What about 'decimated' does Eric Boehlert not understand?

Orig­i­nally posted at Haemet

Left-​winger Eric Boehlert of Media Mat­ters tweets thus:

EricBoehlert Eric Boehlert

Over 48 hrs, still wait­ing for RW blog­gers to find a hole in @politico’s Cain piece.…They haven’t but that doesn’t stop caterwauling

Still wait­ing for the holes. Well, Boehlert, let’s start. There is the expla­na­tion by the fab­u­lous William Jacob­son, Pro­fes­sor of Law at Cor­nell. Jacob­son points out that this story was designed to dam­age a can­di­date, not to dis­sem­i­nate accu­rate infor­ma­tion or to start an inves­ti­ga­tion into an area of con­cern. The Pro­fes­sor con­tin­ues to explain:

Update: I just watched Cain’s inter­view by Greta Van Sus­teren, and he was clear and per­sua­sive that there was no har­rass­ment. As to the inept response to the Politico story, Cain said that while his cam­paign was noti­fied in advance, Politico never spec­i­fied what the alle­ga­tions were and he didn’t know what their angle would be until he saw the story. He said that he remem­bered one of the women, and denied that any­thing inap­pro­pri­ate took place. He said that Politico gave his staff the name of the sec­ond woman, and he was not aware that she ever even com­plained and he could think of noth­ing that would give rise to a complaint.

Not sure how you could have missed the Jacob­son piece, Eric, because Instapun­dit linked to it in the same post as he linked mine, which you’ve been hap­pily twitter-​trashing.

Speak­ing of which, Eric, while you were get­ting your panties in a bunch over my snarky use of “dar­ling” and “grow a set,” you failed to acknowl­edge that I explained the legal ram­i­fi­ca­tions of these alle­ga­tions: absolutely noth­ing. “Hos­tile envi­ron­ment” sex­ual harass­ment usu­ally must be repeated, unless it is extreme in its one instance; it also must make a “rea­son­able per­son” very uncom­fort­able, but Politico only alleged that Cain made a “non-​suggestive” ges­ture. That, Eric, is the epit­ome of what is not sex­ual harassment.

Con­tin­u­ing on the legal angle, attor­ney Erick Erick­son pointed out that a five-​figure set­tle­ment for accu­sa­tions against some­one like Cain is “go away” money, not “wow, he really screwed up” money. From the time that I spent in a lit­i­ga­tion firm, I agree: if your case has any merit, it set­tles in the low six fig­ures, at the very least: that’s the going rate for keep­ing dam­ag­ing infor­ma­tion out of court, whether or not it meets each and every legal require­ment for action­able wrongdoing.

Mean­while, Pro Pub­lica rein­forces the notion that Politico’s story is unspe­cific, unsourced, and based on innu­endo, impli­ca­tions, and hearsay, not ver­i­fi­able facts of wrong­do­ing:

Obvi­ously, this descrip­tion leaves open a myr­iad of pos­si­bil­i­ties, from the boor­ish to the legally action­able. Cer­tainly, it prompts read­ers to scratch their heads as they try to remem­ber what in the late 1990s con­sti­tuted a phys­i­cal ges­ture that was not overtly sex­ual but dis­com­fit­ing. (I checked. The Macarena came out in the mid-​1990s.) Sug­ges­tions from a boss to “meet in my suite” are equally ambigu­ous. Did Cain have a sheaf of strat­egy papers on the desk or a CD player with a Michael Bolton track cued up? (.…)

If the story reached the board of the restau­rant asso­ci­a­tion, as Politico alleges, why do the chair­man, vice chair­man and imme­di­ate past chair­man of the board all say they’ve never heard of it[?]

No excuse for not see­ing that piece, either, Boehlert, because Insty linked to it. In the same post, Glenn Reynolds links to Stacy McCain’s Amer­i­can Spec­ta­tor arti­cle, in which McCain dec­i­mates the Politico hit job. A sample:

Buried far down in the 2,100-word Politico arti­cle, below all the alle­ga­tions from unnamed sources, were the names of five for­mer offi­cials of the National Restau­rant Asso­ci­a­tion who worked with Cain dur­ing his tenure there, and who said the harass­ment alle­ga­tions — which they had pre­vi­ously never heard — were entirely unchar­ac­ter­is­tic of the man they knew and admired. Denise Marie Fugo praised Cain as “very gra­cious,” and Mary Ann Cric­chio said, “Her­man treated every­one great.” So the accusers in the scan­dal remain anony­mous, as do Politico’s sec­ondary sources, while every­one actu­ally named in the story had only kind words for Cain.

McCain then directs us to @KarolNYC, who worked on Cain’s 2004 Sen­ate race. Karol said that Her­man Cain never bor­dered on inap­pro­pri­ate in the slight­est; yet, Politico expects us to take the word of third-​hand anony­mous sources.

Then we have Da TechGuy liken­ing this to Anita Hill’s lies, the Scooter Libby char­ac­ter assas­si­na­tion, and the desire of the MSM and lib­eral estab­lish­ment to dis­tract us from Solyn­dra, Fast and Furi­ous, sub­poe­nas, and the government’s avoid­ance of FOIA requests. Belvedere calls this “the soft total­i­tar­i­an­ism that is sex­ual harass­ment” in ref­er­ence to how easy it is to destroy a rep­u­ta­tion with these alle­ga­tions and how unsub­stan­ti­ated they can be. He also links us to Cain’s response with Greta van Sus­teren, which makes the Politico piece look like the hit job it is.

Speak­ing of which, Ann Coul­ter — lawyer and for­mer Law Review edi­tor and fed­eral appeals clerk — points out how ridicu­lous these charges are:

She also called the alle­ga­tions of sex­ual harass­ment weak at best.

“It’s not grop­ing, it’s not touch­ing, it’s not demand­ing sex, it’s that he had remarks they found inap­pro­pri­ate,” she said. “This isn’t drop­ping your pants and say­ing, ‘kiss it’. This is an out­ra­geous attack on a black con­ser­v­a­tive who is doing extremely well and I think will be our vice president.”

So, Eric baby, three lawyers, two law pro­fes­sors, and a host of other blog­gers are all say­ing the the claims, even if true, do not amount to sex­ual harass­ment; this is designed to be a hit piece, not actual jour­nal­ism; Her­man Cain’s close col­leagues all find his behav­iour to be above reproach; and sex­ual harass­ment can be a weapon used by women to extort money from com­pa­nies. When have we evis­cer­ated this story to your satisfaction?

Updates: Ed Mor­ris­sey of HotAir details the cred­i­bil­ity issues with the unsub­stan­ti­ated claims. There are ques­tions about the fact that at least one of the women brought up the claims as she was being dis­missed from the National Restau­rant Asso­ci­a­tion. Here, one of the complainant’s lawyers inad­ver­tently implies that this is a pro-​forma set­tle­ment, not any type of actual scandal. Karl of Patterico’s notes the dif­fer­ence between “inap­pro­pri­ate con­duct” and “sex­ual harass­ment,” but I will note that ‘inap­pro­pri­ate con­duct” is not legally action­able in of itself; there­fore, say­ing that this is “inap­pro­pri­ate con­duct” but not harass­ment actu­ally strength­ens the view that this is noth­ing more than a shake­down by money-​hungry women.

What I want to know his how many high-​profile, pow­er­ful men end up with these types of law­suits. One per­cent? Ten per­cent? Or is it a sit­u­a­tion where some­thing like half of male CEOs will be accused of sex­ual harass­ment by women look­ing for a golden parachute?

Update: I just watched Cain’s interview by Greta Van Susteren, and he was clear and persuasive that there was no harrassment.  As to the inept response to the Politico story, Cain said that while his campaign was notified in advance, Politico never specified what the allegations were and he didn’t know what their angle would be until he saw the story.  He said that he remembered one of the women, and denied that anything inappropriate took place.  He said that Politico gave his staff the name of the second woman, and he was not aware that she ever even complained and he could think of nothing that would give rise to a complaint.

No excuse for not seeing that piece, either, Boehlert, because Insty linked to it.  In the same post, Glenn Reynolds links to Stacy McCain’s American Spectator article, in which McCain decimates the Politico hit job. A sample:

Buried far down in the 2,100-word Politico article, below all the allegations from unnamed sources, were the names of five former officials of the National Restaurant Association who worked with Cain during his tenure there, and who said the harassment allegations — which they had previously never heard — were entirely uncharacteristic of the man they knew and admired. Denise Marie Fugo praised Cain as “very gracious,” and Mary Ann Cricchio said, “Herman treated everyone great.” So the accusers in the scandal remain anonymous, as do Politico‘s secondary sources, while everyone actually named in the story had only kind words for Cain.

McCain then directs us to @KarolNYC, who worked on Cain’s 2004 Senate race.  Karol said that Herman Cain never bordered on inappropriate in the slightest; yet, Politico expects us to take the word of third-hand anonymous sources.

Then we have Da TechGuy likening this to Anita Hill’s lies, the Scooter Libby character assassination, and the desire of the MSM and liberal establishment to distract us from Solyndra, Fast and Furious, subpoenas, and the government’s avoidance of FOIA requests.  Belvedere calls this “the soft totalitarianism that is sexual harassment” in reference to how easy it is to destroy a reputation with these allegations and how unsubstantiated they can be.  He also links us to Cain’s response with Greta van Susteren, which makes the Politico piece look like the hit job it is.

Speaking of which, Ann Coulter – lawyer and former Law Review editor and federal appeals clerk – points out how ridiculous these charges are:

She also called the allegations of sexual harassment weak at best.

“It’s not groping, it’s not touching, it’s not demanding sex, it’s that he had remarks they found inappropriate,” she said. “This isn’t dropping your pants and saying, ‘kiss it’. This is an outrageous attack on a black conservative who is doing extremely well and I think will be our vice president.”

So, Eric baby, three lawyers, two law professors, and a host of other bloggers are all saying the the claims, even if true, do not amount to sexual harassment; this is designed to be a hit piece, not actual journalism; Herman Cain’s close colleagues all find his behaviour to be above reproach; and sexual harassment can be a weapon used by women to extort money from companies.  When have we eviscerated this story to your satisfaction?

Updates: Ed Morrissey of HotAir details the credibility issues with the unsubstantiated claims.  There are questions about the fact that at least one of the women brought up the claims as she was being dismissed from the National Restaurant Association.  Here, one of the complainant’s lawyers inadvertently implies that this is a pro-forma settlement, not any type of actual scandal. Karl of Patterico’s notes the difference between “inappropriate conduct” and “sexual harassment,” but I will note that ‘inappropriate conduct” is not legally actionable in of itself; therefore, saying that this is “inappropriate conduct” but not harassment actually strengthens the view that this is nothing more than a shakedown by money-hungry women.

What I want to know his how many high-profile, powerful men end up with these types of lawsuits.  One percent?  Ten percent?  Or is it a situation where something like half of male CEOs will be accused of sexual harassment by women looking for a golden parachute?