(CNN) -- It seems fitting that Herman Cain has surged into the top tier of the GOP candidates just as "Celebrity Apprentice" announces its new cast for the upcoming season.
I suspect a year from now the two will be one.
After all, reality TV is at its best when there's a villain we can't take our eyes off of, and over the past two weeks, can you think of anyone who one has benefited more from playing the bad guy than Cain? Back in August he received less than 10% of the Iowa straw poll vote. At the beginning of September, he was still near the bottom in the polls. Now he's a front-runner.
How'd he do it?
By imitating Omarosa -- the villain from the first season of "The Apprentice," who has since made a career out of being bad on reality TV. You see there are three things the media absolutely loves: white women (preferably in jail or missing), a sex scandal (preferably with photos or text messages) and inflammatory comments (preferably involving black people, so we can quote Jesse Jackson).
The latter's particularly effective in raising a person's profile because like with reality TV, the more controversial things you say, the more screen time you get, the more popular you become.
This is why I believe Herman Cain stopped running for president on September 28.
That was the day he went on CNN's "The Situation Room" and told Wolf Blitzer he believed the reason blacks don't vote for Republicans is because they're "brainwashed." Days later he went on ABC's "This Week" with Christiane Amanpour and repeated himself. Sunday he went back to CNN and told Candy Crowley that he didn't "believe there is racism in this country today that holds anybody back in a big way," and by Monday he was in the zone, telling Fox's Sean Hannity that he "left the Democrat plantation a long time ago."
The more inflammatory his statements were, the more television time he received, and the more his numbers climbed. He's not campaigning for president; he's auditioning to be the next pop culture bad boy, and he's using the media to do it.
Now, some pundits say Cain catapulted from curious long shot to unlikely front-runner because of the growing popularity of his 9-9-9 tax plan, which calls for a 9% national sales tax, a 9% personal income tax rate and a 9% corporate tax rate. I say he's been touting that plan of his for months, but he didn't move the needle until he started tossing the poor and the black community under the bus two weeks ago.
Since the change in strategy, everyone from Cornel West to Harry Belafonte to yes, Jesse Jackson (told you we love him) has taken time to condemn Cain, which now enables him to frame himself as a victim of internalized racism. That tack will certainly keep this routine of his going for at least another week.
I suspect a year from now the two will be one.
After all, reality TV is at its best when there's a villain we can't take our eyes off of, and over the past two weeks, can you think of anyone who one has benefited more from playing the bad guy than Cain? Back in August he received less than 10% of the Iowa straw poll vote. At the beginning of September, he was still near the bottom in the polls. Now he's a front-runner.
How'd he do it?
By imitating Omarosa -- the villain from the first season of "The Apprentice," who has since made a career out of being bad on reality TV. You see there are three things the media absolutely loves: white women (preferably in jail or missing), a sex scandal (preferably with photos or text messages) and inflammatory comments (preferably involving black people, so we can quote Jesse Jackson).
The latter's particularly effective in raising a person's profile because like with reality TV, the more controversial things you say, the more screen time you get, the more popular you become.
This is why I believe Herman Cain stopped running for president on September 28.
That was the day he went on CNN's "The Situation Room" and told Wolf Blitzer he believed the reason blacks don't vote for Republicans is because they're "brainwashed." Days later he went on ABC's "This Week" with Christiane Amanpour and repeated himself. Sunday he went back to CNN and told Candy Crowley that he didn't "believe there is racism in this country today that holds anybody back in a big way," and by Monday he was in the zone, telling Fox's Sean Hannity that he "left the Democrat plantation a long time ago."
The more inflammatory his statements were, the more television time he received, and the more his numbers climbed. He's not campaigning for president; he's auditioning to be the next pop culture bad boy, and he's using the media to do it.
Now, some pundits say Cain catapulted from curious long shot to unlikely front-runner because of the growing popularity of his 9-9-9 tax plan, which calls for a 9% national sales tax, a 9% personal income tax rate and a 9% corporate tax rate. I say he's been touting that plan of his for months, but he didn't move the needle until he started tossing the poor and the black community under the bus two weeks ago.
Since the change in strategy, everyone from Cornel West to Harry Belafonte to yes, Jesse Jackson (told you we love him) has taken time to condemn Cain, which now enables him to frame himself as a victim of internalized racism. That tack will certainly keep this routine of his going for at least another week.
