It may have looked smart to you, but to a whole lot of people it looked like a BS-my-way-out-of-it moment. A lot of evangelical Christian voters know a lot about the Israel-Palestinian conflict because it is a key part of their understanding of end times doctrine. To these people, and many others, Cain looked like he was trying to cover a serious gap in his knowledge of foreign policy. And as others have posted, his answer, once he half-way got it, was ludicrous: It’ll be up to Israel to decide whether to grant a “right to return” to a phony nationality that is no more than a political fabrication of their mortal enemies? Duh. Like Netanyahu said, ain’t gonna happen. Cain, nice guy though he may be, is not doing a talk show now; he’s auditioning for President, and he has to do better than that. He made Palin look like Kissinger.
He made Wallace define it, by not attempting to answer and repeating the phrase with a ? after it twice. Wallace then defined it, then Herman answered it. I think it was clear to anyone of common sense that the catchwords were not in his mind, but the concept was. So what?
The fact that Israel will never grant a “right to return” in no way means that it is not, as Cain said, Israel’s call.