Don’t stop believin’, man. Not only did they hack his yfrog, they hacked his mind. Innocent until proven innocent, amirite? Pardon me if I don’t trust the guy who lied to the public for a week that we know all that we need to know about this case. The “facts” at first said he was hacked, then it was a prank, then it was a distraction, then he was hacked by right wing zealots, then he admitted he lied, and now he is getting “treatment”. If people had stopped pushing, the “facts” might have stopped with “he was hacked”. I will wait for the results of the investigation, since “facts” tend to be considered immutable things and this case seems to change regularly.
A “known troll” (here I don’t know whether you mean the guys who were dogging Weiner because he only seemed to follow young girls or Breitbart) turned out to be right (they were both correct). “Somehow managed”? Well, prime mover here was that he sent them to people not himself or his wife. And then egregiously lied about it for a week.
I’m not arguing with the cause, or the lying, just the privacy angle. Which sounds more likely to you:
Option 1: Everyone on the internet who’s ever received a photo from Weiner, a group I imagine is almost exclusively left of center and loves the guy, has decided to send their photos to Brietbart, who is reviled on the left.
Option 2: His yfrog account was hacked and someone is slowly leaking out the photos.
I actually haven’t seen this cleared up. Where the hell are all these photos coming from?
Sorry, but this is really a stretch, Jason. Even if he hadn’t accidentally tweeted his dick to 45,000 followers, he was still sending cock shots to people he met via comments on his YouTube videos. “You say you’re a blackjack dealer in Vegas? Your screen name sounds trustworthy to me. Here’s a picture. If you wouldn’t mind, please don’t forward it to anyone, unless she’s cute and over 18!”
What could go wrong?
At a certain point, you can’t put the blame on political enemies and a sex-obsessed media, because both of those are absolutes you HAVE to be aware of in 2011. It’s in fact so easy to avoid giving them grist for the mill, it’s almost criminal when you still manage to. Fair? Beats me. But it’s too late to play Pollyana when you’re in your nth term as a US Congressman.
He’s no innocent naif here, but it’s also not like he decided to start running around the capital
The whole he should resign thing, why not let the voters decide? Isn’t that one of the great things about our system?
You can look at Vitter. He actually broke the law. Shouldn’t a Senator who has engaged in illegal conduct resign? If not, why should a House Rep who lied but otherwise didn’t engage in illegal conduct resign?
Vitter even called for Clinton to resign due to his adultery. Vitter was also guilty of that when he made those remarks. Why didn’t his dishonesty result in the Republicans condemning him? Oh yeah, because Louisiana had a Democratic Governor and would have appointed a Democrat to the vacant seat.
It’s all partisan politics. The good of the constituents or the good of the country has never figured into it.
That’s not what I’m saying, as I’m sure you’re aware. My contention is with the idea that “a troll” is the cause of all the “bad things” happening to Weiner (bad things, as you’ve pointed out several times, he is doing to himself now). He made series of spectacularly awful decisions, apparently repeating several of them multiple times. That he was eventually caught is less a function of the moral character of his political enemies than it is a matter of inevitability. That he is being asked to resign says more about the backbone of the democratic party, and that he is making his anguish even more public by announcing admitting himself into a treatment center is probably a side effect of his terrible decision-making process. Breitbart is an ass, but this humiliating episode was Weiner’s to create, and his to exacerbate. He hasn’t failed yet at either.
With the exception of the first photo, my is guess that someone stole photos off his account and released them to Breitbart, who then released them to the public. I don’t know why the followers he’s been flirting with would send them around. Where the hell did Breitbart get that cell phone picture? A liberal follower sent it to him?
I don’t know about the source of the latest photos of an all but nude Weiner in the Congressional Gym but most of the photos released so far come from the people he sent them to.
Because he sent them to anyone who clicked follow or sent him a message that looked vaguely female, and because entrusting your political fate to a series of twentysomething starstruck groupies-in-training may not be the wisest of choices. Just as a random example, one of his ‘fans’ sent a website her entire chat transcripts with Weiner.
I already had a shower today, but after reading a couple of pages I feel like I need to take another, and no it won’t be a cold shower. Just gross that newlywed 40 something Congressman is engaging in conversation with 20 somethings.
Tell me again why the country needs Congressman like this clown? I get that partisan Democrat like attack dogs like Weiner. (My god it is practically impossible to write about the guy without making bad puns). Just like partisan Republicans like Rush, and Bachman for blasting Democrats. But how can he possibly be an effective Congressman, with this stuff floating around the internet?
Wow, that’s it? The guy is zero to full-on in like 15 sentences. Don’t they have internet classes telling people how to do this better? The ending where she says she won’t rat him out is amusing.
Actually, in the 19th century 40 yos sleeping with 20 yos was common enough. You’ll have to blame Strollen’s anachronistic reaction on some other time period.
Also, Weiss was the first to mention sex, if I’m reading that properly. I suppose Weiner did mention “What will we do at night?” first. In any case, both are consenting adults. And yeah, I would say this if Weiner were a Republican. This story is just being way overblown.
Well, there isn’t some overwhelming terrible amount of horror to the original story (individually; collectively its more troubling), other than his incredible lack of discretion. It’s the week-long fumbling around lying to everyone, then encouraging others to lie, then allowing other people to attack the people following up on the story, etc. At this point, it’s more about the pattern of behavior, what don’t we know, and the cover-up.
The things that have me wondering if we are through with the revelations yet reading that transcript was the reported similarity in language between the transcript Lum posted above and what he said to the teenager, as well as the same language between his denial any of the women were underage and his denial that the original penis pic was his.
I don’t know what ‘collectively its more troubling’ means in this context, rhino. Lying and covering up is pretty lame, yes, but it doesn’t mean you can’t trust him on anything. He lied about cybersexing because he was embarrassed or protecting his marriage. That doesn’t mean he lies about political issues. As for the ‘what don’t we know!?’ angle, that’s an argument from ignorance that shouldn’t yet be considered. If there is more out there, we’ll get it.
As always it is the cover up that gets people in trouble. I have a pretty hard and fast rule. Married Congressman or Senators and other high level official shouldn’t have affairs while in office. I don’t think married people should have affairs period, but if they had them years ago then it is the wives problems and some type of statue of limitations apply. If they insist on having affairs while in office then they should be smart enough not to get caught. Finally, if they do get caught they are allowed a couple of no comments in the beginning, but no outright lies.
This isn’t about morality it is about public policy. If people think Congress critters are beholden to special interest, than imagine the type of power that somebody has over a Congressman who helps them clean up their messes. Edwards is a classic example of this.
Now I can forgive A mistake and rare case two. Although frankly I think virtually all of them should offer to resign and only stay on if the party leaders/President decide that are really critical. In Weiner’s case he screwed up so bad that there he is well past the forgiveness stage.
Yes he should. Congressman and Senator who are responsible for writing laws need to be held to a higher standard. Prostitution is illegal (except in Nevada) and Vitter broke the law which makes unfit to be a Senator. Plenty of Republicans want to see the guy go, I did.
Right now, I bet there are a ton of political operatives firing off flirty messages to politicians on Facebook, from fake female accounts. Low cost, high potential payoff.
