If reports are to be believed there’s new meaning to Herman “Pizza Man” Cain’s 999 plan, as in, I’ll sexually harass you 9 times, 9 different ways before 9 a.m. The Republican Tea Party (GOTP) presidential candidate is refusing to directly address a media report alleging he’d been accused of sexually suggestive behavior toward at least two female employees while he was the head of the National Restaurant Association in the 1990s.
Still, Cain acknowledged: “I do have a sense of humor and some people have a problem with that.”
Which means he was “sexually aggressive” and later tried to claim it was a joke; that’s a good plan, no one’s ever tried that line before?
“C’mon baby, can’t you take a little joke”?
“I will take all your arrows,” Pizza Man said while talking up his 999 v 3.0 tax plan at the American Enterprise Institute, where the “moderators” refused to allow questions about the allegations.
When asked directly if the allegations cast a shadow over his 9-9-9 tax plan, he responded: “I am going by the ground rules that my hosts have set.” Wink, wink …
As he was leaving the stage, he stopped, turned to the crowd and talked about his sense of humor without providing any context. He said his staff tells him to be himself – or “Let Herman be Herman.”
He added: “Herman is going to stay Herman.”
Which means, “Watch out ladies.”
Pizza Man’s campaign is now engaging in full-scale damage control mode in the wake of a Politico report late Sunday suggesting Cain had been accused of sexual harassment toward at least two female employees. The report said the women signed agreements with the restaurant group that gave them five-figure financial payouts to leave the association and barred them from discussing their departures. Neither woman was identified.
The report was based on anonymous sources and, in one case, what the publication said was a review of documentation that described the allegations and the resolution.
Cain, who claims to be an “outsider” in spite of his years as a DC Lobbyist and having served on the Fed, is of course facing higher scrutiny after a burst of momentum in the race for the GOTP chief clown nomination.
Pizza Man’s “campaign manager” Mark “Cancer Man” Block told MSNBC that “Herman Cain has never sexually harassed anybody. Period. End of story.” Block said he’s spoken to Cain about the Politico report and “he said emphatically the story is not true.”
But of course a payout says differently; you don’t settle with a complainant unless there’s some validity to the allegation.
Cancer Man added, “I am not personally aware of any cash settlement relating to sexual harassment charges to Mr. Cain” and referred questions about whether there were settlements to the National Restaurant Association.
The Associated Press reported Sunday it had received a statement from Pizza Man’s campaign asserting once again Politico’s was bogus.
“Inside-the-Beltway media have begun to launch unsubstantiated personal attacks on Cain,” spokesman J.D. Gordon whined. “Dredging up thinly sourced allegations stemming from Mr. Cain’s tenure as the Chief Executive Officer at the National Restaurant Association in the 1990s, political trade press are now casting aspersions on his character and spreading rumors that never stood up to the facts.”
All claims of a payout aside of course.
“These are baseless allegations,” Gordon said in a second interview. “To my knowledge, this is not an accurate story.”
Which means he doesn’t know if it’s true or not.
Politico however is saying Gordon has said Cain himself had indicated to campaign officials he was “vaguely familiar” with the charges and that the restaurant association’s general counsel had resolved the matter.
Politico’s also saying it confronted Cain early Sunday outside of the CBS News Washington bureau, where he had just been interviewed on “Face the Nation.”
“I am not going to comment on that,” he said when asked specifically about one of the woman’s claims.
When asked if he had ever been accused of harassment by a woman, he responded, Politico said, by asking the reporter, “Have you ever been accused of sexual harassment?”
So, Mr Cain, running for the Presidency responds to a reporter’s question by asking the reporter the same question back? How third grade of him; exactly the type of person we need in the White House. Could it be there’s more to the story? Could it be where there’s smoke, there’s going to be fire? Could it be the Pizza Man’s a player? Could it be Cain’s just one more conservative “family values” candidate who has none?
The Liberty Tree 