John Truscott, who was a very able and professional press secretary for John Engler, has again demonstrated that he has slipped into a nexus with the practitioners of right-wing rhetoric as 2012 approaches.
In his newest writing for one of the Detroit papers, John refers to the allegations against Herman Cain as “cheap attacks by the mainstream media and liberals.”
Really, John?
John knows that the claim of widespread liberal bias in the media is substantially exaggerated. John knows that the sexual harassment claims against Cain would have been a big story if they had been raised against any other candidate. And John knows that Politico, which broke the story, is far from some liberal advocacy website.
This is not an Anita Hill moment when a woman comes out of the woodwork to make he-said, she-said allegations. These were accusations that were apparently known by many members of the National Restaurant Association and resulted in cash settlements to keep the women involved quiet.
And Politico went after the story meticulously, documenting it thoroughly, though they hit a roadblock when they couldn’t crack the secrecy surrounding the settlements. The Restaurant Association could quickly solve that problem, if Cain simply gave them the word to do so.
John knows that if revelations like these had surfaced against, let’s say, Geoffrey Fieger during the 1998 gubernatorial campaign, it would have been a huge story in Michigan. And John, as Engler’s spokesman, would have been quietly stoking the fire. John knows perfectly well the political dynamics at work here that are causing Cain so much grief.
In other words, John should know better.
