The Warden

Cain’s defenders could also claim that his ignorance is irrelevant because, once in power, he can just rely on the advice of experts. Obviously, every president must rely on advisers to a great extent. But in order to make effective use of those experts, a president needs to have at least a basic understanding of what they’re talking about. That’s especially true in the many cases where experts disagree and the president has to decide whose advice to follow.

The China miscue points up a persistent problem for Cain: He doesn’t seem to know much about foreign policy. His stumbles on the economy and his personal life are bad, for sure, and the sexual harassment claims could very well end his campaign. But arguably Cain’s most notable gaffes on the stump have come not in the realm of social or economic policy, but in foreign affairs. If he wants to weather the current storm and remain the Republican front-runner, Cain must convince skeptical primary voters and party leaders that he can govern competently as president. His many foreign policy slip-ups aren’t helping.

Herman Cain deserves credit for proposing a tax-reform plan that is specific, promotes economic growth, and has captured the imagination of conservatives nationwide. His 9-9-9 plan builds on the insight that one of the chief defects of the current tax code is its bias toward consumption over savings. But his plan’s peculiarities of design, substantive weaknesses, and political naïveté render it unworthy of conservative support.

All Cain needs to do is: run a real campaign in early states, fix the flawed economic plan that is the totality of his message (in part because the conservative base will never go for a regressive sales tax), explain why he had exactly the same position as Mitt Romney on TARP (which the conservative base loathed), learn something about foreign policy (and presumably support needed defense spending and reject isolationism) and stop making “incendiary” statements that make him sound like a crackpot. Simple enough. And then he can wrap this baby up.

I am 100% in agreement with Mr. Cain: he hasn’t the faintest clue what to do when it comes to American foreign policy.

(via RealClearWorld)

“Mitt Romney’s leadership credentials offer the best hope of a leader with substance, and the best hope for a good president who could turn out to be great,” the talk-show host noted in an opinion column, pointing to Romney’s business background, Olympic leadership experience, and life largely spent outside politics.

That was Herman Cain, then doing an Atlanta-based talk-radio program.

There is reasonably persuasive evidence, however, that endorsements from party officials have a significant amount of predictive power in determining the identity of a party’s nominee, even after accounting for polling. On that score, Mr. Cain is doing quite poorly. As of Sept. 23, Mr. Cain had just a handful of endorsements, versus dozens for Mr. Romney and Mr. Perry.

So here is one test to see whether Mr. Cain is a long shot — or a big shot. Will he begin to receive more endorsements from Republican elected officials, and key party officials in states like Iowa and New Hampshire, in the coming days?

A Cain nomination would be an aberration of historic proportions: American political parties typically don’t nominate people without previous officeholding experience for president.

More importantly, these staffers are from Iowa, where Cain has to play to remain competitive.

Mere days after two top staffers resigned from Herman Cain’s presidential campaign, two others have also called it quits.

Nate Silver runs some numbers and argues that Cain may be doing better than expected, especially because of higher polling with lower name recognition.

I would wager, though, that most of the potential Cain supporters are more hardcore Republicans who tend to be more active in politics. Thus, I’m not so sure that Cain’s support with those who name him would mirror his support with those who don’t.

What’s especially interesting about Mr. Cain’s standing is that he polls at 8 percent despite being familiar to only about one-third of Republican voters, according to supplementary Gallup data. Of those voters who are familiar with him, 24 percent have him as their first choice. That’s the best figure for any candidate in the Republican field: