Politics
Herman Cain continues to defy the odds
Retired pizza executive Herman Cain (pictured), continued to defy the odds Sunday, beating out his fellow Republican contenders in yet another presidential poll, this one from Iowa, the lead-off state for next year’s election balloting.
Cain nipped former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney 23 percent to 22 percent in the race for the Republican nomination, according to a Des Moines Register poll of voters planning to take part in the 2012 Iowa Caucus.
The former CEO of Godfather Pizza has surged 13 percentage points since a poll by the newspaper conducted in late June, despite spending little time in the state and taking just fifth place in an August 13 Iowa straw poll vote.
Pundits give Cain little chance of winning the Republican presidential nomination, especially after seeing a parade of Republicans claim the frontrunner mantle only to see their fortunes fade.
And they point out that were Cain to win the nomination, he would be the first candidate in modern presidential history to do so without having first held elective office.
Still, the plain-speaking African American businessman and minister has been a phenomenon on the campaign trail, livening up an otherwise lackluster Republican race, and spawning copy cat tax reform proposals modeled after his catchy but controversial “9-9-9” plan.
Many experts say Cain’s popularity in Iowa, as well as in other recent national polls that also showed him to have taken the lead, is a product of voter dissatisfaction with Romney.
Romney, like Cain a successful businessman before entering politics, has been tipped by many experts to be the eventual Republican nominee, but so far he has failed to excite conservative voters and has been criticized for his apparent readiness to tailor his views when it is politically expedient.
