Scathing View of Cain

Jonathan Martin writes at Politico:

Herman Cain is in the midst of “reassessing” whether to continue his 2012 bid, but its legacy is already settled: His campaign will go down as one of the most hapless and bumbling operations in modern presidential politics, setting a new standard for how to turn damaging press coverage into something far worse.

The botched responses to allegations of marital infidelity, sexual impropriety and his own gaffes — not to mention the puzzling strategic decisions — have, in the eyes of many veteran strategists, reached record levels of ineptitude.

It’s an operation that has repeatedly contradicted its own candidate, leveled baseless charges and put Cain in difficult political spots with little apparent forethought.

The chain of events following a woman’s claim Monday that she had a 13-year affair with the Republican presidential hopeful provides the freshest evidence. Campaign manager Mark Block confirmed to ABC News Tuesday that Cain is “reassessing whether to stay in the race,” while spokesman J.D. Gordon told ABC the opposite: that Cain is simply reassessing campaign strategy, such as “what states we visit, what interviews we do, how we allocate resources – things like that.”