Raising Cain, or at least holding him up.

Jen Rubin on the Anti-Romney fixation of some conservatives:

Conn Carroll wonders: “Why some conservatives are still defending Cain is becoming more and more of a mystery. He simply does not have a grasp of the issues to be taken seriously.” The answer I think is because, as I previously have surmised, Cain has become a symbolic repository of anti-Romney sentiment. Take him down and the anti-Romney types become desperate, if not unhinged. It matters not at all that the anti-Romney forces don’t have a viable alternative. They’re mad, and they’re going to huff and puff, foretelling doom for the party and a Dark Ages for conservatism. Of course this is silliness, but silliness with an underlying message. A Romney presidency and a GOP Congress would be tonally different that the anti-Romney forces, but they might actually accomplish quite a lot. That means — oh, my — the loudest squawkers would be irrelevant? How can it be — they have hundreds of readers and friends who think just like they do?! Those who would follow the talk radio show hosts to the barricades for Christine O’Donnell or accuse Speaker of the House Rep. John Boehner (R- Ohio) of treachery to the conservative movement have shot their wad on pulling the party so far out of the Beltway that electoral success becomes irrelevant. The point, you see, is not to advance (incrementally or otherwise) the conservative ball but to remain forever aggrieved. Whatever deal is attainable and whichever candidate is acceptable to a broad cross-section of Americans are almost by definition unacceptable to those voices.