With the Republican primary continuing to heat up, I would like to share some thoughts on Herman Cain, from a libertarian point of view.  Cain ijs known by listeners of Neal Boortz’s radio show and probably a few other conservatives.  He is becoming more well-known now that he is a presidential candidate.

Herman Cain was the CEO of Godfather’s Pizza.  This makes him attractive to conservatives.  Many conservatives believe that government needs to be run more like a business.  Unfortunately, they never consider the fact that the two are not similar.  Government relies on force or the threat of force.  Businesses rely on persuasion and customer satisfaction.  Businesses want to maximize revenue.  They do this by pleasing customers.  Governments also want to maximize revenue.  They do this through taxes and inflation.

Unfortunately, many libertarians and so-called libertarians are attracted to Cain.  He sometimes fills in for Neal Boortz on the radio and is definitely supported by Boortz, at least implicitly.  For those unfamiliar with Neal Boortz, he is a popular radio host who calls himself a Libertarian.  While he is good on some issues, he definitely does not take a libertarian stance on foreign policy and he does not have much interest in monetary policy.

Boortz is also a huge advocate of the Fair Tax.  It is a plan to replace the national income tax, payroll taxes, corporate taxes, and other taxes with a national sales tax.  I will comment more on the Fair Tax tomorrow.  But for now, I will just say that Herman Cain has come out in support of the Fair Tax.

If you are a libertarian, or even if you lean libertarian, then Herman Cain should not be for you.  If your only goal is to see Obama defeated in the next election, then perhaps you should support him.  Obama and the Democrats would not be able to play the race card (or at least not effectively), since Cain himself is black.

The problem with Herman Cain, from a libertarian perspective, is that he is not for small government.  He may sound good sometimes and even have some libertarian rhetoric, but he is not a friend for liberty lovers.  While Cain is somewhat known for being the CEO of Godfather’s Pizza, it is less well-known that he worked for the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City.  If you look at Cain’s resume, he is not exactly a political outsider.

In 2008, Cain was a supporter of the TARP bailouts.  That should be enough said for libertarians.  The guy is not in favor of small government.  He talks that game to get support, but he is another political hack who will dole out favors to his favored groups.  In his case, it would be the powerful bankers.

If you are a libertarian, you should be running away from Herman Cain.  He may be more dangerous than Obama.  At least with Obama, and even someone like Mitt Romney, it is obvious to anyone paying a little attention that these people want big government.  With Cain, someone trying to get Tea Party support, he will say that he favors smaller government on the campaign trail, but in actuality the guy is a lover of big government and central banking.

There is a libertarian candidate in the Republican primary.  His name is Ron Paul.  There is also a quasi-libertarian and his name is Gary Johnson.  The rest of the candidates and potential candidates are hacks who only want to expand government and expand the U.S. empire.