The fact that the dude has no mention over three pages is, in fact, an indication that he does not have a very solid base. Has anyone other than the same folks who keep coming to all his rallies ever heard of him? What’s he done before? What big ideas is he bringing to the table? How much money has he raised? Yes, yes, I could no doubt look him up on Wikipedia and learn the answers to all those questions, but the fact that I even have to ask is a very bad sign for him as a candidate.
Umm . . . care to point out where I said only KDFs would be voting for Cain?
I guess I’ve been royally put in my place.
(scrolling up …) Phew. I thought KDF meant Kraft Durch Freude.
There were plenty of people, even a lot of future Obama voters, who had never heard of Obama at this point in the last Presidential election cycle. However, there are other things that are very bad signs for Herman Cain as a candidate. For one, he’s a Teabagger, and that ship seems to be sailing at about the same rate that the 112th congress is diarrheaing on their campaign promises of fiscal restraint in favor of spending money on social conservatism.
Oh, and he’s black. And I will unabashedly state that a significant number of people who would otherwise like what he says will have a hard time getting worked up about voting for a black man. You’re living in a fantasy world if you don’t realize that this would hurt/kill his (extremely hypothetical) run at office.
Not that I think people will be thrilled with the Democrats next year, but I’m fairly sure that the label “Tea Party” will rightfully be seen as the joke it’s always been by then. It served its purpose for the Republican party and they’re just about done with it.
Most politically interested people were aware of Obama at this point in the '08 cycle. I don’t think you can say the same for Herman Cain.
I guess its possible that Cain and other marginal candidates might gain a boost if the ‘real’ candidates go much longer without actually starting to run for the nomination. After all, the media is eventually going to want to start talking people up as actual candidates, and say what you will about Cain, he’s at least pretty straightforward about running for Prez.
That said, I agree he won’t actually win.
Obama wasn’t polling badly at all by this point in 2007. Cain doesn’t appear to be polling at all.
Missed my edit window:
Last time, there wasn’t a lot of enthusiasm for anyone the Republicans were running, which led a bunch of people (especially Freepers) to latch on to their great savior… Fred Thompson.
I’m not really contradicting you but I think people desperate for a candidate would look elsewhere than Herman Cain. St. Sarah would be a likely one to want to ride to the rescue and claim that she simply HAD to enter the race (then pull out early claiming she was being threatened).
Aside from everything else, Cain’s only experience as a candidate (from his Wikipedia page, possibly they are omitting something) was a failed primary run for a Senate seat; he didn’t even get his party’s nomination.
Wishful thinking.
I mean that in both senses of the word. “Wishful,” as in I wish conservatives would gear up and present more in-depth ideas and rhetoric than that designed to appeal to the tea party mass. Some of the goals may be the same, but the vehicle and manner of implementation coming from a ditto head versus, say, a Buckley-ite are two different things.
And wishful thinking in the sardonic sense. Between Fox, talk radio, and the Koch brothers, there is a lot of media and money to be spent propping up tea party candidates. All three know they it will be easier to get what they want (money, power) by appealing to the tea party’s base instincts.
No one is laughing. 
Apparently he won the Redstate.com reader poll. But I’d never heard of him, Godfather’s Pizza, the National Restaurant Association or basically anything else he’s ever been associated with.
Its kinda weird how little attention Pawlenty has been getting. He seems the obvious pick to me. He’s pretty obviously running, unlike Palin and Huckabee who seem to be just keeping a toe in the water, he isn’t insane like Bachmann, he actually has a political office unlike, well, most of the GOP field, he’s from an area that will likely be a battleground in the general election, he isn’t hated by most of the country like Newt and Palin. He’s bascially Romney, but without the baggage of having invented Obama-care or thinking Jesus came to America.
But he always seems to comeup as an afterthought when people are considering GOP primary candidates.
Thread had moved on a bit by the time I posted. This was in reference to Cain.
That’s entirely due to his low name recognition: He is hated by most folks who have heard of him.
He’s currently running second to Romney in the Intrade markets.
With Palin apparently out, Bachmann will be the new darling of the Tea Soirée. She could do well in Iowa. The Republican party primaries last year showed that the tea bagger element must be taken seriously at that level and less so at the general election level. That said, Bachmann is still Palin-lite. She is just as nuts as Palin, if not more so, but she doesn’t have the same rabid following of fans behind her. Not yet anyway.
Ultimately, I think the party will try to pick someone they think can actually oust the foreign-born, socialist in the White House and to me that comes down to T-Paw and Daniels (if he decides to run.)
Ooh! Roy “10 Commandments” Moore is throwing his hat into the ring! This is just the most pathetic roster of candidates (well, sort of - maybe - someday candidates) ever.
Do you think this is how it will be? Most of the serious candidates don’t want to burn money on a tough campaign cycle, so they’ll sit it out until 2016, leaving mostly the unknowns to go at it in 2012.
Sorta like the Dems in 1992: everybody knew Cuomo was gonna get in eventually, and nobody wanted to go up against him. Even Clinton was (supposedly) just in it to raise some money and get some name recognition before he dropped out.
There were no posts for Cain, now there are 8 and counting. Played like a fiddle. Thanks for the press.
-Regards.
OMG how can Cain lose now that he’s got ten whole posts on a rarely-updated thread in the SDMB!
Google still follows it, rarely-updated or not.