Herman Cain blows it big-time

... or, is this Herman Cain's Rick Perry moment?

Via Andrew Sullivan's Daily Dish, I just happened to see this video clip from a Herman Cain interview which Sullivan is right to call simply "amazing". Asked about Libya, Cain Draws A Blank:



The Daily Dish post includes a roundup of assorted reactions. Here are some of them.

Dan Drezner:

There's a mercy rule in Little League, and I'm applying it here -- unless and until Herman Cain surges back in the polls again, or manages to muster something approaching cogency in his foreign policy statements, there's no point in blogging about him anymore. I can only pick on an ignoramus so many times before it feels sadistic.

Jonathan Chait:

Cain was operating on four hours sleep, his campaign tells Chuck Todd. I have been on four hours sleep before. It has not prevented me from recalling the general outline of recently concluded American military interventions.

Conor Friesdorf:

Like Rick Perry's inability to remember one of the three federal agencies he would eliminate, the moment must be seen to be believed -- do watch above, no description is adequate -- and is damaging not because presidential candidates must know small details like the leader of Uzbekistan, but because Cain clearly hasn't thought at all about a war his country was fighting while he ran for president. Presumably he was briefed on it prior to Saturday's foreign policy debate. [....] The man is not a quick study.

And from the far right corner, Michelle Malkin!:

Sorry, Cain fans. Tried to give him the benefit of the doubt. But like Rick Perry, Herman Cain is just not ready for prime time. The real Cain scandal: He can barely form a coherent thought on Libya when put on the spot and garbles collective bargaining 101 facts. [....] Cain makes Rick Perry look like a Mensa president.

Well, let's see whether any of this actually cuts into Cain's support in the Republican primary electorate. As I've noted before, the whole spectacle of this Republican nomination contest would be funny if its potential implications weren't so terrifying. Stay tuned ...

—Jeff Weintraub