Why isn't Ben Carson leading the Republican race?

SGT Benjamin Lindsey As someone who has been more or less campaigning for him through the 2016 Committee for 3 years (Volunteer MN State Coordinator for 1), I can tell you it is a combination of several things.

1. There was a calculated and manipulated attempt to attack the public perception of him as honest, when polls showed this was his most favored attribute by voters (back around Sept-15). They released a series of false attacks intentionally directed to throw question into his honesty, and though all were disproved, it left some questioning him. Examples of these attacks: Claims that his childhood story of overcoming violence in his youth by turning to God was false, claims that he did not get offered a scholarship to West Point as was claimed, claims that his claim of being a victim of a prank in a psychology class was false, etc. I could go on forever on these attacks, all of which, if you are interested I have the proof are false.

2. There was also a calculated attempt to mischaracterize him to the public as a lunatic. This started with pulling up decades old discussions he had with a coworker about how the Egyptians could have stored grain during the plagues and has continued throughout this cycle. This was done in conjunction with sidelining him at the debates, marginalizing him (or completely ignoring him) in media discussion, etc. to prevent him from correcting the false perception. Examples of this include when he mentioned the threat of an EMP attack at the Iowa GOP debate, and they took a 6 second clip and broadcast it with headlines such as "Dr. Carson Has a Movie Idea Call Hollywood: GOP Debate" and "Did Dr. Carson Just Watch Goldeneye". You will notice, that Ted Cruz brought up the very same issue in the last debate... Did you see any critical headlines? That's because they have been trying to paint him as completely ignorant in Foreign Affairs, and will continue to do so, despite his Campaign Chairman being MG Robert Dees, and the fact that he has well thought out and organized plans laid out in writing on his goals for ISIS, Russia, etc. (All available at http://www.bencarson.com/issues)

3. They falsely characterized his campaign as being in shambles, and falling apart around him. I'm sure you've heard the rumors about his campaign staff leaving. The reality is, Dr. Carson was struggling in the debate setting, and was constantly being put in situations that allowed the media to paint him in a false light. He was being held back by Barry Bennett and his Communications Director who were putting him in these situations and Barry Bennett was trying to politicize him, and was telling him to act passively in the debates, and was essentially being detrimental to the campaign. This is why Dr. Carson chose to restructure his team, and fill positions with people who were wanting to take the campaign in the same direction. Barry Bennett was essentially given the save face option of resigning rather than being fired, and took it like an immature child. You may have also heard about "half of Dr. Carson's New Hampshire team leaving to go to Cruz Campaign". The reality, is one, this was not Dr. Carson's campaign, it was our organization (the 2016 Committee) and it was 5 people. One of which had been told he was not allowed to continue representing himself as part of our organization because he was supporting Cruz pretty much the whole time, and was consistently attacking Dr. Carson publicly. He did his best, and managed to convince others to leave with him (they were unpaid low-level volunteers not staff). Then I am sure you've also heard that Dr. Carson's campaign underwent more "cuts" following Iowa. The reality here is that Iowa was of major importance, and had its own designated staff. They were hired on contract to work through the Iowa caucus, they weren't cut, their contracts expired and were not renewed. This goes along with my next rumor, that Dr. Carson is out of money (the media's reason for the 'cuts'). The reality is, that Dr. Carson's campaign has since its inception raised more money from more individual donors than all of the other campaigns. In fact, the campaign just released about a week ago, that they have nearly $47M cash on hand. What I am getting at here, is there was a calculated effort to push the inexperienced message to the voters. They are trying to paint his campaign as struggling to survive, and barely holding on, therefore not able to win.

Which is another message being pushed. That he only got 4th in Iowa and 8th in NH and that he should drop out. They are trying to paint him out as the candidate splitting the vote who will make Trump win. I'm not going to get into the unreliable results of the Iowa Caucus, but SC has more delegates than both Iowa and NH combined, and the winner of SC will effectively take the lead in delegates. Dr. Carson has a ton of support in SC, which is where he focused his time knowing he would poll poorly in NH. He has the endorsement of Alveada King, and they are effectively reaching out to the Southern Black Democrats, who are not being included in any of the polling that is represented in the media. This is why our own internal polling (which is completely random phone polling that includes these segments of the population) has Dr. Carson bouncing between 1st and 2nd place in SC.

Bottom line: It's because the media, the establishment, and the other candidates have been successful in creating a new Dr. Carson, and selling that person to the public, while marginalizing the real one and preventing him from disproving that perception. This has resulted in a lot of voters turning to their second candidates. Also, much of Dr. Carson's support comes from disaffected voters, democrats left behind in the push to Socialism, libertarians, and other groups that are not included in the polling results (which typically only include past caucus goers and registered republicans) shared by the media.


Sorry for the length of my post...

Respectfully,
Isaac Jensen

This is not intended to be a knock on Dr. Carson, but "Energy." (just an assessment)

Psychologically, it is much easier to get behind someone with Energy than someone who is "Calm."

Because an insane percentage of Americans can't see the forest for the trees. They want campaign gimmicks and false promises, instead of decency, humility, and unqualified truthfulness.