought being bandied about that Cain wasn't really all that serious about running for President much in the way it was the suspicion that Mike Huckabee was mainly in it for the money down the road.  But still, why put yourself in the public spotlight thereby running the risk of humiliating your spouse and/or hurting your family and supporters?  How could you?

A buddy of mine has a working theory that a person has to be borderline crazy to want to put themselves through electoral politics at a certain level.  Or maybe any level.  I have a buddy in the Arkansas State Legislature.  You ought to hear some of the stories he's told me. 

There may be something to my friend's theory.  You would have to be crazy to think that you can cat around with and give money to a woman not your spouse for 13 years and that it can be kept a secret when all of a sudden you decide to thrust your philandering self into a race for a public office.  He wasn't sleeping with her?  Right.  Name me another man in our common experience who is giving money to a woman over that length of time who isn't showing him where the horse bit her. 

I mean c'mon.  That's crazy.  And he was leading on that side of the aisle for a bit.  And now serial philanderer Newt is "trending" as they say.  In the race to become the standard bearer for the party that allegedly stands for an exceedingly cramped view of Christian morality. 

This is crazy. 

But maybe the R's are counting on their lunatic base to compartmentalize as well.