Cain Blames Perry, Perry Blames Romney

Discord in the Republican camp: As a third woman claims that she was sexually harassed by up-and-coming Republican candidate Herman Cain, Cain has revealed the identity of the real culprit. He’s blaming Rick Perry, who, Cain says, is running a mudslinging campaign against him. Perry, in turn, passes the buck on to a third front-runner.

Things aren’t going especially well for Barack Obama. He can’t get the nation’s debt under control. His promise to increase taxes on the rich has come to naught because of Republican opposition. The United States lost its AAA credit rating for the first time in history under his leadership. The strategy in Afghanistan isn’t going as he had hoped. He is unable to keep his promises in the Middle East. The “Yes-We-Can” president’s approval numbers have been below 50 percent for months now.

The situation would be depressing, perhaps even hopeless for Obama were it not for the Republicans. They’re doing their best to deflect attention away from his weaknesses while attracting attention to the fact that they have no seriously credible challenger to run against him in next year’s election.

It’s going especially bad these days for candidate Herman Cain. The African-American from Georgia and former CEO of the Godfather’s Pizza chain was the big surprise so far in the primary race. He was an unsuccessful candidate for the Senate in 2004; instead of making policy in Washington, he got his own radio talk show in Atlanta. Experts were initially skeptical that he had much of a chance, but Cain’s popularity in surveys has so far held up. That could all change now.

A woman accused him on Wednesday of making improper remarks to her. She told the Associated Press news agency that Cain had told some of his friends how attractive he thought she was and that he had invited her to his private quarters after working hours. Cain denies the accusations, but they’re not the first of their kind.

Memory Lapses

The newspaper Politico reported on Sunday that two women had complained about similar remarks and gestures Cain made to them in the 1990s. At that time, Cain was president of the National Restaurant Association. Both women accepted monetary settlements on the condition that they leave the organization and agree to remain silent on the issue in the future.

Cain responded to the allegations on Monday, saying he had been falsely accused. He told Fox News Channel that he had never sexually harassed anyone. When asked about the settlements reached with his accusers, Cain claimed to have a lapse of memory saying he didn’t remember what he had signed. He said that just because he doesn’t recall signing anything didn’t mean that he didn’t do so, just that he doesn’t remember doing so. That doesn’t sound very convincing.

Cain suspects that a mudslinging campaign is being waged by one of his rivals. He wouldn’t be the first candidate to be tripped up by past transgressions, real or concocted, made public by the opposition.

Cain claims to know who is behind the revelations, claiming to Fox News that the information came from Rick Perry’s organization. The Texas governor had risen to the top of the Republican field a few weeks ago by cultivating a country boy image. Perry projects the image of being a straight-arrow, honest and hands-on rural guy, the exact opposite of a Washington career politician. The dirty tricks accusation is especially painful to someone like Perry as he tries to distance himself from that crowd.

Perhaps that explains Perry’s unusual reaction. Instead of denying the accusation, a Perry spokesperson announced that it was Romney, not Perry, who might be to blame. Cain’s successor as head of the NRA is a major donor to Romney’s campaign. Perry’s communications director said, “There are much closer connections between the restaurant association, Cain, and the Romney camp than there are with us.”

Statesman vs. Mudslinger

Romney’s people also deny the allegation — no great surprise — and are supported by The Washington Post. The Perry camp admits it has “no evidence to accuse Romney of leaking [the] Cain story.” Perry’s spokesperson claimed to have only quoted facts showing a connection between Cain and Romney. The “facts,” according to Jennifer Rubin at The Washington Post, consist of just one fact, namely that Cain’s successor at the NRA was a Romney supporter.

Meanwhile, in Forbes magazine, Cain tried to reinforce the suspicion that Perry was behind the smear. According to the Forbes article, the connection is a man named Curt Anderson, currently an adviser to the Perry campaign but who was on Cain’s payroll during Cain’s unsuccessful run for the Senate in 2004. The guess is that Anderson might have gotten wind of his missteps during that episode.

Meanwhile, new accusations are coming from a man also with connections to the Perry camp. A certain Chris Wilson has claimed in interviews to have personally witnessed Cain sexually harassing women.

All this must be pleasing to President Obama: As the Republicans tear one another apart in the United States, he appears as a statesman in Cannes at the G-20 summit.