I have mixed feelings about the whole Hermain Cain / sexual harrassment controversy. Just when you thought the whole controversy started by Politico a week ago Sunday might recede into the background because of a lack of hard information and anonymous resources unwilling to go on the record, it really got jumpstarted again today when media whore / ambulance chaser attorney Gloria Allred dragged out from under some rock a woman named Sharon Bialek who says Cain put some unwanted moves on her in return for a job offer nearly fifteen years ago. Oh, Bialek’s fiancee says he supports her story 100%, even though she only told him about the incident last Friday. Me, I find that rather strange.

I dunno, on one hand it’s hard to take any Gloria Allred client seriously – I mean, you want to talk about questionably ethical, high-powered muckraking attorney scraping the bottom of the human rabble barrel looking for attention – well, she’s the poster-child. But on the other hand, after a certain point in time you have to wonder if that old adage “where there’s smoke, there’s fire” is at play here. I mean who knows?

I suppose what bothers me the most is that you have totally unscrupulous people at work here who can make the most sensational of charges, forcing someone to respond whether there’s anything to them or not. It used to be you were innocent until proven guilty; in this media-saturated 24/7 cable news cycle it’s now the other way around. The only thing you can do is probably put Cain and Bialek at the scene through hotel and dinner reservations, but after that it’s all he said / she said. Of course, politics has always been a rough-and-tumble sport (if you don’t believe me, look at the yellow journalism of some of the 19th century presidential campaigns), but there’s something incredibly seedy about this whole thing, and Cain now finds himself, rightly or wrongly, in a world of trouble.

Part of the problem, as I alluded to last week, is the Cain campaign’s weakness in confronting this head-on after Politico blog’s original story more than a week ago. Rather than meeting the charges head-on in a forceful way, they kinda lollygagged for a few days blaming everyone but themselves – first it was the Perry campaign’s doing, then Cain himself called it a racist attack. That kind of tepid response just opens the door to opportunists like Allred and Bailek; don’t be surprised if others seeking publicity and opportunity don’t step forth in the next day or two. By the end of the week, why, Cain will be a serial rapist!

How Cain handles this going forward is going to require some deft political manuevering. Acting as if nothing happened and trying to return the conversation to jobs and his “9-9-9” economic plan is not going to cut it – that horse left the barn a week ago. Whether he likes it or not, whether it’s right or not, he’s going to have to forcefully defend himself and call these women liars with names, dates, figures, and informed witnesses reinforced by threats of defamation lawsuits to back him up. Otherwise, he’s toast.

I’m hoping the other candidates for the GOP nomination are playing very close attention to this, because, sooner or later, their turn is coming. The Obama re-relection machine and their syncophants in the mainstream dino-media are going do everything they can to destroy anyone who attempts to come between their progressive agenda and Obama’s re-election. These guys are cutthroat Chicago politicians who know only one way to play the game, and that is the Chicago way, no-holds-barred, scorched earth be damned. This White House will do whatever it takes, no matter what the cost, to keep Barack Obama in office, because it’s not just Obama and his cronies and czars, it’s liberalism itself and all the power and money that go along with it that loses if Obama goes down. When the stakes are that high, you will find more-than-willing people who will say and do anything; nothing is sacred in that kind of all-out war.

Herman Cain and his campaign made the mistake of not paying close enough attention to what was hitting them last week. He may not be a professional politician, but his campaign operatives should have known better. Here’s hoping the other campaigns are not so naive to think the same kind of thing can’t happen to them. Because if you think what’s happened to Herman Cain is bad, you ain’t seen nothing yet.