(ThyBlackMan.com) A fourth woman, Sharon Bialek, has accused Herman Cain of something much more serious than sexual harassment. Speaking to reporters, Sharon Bialek, the first woman to come forth and publically reveal her identity, described an Washington, DC encounter with Herman Cain in 1997 that can only be accurately described as a sexual assault. Even though Bialek has said, she does not wish to pursue criminal charges and simply wants Herman Cain to cop to the fact that he is a sexual predator who preyed on women while heading up the National Restaurant Association. There is some good news for Cain, at least concerning Bialek’s allegations; the statute of limitations for sexual assault charges inWashington, DC has run out. Time is also running out on the credibility of the Tea Party. They must show the rest of the country that they objectively handle these allegations about their man instead of engaging in partisan attacks to protect him.
In the glare of cameras in a room full of reporters, Bialek said that in 1997 that she went to see Herman Cain in Washington, DC shortly after she was laid off from her job with the National Restaurant Association to see if he could assist 
her in retaining another position. After having dinner with Cain to discuss her job search, Bialek says that Herman Cain offered to show her the DC offices of the NRA. What she described next was nothing short of a sexual assault. While riding in the car with Cain, Bialek said, “He suddenly reached over and he put his hand on my leg, under my skirt and reached for my genitals….he grabbed my head and brought it toward his crotch.”
In the District of Columbia, where the sexual assault alleged by Bialek took place in 1997, the statute of limitations is 3 yrs. Just to be clear that we are talking about a sexual assault and not sexual harassment, sexual assault according to The National Center for Victims of Crime “takes many forms including attacks such as rape or attempted rape, as well as any unwanted sexual contact or threats. Usually a sexual assault occurs when someone touches any part of another person’s body in a sexual way, even through clothes, without that person’s consent.”
Members of the Tea Party movement have so far been blindly supportive of Herman Cain despite his obvious less than truthful answers about what he remembers. One Tea Party activist interviewed by NPR said to show her support she went online and donated twice to Herman Cain. When Cain and Newt Gingrich recently participated in a forum billed as a “debate” which was also a fund-raiser for the Texas Patriots Political Action Committee, the organizers would not allow reporters during a press session to ask questions concerning the recent allegations. Lloyd Marcus is a black man who refers to himself, as an unhyphenated American is a relative pop star in the Tea Party movement gaining notoriety for his writing and singing of the “American Tea Party Anthem” at national Tea Party events. Marcus recently wrote an open letter to Herman Cain in which he wrote, “Herman Cain, bottom line; we, your Tea Party family have got your back!”
You would think most of the people running the various Tea Party corporations and putting a lot of stock in Cain, would be looking to guard their brands. Cain has the potential to pull down or severely damage the credibility of the Tea Party brand for a number of reasons.
The sexual harassment and sexual assault allegations top the list of Cain’s problems. Blind unwavering support of Herman Cain coupled with the outright dismissal of the allegations and attacks on these women makes the Tea Party seem like it is a willing part of a Herman Cain cover up or at the very least lacking sensitivity or ignorance of a very serious problem in the workplace. Less than 39 percent of rapes and sexual assault were reported to law enforcement in 2005 so for critics to ask why Bialek did not report Cain shows willful ignorance of the problem. The University of Michigan published a study in March that showed more than 50 percent of working women reported at least one incident of harassment during a 12-month period. So it stands to reason that millions of female voters, some even part of the Tea Party movement, have suffered some sort of sexual harassment and the Tea Party leaders need to be cautious about their continued support of man refered to as a “monster” by one of the victims who has now come out of the shadows.
Even if Cain were to take and pass a lie detector test as he offered to do, which is highly unlikely but Cain’s management of the crisis begs the question about the 3am phone call and if he can make good decisions under pressure. Cain has made serious missteps in addressing the allegation and his appearance of giving less than truthful answers, open hostility towards reporters asking questions about the newsworthy story and dragging his wife into the fray is not the mettle of man ready to deal with weight of nation’s problems.
Then there is the flip-flop on the Obama administration’s assassination of aU.S. citizen, which Herman Cain was against before he was for it reacting purely to propaganda designed to get citizens to believe that this is not a major violation of Constitutional rights. The due process clauses of the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments prohibit the government from taking a person’s “life, liberty or property without due process of law,” One of the Tea Party’s main talking points is about how it cherishes the Constitution and how the country must get back to constitutional government. How can the Tea Party then embrace the Obama administration trampling of due process rights is something voters should ask themselves or does it reveal a deeply embedded racism in the movement towards Arabs and religious bigotry towards Muslims. Remember Cain said he would not hire a Muslim to work on his staff if elected President, which amounts to a religious test expressly forbidden by the Constitution.
Article VI, paragraph 3 of the Constitution states “The Senators and Representatives before mentioned, and the Members of the several State Legislatures, and all executive and judicial Officers, both of the United States and of the several States, shall be bound by Oath or Affirmation, to support this Constitution; but no religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office or public trust under the United States.
Nevertheless, why let the Constitution get in the way of a little religious bigotry?
The main point is that the Tea Party risks further alienating itself from the rest of the populace and to link its fate to that of Herman Cain is a bad business move. It will be interesting to watch and see if Herman Cain poll numbers fall as the sexual harassment scandal continues to grow and if his fate has a negative impact on Tea Party groups.
Staff Writer; Scotty Reid
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