Witness: I Completely Saw Cain's Sexual Harassment Incident But I Can't Talk About It For Legal Reasons & Stuff

What legal reasons? He was a pollster for the National Restaurant Association and I assume that maybe he's bound by some no-derogatory-disclosure agreement with them. (Michele Bachmann is right now thinking, "But Ed Rollins told me those were unnecessary!")

Captain Ed thinks that this statement itself, that he saw the whole thing, would be a violation of such an agreement, but I don't know. If he's just saying he saw it, without specifying that he saw something bad, maybe it's non-derogatory and hence not in violation.

Of course, he's obviously hinting he has more to tell. I guess he wants to be released from the National Restaurant Association's no-tell clause too.

Interviewed today on KTOK’s Mullins in the Morning, [Chris] Wilson, of Wilson-Perkins-Allen Opinion Research headquartered in Washington, D.C. explained he was a witness to the incident. “I was the pollster at the National Restaurant Association when Herman Cain was head of it and I was around a couple of times when this happened and anyone who was involved with the NRA at the time, knew that this was gonna come up.”

Wilson described the woman as a low level staffer who was maybe two years out of college. “This occurred at a restaurant in Crystal City (Virginia) and everybody was aware of it,” he continued. “It was only a matter of time because so many people were aware of what took place, so many people were aware of her situation, the fact she left—everybody knew with the campaign that this would eventually come up.”

Okay, well look: If "everyone" was aware of it, one of those people must not have signed an NDA. Even if they are only hearsay witnesses, they can at least tell us what was so awful.

There's some skulduggery hinted at, as this guy now works for a PAC that boosts Rick Perry. I guess people can make the obvious connection, and further make the wrong assumption (Garsh, if it weren't for Perry, the media never would have discovered some dirt in plain sight about a Republican candidate!), and also avoid asking if Cain had played by speak-no-evil rules himself.

[B]efore conservatives start rushing to the aid of the “victim” in this case, it’s worth remembering just how Herman Cain reacted when he was asked to comment on an even more thinly-sourced, vaguely-worded report in a higher-profile publication about one of his rivals for the GOP nomination. It didn’t happen so long ago that it should have fallen down the memory hole by now.

In fact, it was just a few short weeks back that Herman Cain, when presented with the opportunity to demonstrate some semblance of personal integrity by withholding judgment against a fellow conservative, chose instead to use a flagrantly biased piece of shoddy journalism as an opportunity to gain an advantage over Rick Perry. For all the endless complaints about dirty tricks and “another high tech lynching” from Cain’s defenders, no one can make the case that Cain is somehow above exploiting similar attacks on his conservative Republican rivals when the opportunity presents itself.

Thanks to RD for that last link, taken from the sidebar yesterday.

posted by Ace at 01:54 PM

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