Herman Cain On NYT: 'They Don't Know What They Are Talking About'

In debates and on the campaign trail, Herman Cain touts his extensive business experience as his main qualification to be president. So when a recent New York Times article raised questions about his management ability, describing his campaign as chaotic and disorganized, the former pizza magnate took it personally.

"They don't know what they are talking about," he said, in an interview with Fox Business. "They are trying to draw a conclusion based on anecdotal information from disgruntled employees."

Cain took particular umbrage at the allegation that staff traveling in a car with him had been ordered not to talk to him.

From the New York Times:

And then there was that e-mail to the staff about traveling in a car with Mr. Cain: "Do not speak to him unless you are spoken to," the memo said.

"I found it odd," said a former staff member who liked to prep Mr. Cain for appearances while driving. The aide, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, quit not long afterward, citing the e-mail as one of the deciding factors.

Cain called the claim 'ridiculous.' "That's bullfeathers," he said. "I've always had an open door policy in everything I've done. How could I have succeeded over 40 years in business trying to muzzle people?"

He described his organization as solid and explained any turnover of staff as a normal part of campaigns. "Doesn't seem as though those people who left have slowed us down," he said, "in fact our momentum has picked up dramatically."

He also told Fox he considers himself a frontrunner for the nomination. "I would say I am one of the frontrunners because as you know if you are within three or four or five points, that can change next week. I don't see myself as a clear frontrunner, because I don't have a double digit lead, but I would say I am right up there."

 

 

Comments

[grayplace]

01:36 PM on 10/31/2011

When will people realize that a business is not a democracy, it's a dictatorship, and the CEO is the chief autocrat? Business experience does not translate into presidential qualifications.

[cjm1000]

06:26 AM on 10/31/2011

Let me add, the only time I would ever eat a godfathers pizza is at 4 am when Im drunk and there is nothing else open, or.....

when Im sexually harrassing women.

Which also usually happens to be around 4am when Im drunk.

[blarneydude]

03:05 PM on 10/30/2011

Herman: you forget, the NYT is not the only way we have to hear you.

We hear you loud and clear. And you don't know what *you* are talking about.

Which, when you ask us to vote for you, is all that matters.

This isn't a book tour. Which is how you are running it. You may sell the book, but that is as far as it is going to go.

[Johnoneone1999]

01:10 PM on 10/30/2011

Just Sayin"...I am 110% not a Cain supporter; nevertheless, it is important to speak to his and others' business skills.

Why in the world, and where is hell, did any Americans become hood-winked into accepting the idiot premise that business excutive skills were directly propostional to being a successful President of the United States.

Face it, "business leaders are PAID to focus on ONE RESULT; PROFIT. and profit by any means over challenges, laws, or compassions. Benefits then trickle-down through drip faucets which are not regularly or evenly maintained.

Our's is a COUNTRY of its People; dedicated to the lives, hopes, and dreams of its people. The United States is NOT some "for-profit company"; rather a nation of, and for, POEPLE. The is this Dedicated" abstract that even the "Occupy" cries to have re-examined and reconfirmed.

Business Executives do not have aptitudes or succinct abilities for the Much Greater "Multi-Focus" Skills and Demonsrative Wisdoms demanded for a Executive-Chief office by which success is not measured by money-profits above other issues.

Again, Its very premise is a step away from a "Trading On Me" sell-out. More a step towards what looks a lot like a feudal system.

[askandtell]

02:59 PM on 10/30/2011

Excellent post. The support for a "for-profit" corporation named the US has left me scratching my head for the sheer ridiculousness.

[blarneydude]

03:09 PM on 10/30/2011

While we're on business, this from the humor front.

HuffPo's teaser for one of its blogs reads (exactly) like this:

WASHINGTON -- The presidential campaign of Herman Cain has capitalized on his surge in the polls and recent media attention by raising more than $3...

That sounds about like the volume of the surge to me. Three bucks.

[razaminaz]

12:46 PM on 10/30/2011

Let's see, where was Godfather's pizza rated when Cain bought it, and where is it now? And in the Bible didn't Cain slay Abel?

[Barbara DeZan]

11:31 AM on 10/30/2011

Herman Cain campaign:

"I, me, me, I, me, I,"

and

"Everybody in the entire journalistic world, print media and all TV stations (except Fox) are liars, deceivers, full of horsefeathers."

"I am the greatest at everything, pizza to song, nobody is as grand as I"

[avrt]

11:15 AM on 10/30/2011

Sounds VERY much like what staffers used to say about Queen Hillary when she was in the whitehouse. I recall many "recounts" that not only were you not to speak to her, but in addition not look directly into her eyes. Looks like this crap about Herman is just a recycle.

[gjwarnock]

11:03 AM on 10/30/2011

From Mother Jones:
"His long tenure as a director at a Midwest energy corporation named Aquila that, like the infamous Enron Corporation, recklessly dove into the wild west of energy trading and speculation—and ultimately screwed its employees out of tens of millions of dollars."
,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,
KochCain For WHAT!!

[BlueGirlRedState]

11:15 AM on 10/30/2011

The media is sitting on that story. When the time is right...

[gjwarnock]

11:20 AM on 10/30/2011

Oops, I let the cat out of the bag? :>)
And there is Lot of other stuff too!

[Captjashook]

11:27 AM on 10/30/2011

Seriously? He is one of those sociopaths?

This guy is toast. He should be in jail, and he is allowed to by put up as a presidential candidate? Lord, help us.

[gjwarnock]

11:34 AM on 10/30/2011

Hand picked by the Koch Bros.!!

[mrjeremyfisher]

11:01 AM on 10/30/2011

Herman Cain, the proofs in the pudding and those Godfathers pizzas were the worst I ever tasted - couldn't eat more than a few bites - cheap, oily, low quality ingredients that left a bad taste in your mouth. As for management, he halved the number of restaurants (600 to 300) and lowered the costs (and quality) of the product. Is that a formula for America? But since if he's so proud - a prophet for his incredible managerial skills, surely he'd be worth much more than the estimated 4 - 6 million, much of that made a LOBBYIST after the Godfathers debacle (quite the outsider).

[moses123]

11:00 AM on 10/30/2011

and if i win ther will be a pizza in every home.

[thefacts22]

11:38 AM on 10/30/2011

at least is better than standing on the food lines provided by the churches, like Europe.

[Francois Bergeron]

12:45 PM on 10/30/2011

Yikes. That's a new one.
Buy a newspaper.

[blarneydude]

03:11 PM on 10/30/2011

No kidding.

In the US, churches don't have food lines. Feeding the poor isn't Christian.

[thefacts22]

10:54 AM on 10/30/2011

Nothing new on those allegations....Most everyone has a price....Money talks and BS walks...The proof is potus, so anyone who uses his brains knows how socialist/liberals work all over the world. It is called taking issues to distort facts. obama was a simple "Komunity Organisher", a second rate acorn lawyer, never managed anything or made a penney on his own and no one has seen his famous grades, they are sealed and I guess he did not make an impression because no one remembers him, students, friends. And yet, he was elected president. Everyone in the world knew who he was except his own followers.

[Captjashook]

11:01 AM on 10/30/2011

I keep hearing Conservatives blame Liberals about distorting facts. This must be what Sam Seder calls the Projection mechanism.

Conservatives must project their own faults on others in order to justify their own sinful behavior. It truly is a mental disease. Some sort of intellectual survival mechanism that allows them to sleep with all the fear and anger in their hearts.

[gjwarnock]

11:07 AM on 10/30/2011

And we should believe you because you are,,,,,,, famous???

[thefacts22]

11:35 AM on 10/30/2011

Dont argue they are all genious, very, very well read, have read all the "pilotophers", now about "geopolitize", "Teo-logy", "mikkology" brilliant minds and they all have a doctorate in urination and defecation....Dont you see Wall Street? We should "abhor" their filth

[p mersault]

10:50 AM on 10/30/2011

Early nomination cycles are nothing more than a popularity contest. Remember, Trump? He never had a chance but people know him so he polled well. Cain is a different candidate, but he's the Republican's likable kind of "mavericky" so he polls well.

Once people really get down to it and think about these candidates behind the oval office desk, eccentrics like Cain poll at roughly north of nil.

[BlueGirlRedState]

10:50 AM on 10/30/2011

Herman Cain writes in his latest book, "I'm a leader, not a reader." What a brilliant statement from the author to all the readers who bought his book and got punked.

[sanddc]

10:46 AM on 10/30/2011

Cain maybe you have brainwashed your staff a bit to much and that why they quit your campaign.

[jaslyn]

10:43 AM on 10/30/2011

he's a legend in his own mind.