It’s been speculated by some that former Godfather’s Pizza CEO Herman Cain is running for president not because he wants to be president, but because he wants to be get his own Fox News show and a multi-million dollar book deal, ala Sarah Palin. If the web ad that went viral last night — which was shot on an iPhone and features Cain’s campaign manager Mark Block taking a long, slow drag on a cigarette followed by Cain busting out his best trollgaze — is any indication, those aforementioned speculators are probably right and the current Republican party frontrunner is just trolling us all.
When I first watched it, I had no idea what was going on when the spot hit the :40 mark — the precise point where Block busts out a cancer stick and the chorus for “I Am America” kicks in, but I was sure that I was watching either the greatest political campaign ad of all time, or the worst (Cain was once a lobbyist for the tobacco industry). But then the Cain trollgaze kicked in and suddenly I knew — Herman Cain was speaking to me.
Below’s a video of the ad’s highlight moment repeated over and over. And of course there’s already a Fake Mark Block Twitter account.
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Not to get too politifag on everyone, but it’s actually no mystery where Cain came from. There was recently an AP article about how Cain was handpicked by the Koch Brothers through their PAC, Americans For Prosperity (AFP) (source: [goo.gl]). Just some rich-ass dudes, buying their own candidate. Welcome to a post-Citizens-United America ([en.wikipedia.org]). Block gets a nice mention in that article too. Guess where he came from?
But then I look at that smile, and I can hear him in my head: “U mad, bro?”
Every other thing coming out of the conspiracy theorists mouths is Koch.
Are you referring to the Associated Press? Are they in on it? That’s quite a conspiracy theory you’ve got there…
@bemlim
As conspiracies go this is weak sauce. The Koch Brothers, as rich individuals, are within their rights to find and encourage candidates that have views they support. David Geffen, also a billionaire, was a very early supporter and fundraiser for Obama ([latimesblogs.latimes.com]) and that is fine too.
I get that lots of people disagree with the Koch Bros. (though many seem to think they are conservative and that isn’t really true since they oppose the Patriot act, support gay marriage and weed decriminalization). I don’t get why people think they are Bond villains but are not worried at all about liberal billionaires (e.g. Soros, Geffen, Buffet) and their access to political power.
@All…The sad fact of the matter is that both sides have their fat cat Bond villains because the American political system as it exists today is corrupted by money and corporate interests. Just about every prominent politician, Republican or Democrat, on the national stage is bought and paid for. This is why I’ve said repeatedly that everyone, liberals and conservatives, should be behind the OWS movement…at its heart it exists as to protest the breaking down of the wall between corporation and state, and that, to me, is something all of us “little people” should get behind. It should be a non-partisan movement.
Now excuse me while I step down from my trusty soap box.
@Cajun
I get where you are coming from. The problem with OWS as it currently stands (with the caveat that it is not a monolithic movement) is that many in the movement think the solution to government being “captured” (to use the econ term) by monied interests is more government. Why do they think that that additional regulation won’t be co-opted just like the stuff we have now (see: a tax code that is too complicated for most folks but filled with goodies for people who can afford a $600 a hour lawyer)?
OWS also frequently blames the wrong folks. I agree, the banks should not have been bailed out, but neither should the unions at GM and Chrysler, or Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac who papered many of those bad mortgages. And as for the concerns with student loans, I totally get that (100k+ law school loans ftl) but it isn’t the bank’s fault. Blame the school that charged you 40k a year for a useless degree, and in some cases cooked their employment stats to hide the fact that the degree was worthless, or the government policies (artificially low interest rates and lending standards) that encouraged 18 year-olds to take massive student loan debt without allowing it to be dischargeable in bankruptcy.
It is easy to just blame corporations as if they were uniquely powerful and evil, and certainly deserve some blame, but there are quite a few other guilty parties that also need reform for there to be a meaningful improvement.
@Tacos_Gigante, I really didn’t mean for what I said to come across as conspiratorial. I am also well aware, as you and Cajun Boy pointed out, that there are Fat Cat donors involved with both parties. My only point is that there’s no mystery to where Cain came from and why he’s running (which was the lead in to the post). He’s on the national stage because AFP wants him there, it’s a simple as that.
Though I will say that there seems to me to be a fairly significant difference between having a rich donor or three, and having your entire campaign staff consist of ex-employees of a single PAC. There’s certainly nothing nefarious or illegal about that, but it makes me uncomfortable as a voter.