by Herman Cain
We then went on to Fargo, rushed to the hotel to change, and arrived at the meeting room as the attendees were eating dinner. When they saw me, they stopped eating and gave me a standing ovation. It made me forget all about the flight to get there.
From North Dakota, we flew to Michigan, where I made two appearances: First I participated in a Skype presentation from my hotel room to a meeting near Tucson, Arizona, of the SaddleBrooke Republican Club, and the following day I spoke at a Tea Party rally on the steps of the State Capitol Building in Lansing.
Finally, after a week of close calls, we flew from Detroit to Atlanta. When we looked at our boarding passes, we discovered that we were on Delta 1045—there’s that number again! That’s the way God works.
Earlier on, Mark and I had agreed that if only we could get through Hell Week, we could then prepare for the first debate, in Greenville, South Carolina. For a while the decision to participate was touch and go, because funds we had anticipated receiving from some people in Texas and allocating to pay the $25,000 entry fee hadn’t come in, as promised.
I ended up putting in some of my own money as seed funds because there were some positive signs, among them that I had won several straw polls, including the one held in Iowa at the Conservative Values Conference. And we had just been listed for the first time in a Gallup Poll, achieving the highest positive intensity score over the other declared and presumed candidates. This score measures each candidate’s capability of generating enthusiasm among those Republicans who are familiar with the candidates.
Good things were happening, and I told my staff that we needed to “double down” so that we could participate in the debate. An accountant would never have made that decision; only an entrepreneur could have. I just had a really good feeling about it.
We got to Greenville at three o’clock on the day before the debate. I did the Cavuto show at four and then the team went out to dinner. Then I got to bed early, but not before calling Scott Bieniek, my campaign’s general counsel, asking him to call my executive assistant, Lisa Reichert, with a special message from me not to worry about the office, but to come to the debate.
Lisa thought that was a wonderful invitation, so, as she told me after the debate, since she didn’t have to go to the office that day, she decided to go by her church, the Stockbridge First United Methodist, and pray. It was the sixtieth observance of our country’s National Day of Prayer. When she walked into the sanctuary around noontime, it was empty. That was unusual, and Lisa was able to go to the prayer rail and get on her knees for about twenty minutes and talk to God about all the things that were in her heart.
One of Lisa’s prayers was for me: “Lord, you have already given him the words to say; now let everybody hear what he has to say.”
When her prayers were completed, as she wiped her tears from the prayer rail, Lisa looked down on the altar and saw that someone who had been there before her had left a prayer card with my name on it. As Lisa told me, “I knew that God was surely with you.” Obviously her prayers were answered, because my words were heard by so many around the country.
The next morning I did a few interviews and relaxed. In the afternoon I took a nap and then had a bowl of soup before going over to the Peace Center.
In the green room, I was straightening my tie, and I looked at Hansen and said, “You know, I can remember when I wanted to make $20,000 a year and I thought: If I could only make that annual salary, I would achieve my American dream. And now I am in a presidential debate!” Hansen and I looked at each other, both of us thinking, “Life is an adventure, isn’t it?”
The debate began. During the first commercial break, Tim Pawlenty, a really nice man—he was standing next to me on the platform—said, “Herman, we don’t have anything to do for a few minutes. Want to play tic-tac-toe?”
“I forgot how to play it,” I said, because I knew he was joking.
After the debate, when I walked into the media room, it felt like a hundred cameras and microphones were being stuck in my face, like a swarm of bees, and as I walked around the room, the whole swarm followed me.
Then we went back to our hotel and Mark and the others who had accompanied me to Greenville joined me in my suite. Lo and behold, Fox was running the whole debate again, so we sat there, glued to the television set. It was like watching a football game we had just won, all over again.
Lisa didn’t get home till after 2:00 A.M. but she still managed to be in the office by 8:00 A.M. She was exhilarated and shared her story with me about the prayer card. I took off my glasses and pulled out my handkerchief. It was truly a “God moment.” The whole experience was thrilling, the turning point that saved my campaign. I was inspired anew.
I continue to be inspired by the citizens’ Tea Party movement. I’m inspired by other people I’ve met who are encouraging me to go forward in my venture. But, most important, I’m inspired by God Almighty. I feel compelled to do this and I’m inspired by all those little faces out there. And if you don’t believe me, ask any parent or grandparent, because it’s not about us, folks, it’s about them.
We’ve got to save the savable and take back this country. I know now that I’m going to save my aunt Bessie and she’s got hope. It’s not about us. It’s about our children and grandchildren.
As I travel around the country and am introduced at an event, I prefer a short introduction to a long one, because what I’ve done in the past is not as important as what I’m going to do.
I’m constantly trying to reach audiences based upon the reaction I get from certain things and then incorporate in my speeches. It’s a dynamic process. It’s not just a stump speech I’m giving.
I’ve used a written speech only once in over twenty years and it was the worst one I’ve ever made, so I said, “I’ll never do that again.” There will be times that I might have to use a script, especially when it comes to foreign policy and foreign relations, because I don’t want to mess up somebody’s name or title—you’ve got to be really careful not to misstate something when you are talking about leaders of other countries. But other than that, I just speak from the head and from the heart.
And what I say must be striking a chord, because I invariably get a standing ovation. In fact, if I don’t get one, I’m sure I didn’t give a good speech. Actually, there was one time that I didn’t get a standing ovation and I thought, “It’s because I didn’t give a good speech.” Well, I had—I was told it was a great speech—but the reason I didn’t receive a standing ovation was that I was speaking at an accountants’ convention. They’re trained to be unemotional, so they sat there and just applauded. But according to their written feedback, they loved it!
Everywhere I campaign these days, people come up to me and ask, “Can you really win in 2012?”
“Well,” I tell them, “I wouldn’t be doing what I’m doing now if I didn’t think I could win. Losing is not in my DNA.”
Will it be difficult to unseat the incumbent president? Yes. His ratings hover around 45 percent. When I’m told that they have dropped to an all-time low of 39 percent, I’m not happy. Do you know who that 39 percent is? It’s the people who don’t have a clue what the real issues are—all they hear is what he’s reading off the teleprompter—and many times it’s deceptive, misleading, and incomplete. So he will be able to carry a lot of the people who are not paying attention. That’s why his approval rating stays low—that percent of people are not informed voters, which means that if he raises enough money and does enough slick commercials, he could pull it out. So that’s what we’re up against.
But here’s the good news. Here’s what encourages me: The people who were independent—who aren’t staunch conservatives or staunch liberals—have awakened to the president’s weaknesses. He’s weak as a leader, his economic policies have failed, and he’s been inconsistent on foreign policy.
And here’s the other thing: the citizen’s Tea Party movement that the mainstream media wants to go away is not going away. In fact,
it’s getting bigger and it’s getting stronger. For instance, in May 2011, when I was campaigning down in Florida and spoke to a packed, actually oversubscribed, house in the Villages, a retirement community in the center of the state—when I saw the place, I wondered out loud: “Why do I keep failing at retirement?” A lady there told me that she had never come out for one of these events before.
According to a poll taken in Iowa around that time, I was leading there. I’m quick to remind people that polls are nice barometers, and we’re not changing our strategy based upon what barometric reading we get in Iowa, but those polls tell us that we know what we’re doing. And we can make it bigger.
So as the pool of Republican presidential candidates grows, I’m not worried about Mitt Romney; I’m not worried about Rick Perry; I’m not worried about any of the other folks that I’m running against, least of all Ron Paul, whose campaign sends one of its “Paulites” everywhere I show up. Clearly the intent is to agitate, not to educate.
They do that because they’re threatened by me and have made a conscious effort to try to discredit me and bring me down by always bringing up the same issue: the Federal Reserve. They’re trying to destroy me on the fact that I was once affiliated with that body, and they’ve generated a lot of animosity toward it, some of it warranted, some of it not warranted, based upon some things I’ve said about the Federal Reserve.
In doing so, however, they’ve stretched the truth, saying that I did not want the Federal Reserve to be audited. I have never said that. I have said: “I don’t think you’re going to find anything to audit on the Federal Reserve.” But they want you to believe that Herman Cain doesn’t want the Federal Reserve to be audited.
I get the same stupid question at almost every one of these events. I know it’s a deliberate strategy. How can a person randomly show up at a hundred events and ask the same stupid question to try to nail me on the Federal Reserve? It’s really becoming annoying more than anything else.
But I’ve got news for those Paulites: It’s not going to work, because the American people are a lot smarter than they are. That’s what I’m seeing round the country.
But there are stupid people out there—the people who are ruining this country, and I’m worried about them. So we’ve got to get enough informed people off the sofa, get them to get out and get active. I believe we’ve got those people out there.
And even though I don’t have the name ID that the other candidates do yet, and I don’t have the perceived amount of money that some of the other candidates have, we’ve got support on the ground, across the country, in every state, in the critical primary states, that most of the media aren’t even aware of. As of the beginning of July I released my first campaign finance report, listing contributions totaling $2.46 million, with zero campaign debt. So it’s a lot easier now, as a result of the debates and many media appearances, to get that name ID. It’s already starting to happen.
Still, a lot of people don’t want to take the time to become educated. They are educable, but it’s difficult to do so because a lot of them watch Jon Stewart and Bill Maher.
The good news about the Jon Stewart show is that he does make people aware of some of the issues that are happening in the news. But he always does parodies on that; you’re not sure where he stands, which is fine, as long as you know that that’s what he’s doing.
Jon Stewart is a comedian—his words, not mine—and I’m a conservative. He takes shots at me not because I’m black but because I’m a conservative, and I find it hilarious that he mocks me in the tone of Amos ’n’ Andy and Stepin Fetchit.
Stewart adds the mocking, but the name calling is nothing new to me. When I was on the radio I began to keep a list of the names I was called because I am an American black conservative. So I just added Stewart’s comments to that list. But as Mark Block would say, “At least Stewart’s audience knows who Herman Cain is.”
Mark is right. That audience will be able to discern whether I am a Stepin Fetchit or not. I refuse to get into this whole race card thing. I’ve been called “Oreo,” “sellout,” “Uncle Tom,” and “shameless.” These are only the names that are printable. The color of one’s skin has nothing to do with qualifications for public office. What is important is one’s character and the content of one’s ideas.
I can understand, as a black conservative whose campaign is gaining momentum, that liberals in the media and elsewhere are getting nervous about me. I guess that Jon Stewart is trying to be funny. I don’t hold a grudge against him. He doesn’t offend me, because I know who I am. I just look forward to the day when he has to call me “Mr. President.” He can do it in an Amos ’n’ Andy dialect.
As for whether I will get a significant share of the votes of black Americans, my gut tells me that I will, for the simple reason that the victim mindset is losing favor in the black community. It no longer works because black people realize that if they want to achieve something in this country they can’t accomplish that under the victimization system. That’s why blacks have awakened to the deceptions of the liberal leaders and the Democrat Party.
Now, as I continue to campaign around this exceptional nation we are fortunate to live in, and to vote freely in, I tell everybody I encounter, “Our Founding Fathers did their job. Now we have to be the Defending Fathers of this nation. We have to defend the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution of the United States of America. It doesn’t need to be rewritten, it just needs to be reread and enforced. That’s our job.”
I said as much on July 4, 2011, the 235th birthday of our great nation, when I addressed a Tea Party celebration in sight of Independence Hall.
Then I flew up to Manchester, New Hampshire, to participate in America’s pastime by throwing out the first ball in an evening game. While I looked good, it was a low ball.
Now, as I continue my campaign for the Republican Party’s 2012 presidential nomination, I recall and paraphrase the words of the great American patriot Ronald Reagan, who summed it up best by saying: “We’re now going down a road called socialism.
“You can’t pass freedom on in the bloodstream, it must be fought for, and protected, or one day we will spend our sunset years telling our children and our grandchildren what it used to be like in the United States of America when men were free.”
As I make my way through the uncertain political arena, one thing is certain: I’m not going to have that conversation with my grandkids. And I don’t think you want to have that conversation with your grandkids either.
We have a choice on November 6, 2012; we can get back on the road to freedom, democracy, and a democratic republic.
And if you choose to get on the Herman Cain Train, just bear in mind one thing: God is blessing America, and because of His blessing, come November 2012, when all votes are counted, we will score a trifecta. Both houses of Congress will be under the leadership of the party that truly cares about the future of our great nation, and Gloria and I will be living in the People’s House at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.
12
The Cain Administration: The First Ninety Days
His lord said unto him, Well done, good and faithful servant; thou hast been faithful over a few things, I will make thee ruler over many things: enter thou into the joy of thy Lord.
—Matthew 25:23
It’s midafternoon on Monday, January 21, 2013. The last Inauguration Day Parade float has just passed the presidential reviewing stand. The stirring march music has stopped, and invitees to the evening’s inaugural ball—yes, there will be only one—are enjoying some down time before dressing for the evening’s festivities.
I’ve become America’s forty-fifth president—there’s that persistent number again. I was sworn in at high noon. Now I’m sitting at my desk in the Oval Office, because I’ve got a lot of work to do before I dress for this evening’s festivities and I’ve just convened a meeting of my senior staff, one that will likely last most of the evening.
Thirty days after
taking office, I plan to convene a summit meeting of the heads of state and also the leaders of the opposition parties of our trusted allies. Doing so will enable me to outline my views on foreign affairs, as well as to take the measure of the men and women with whom I will most closely work in resolving the tensions that are eroding our confidence.
Incidentally, I’ve been examining the workings of the White House, and I intend to change some of the ways in which the presidency functions. I will define the office of the president; the office will not define me. And despite my high regard for the professionalism of those assigned to protect me, I and only I will in—God forbid—moments of national emergency determine when, where, and how I can best perform my duties as chief executive, because I happen to believe that the people want to see their president working in the Oval Office. I believe that they are comforted and reassured by having him at the very center of presidential authority and responsibility.
In order to help Americans regain their self-confidence, it will be my responsibility as president to help them regain confidence in their governmental institutions. I do realize, of course, that under the separation of powers, I cannot directly influence the way the Congress operates, but I can and will restore trust in, and respect for, the executive branch.
Thus my appointees will be people whose professional lives reflect high ethical and moral values. They will be expected to act in a decorous manner at all times and to arrive at work each day realizing that they serve their fellow citizens, not their self-interest.
And from the most junior clerical person to my chief of staff, White House personnel will be expected to have a copy of the Constitution of the United States nearby.
I will not come to Washington to do the usual, anticipated, accepted things. Rather, paraphrasing the time-honored words of Abraham Lincoln, I will bring the nation a new birth of freedom, one that will be dedicated to the people who, together with me, will ensure that the American dream, one that patriots have pursued in good times and bad, will not perish from this earth.
