Herman Cain Tells GQ Men Don’t Want A ‘Sissy Pizza’ Loaded With Veggies (Though He Does Like Arugula)

by Alex Alvarez | 1:25 pm, November 14th, 2011

» 21 comments

In an interview wherein Herman Cain is referred to as “the funniest, most outrageous guy on the GOP stage,” GQ‘s senior editor Devin Gordon joined correspondent Chris Heath and food critic Alan Richman to take a look at the former Godfather’s Pizza CEO’s thoughts concerning myriad important issues facing our nation today: Jobs! Muslims! Ice cream flavors! Pizza toppings!

“No matter where you stand on Herman Cain,” begins the interview, “whether, in your evolving estimation, he’s a populist hero, a charming buffoon, or a thuggish sexual predator—let’s all agree that American presidential politics has never seen anything like him.” And there’s no better way to observe and report on how, exactly, Cain has managed to sweep America off its feet than in the man’s home environment – a pizza shop. Specifically, Washington DC’s Seventh Hill.

In the interview, we learn that, despite the fact that his name is now inextricably linked to that most delicious of culinary offerings, Herman Cain doesn’t eat pizza that often because it has “got to be as good as Godfather’s or I won’t eat it.” Also (Parents, cover your children’s eyes. And, actually, get them off Mediaite altogether.), he believes veggie pizzas are for sissy men. Sissy men with regular bowel movements and glowing skin:

Chris Heath: What can you tell about a man by the type of pizza that he likes?

Herman Cain: [repeats the question aloud, then pauses for a long moment] The more toppings a man has on his pizza, I believe the more manly he is.

Chris Heath: Why is that?

Herman Cain: Because the more manly man is not afraid of abundance. [laughs]

Devin Gordon: Is that purely a meat question?

Herman Cain: A manly man don’t want it piled high with vegetables! He would call that a sissy pizza.

Classic Cain. Many, we’re assuming, will find his comment offensive because of its implications about gender roles and machismo and the like. But those who find their feathers ruffled will be met, we’re assuming, with a very specific response: “It was just a joke.”

Never mind whether the joke is one that is appropriate for a candidate running for the position of commander-in-chief, if you can’t get behind Cain’s sense of humor, that’s not his — or his supporters’ — problem; it’s yours.

Also, another fun fact: Just like Bachmann and Perry before him, Cain used to vote Democrat.

And in case you’re wondering whether constantly being connected to all things pizza has begun to get to Cain, the answer is: Yeah, kinda. He would like you to know that he’s worked at various corporations, both within the food industry as well as with the Department of the Navy and on the advisory board of the Strategic Air Command, and that his educational background wasn’t in business or food management at all, but, rather, in mathematics and computer science.

In closing, we’ll leave with the recommendation to read GQ’s interview, in full. And with this parting thought:

Devin Gordon: What do you think of the arugula?

Herman Cain: Oh, I like it.

[A fine pie, with a thin, chewy crust. To his credit, Cain is overcoming an innate prejudice toward vegetation.—AR]

[But a potentially dangerous political stance? Recall that during the 2008 campaign, then senator Obama was mocked for bringing up arugula at an Iowa campaign stop.—DG]

h/t GQ

GQ, Herman Cain, pizza

Anonymous

Italian Pizza Pie.

A little known secret from WW2 is that when Italians were captured, they were sent to Sweden to be questioned using a technique known as smorgasbording. To this day, Italians veterans will never order the Herring Pizza with anchovies.
Anonymous

I think this man needs to go back to making pizzas. And I suspect he will after the New Hampshire primary.
Kid Dynamite

Herman’s specialty is a pesto pizza … because he loves white pie.
Anonymous

Little known fact; Many people outside America do not even eat pizzas at all.

Real men hunt for food.
News Of The World

Uggh. What a tool.
Anonymous

‘The more toppings a man has on his pizza, I believe the more manly he is…’ Herman Cain

…Make this man the Republican Candidate for President now.
Anonymous

His take on pizza sounds a lot like his stance on abortion. Mainly that it’s a direct contradiction.
Pablo

Pesto ain’t white, genius.
Anonymous

I wonder if they like meat on their pizza in Uzbekibekibekibekistan?
http://mediamatters.org/ Leedog

Can someone remind Herb this is America and people have the right to order whatever they want on their pizza!!
Anonymous

Herb equates pizza toppings with women. The more meat toppings you have on your pizza, the more manly you are; the more co-workers you can bed, the more manly you are.
Tim Tebow

Pesto is usually on an olive oil base, not tomato.

Thus “white.”

Talking about things you don’t know?

Pure GOP.
Anonymous

Godfather is crappy mass produced fast food, not real pizza. All he was was a boardroom wonk, not a cook!
Anonymous

Well Pizza is quite a process to make, someone has to grow the tomoatoes, milk a cow, get it’s milk, pasteurize the milk, turn it into cheese, grow the wheat to create the bread, slaughter a pig to get pepperoni, grow spices to season the pepperoni, that’s not mentioning the pizza oven which is created out of metal that must be mined from quarries with huge machines powered by gasoline and diesel engines, running on oil mined from the ground by huge machines made of metal themselves.

Buying pizza is a status symbol god damnit.
Anonymous

but why he does not want to Pizza with sissy?
http://vietzip.co.cc/forum/member.php?7930-Lawanda
mikey970

real men have vegetables on their plate and pizza…the fiber cleans out the colon……………..
http://twitter.com/Socoral Tom Green

The problem has always been that conservatives are just not that funny.
Anonymous

Alex you spend such an unexplainable amount of time writing and writing about Herman Cain it makes everyone wonder if you aren’t angling for a little ‘one on one’ time with him. Or are you feeling left out of his girl collection?
Thinker

This is the part where a Hermanite would usually call you a racist, liberal, media lover for not supporting Herman Blame. It seems they’ve all woken up since his little Libya interview! Lol!!
Anonymous

Herman needs to go on the offensive! Instead of just issuing blanket denials, he should claim that he was the CEO of the NRA and therefore had to train the NRA members how to increase security at their restaurants. In order to protect restaurant patrons from possible female terrorists, he believed that the best way to do so was to reach under the dresses of all the beautiful patrons and stroke their thighs and panties in a search for concealed weapons and bombs! He should argue that the receipt of only a handful of complaints from women who claim they were harassed, is proof positive that everybody else knew exactly what he was trying to teach them.
http://societyfordaintydamsels.wordpress.com/ fennel

Herman Cain is redic. What men put on their pizza or don’t for that matter is no bearing on their manliness. Some men and women too are concerned over their cholesteral. True pizza contains cheese. But putting on meat only increases the cholesterol. Plus if one is Jewish and Kosher its forbidden to combine meat and dairy. Well I suppose Herman Cain never served a Jew in his restaurant or that slipped his mind. Not surprised. It seems like there’s much that slips his mind.