Saturday Massacre: Pelosi, Israel, Wasserman Schultz call for Weiner to resign

[cinyc]

He was hacked, from what I've researched.

If Weiner's Twitter and yfrog accounts were hacked, I'm the Queen of England.  If he was hacked, why did he call a lawyer instead of the Capitol Police or FBI?  Hacking the Twitter account of a public official is a federal offense.  Just ask the guy who was convicted of hacking into Sarah Palin's e-mail account.

Which member of New York's congressional delegation will post a lewd picture of themselves on the internet next, do you guys reckon? It's too bad old Vito Fossella got run out of office before twitter really took off.

They've all been men so far.  It's time for a picture from Kirsten Gillibrand for equal opportunity - though our luck, equal opportunity would be a picture of Louise Slaughter or Nita Lowey, instead.

[cinyc]

Ι doubt that apart from some political junkies anybody in the US is fascinated with the whole Weiner's weiner saga.

Sure.  Nobody cares about this story.  That's why it has been on page 4 or so of the New York Post for the past few days, the top or one of the top stories on the NYC local news, (reluctantly) featured on the Daily Show and even on Nightline tonight.  If Leno and Letterman weren't in repeats this week, they'd be making multiple jokes about the story, too.  People care about Congressmen making asses out of themselves - which Weiner did, if not by actually sending the photo, by his obnoxious non-answers to simple questions.  Which leads to...

He's now saying that the picture might be of his crotch, but that he definitely didn't send it.

http://www.mediaite.com/tv/rep-weiner-i-cant-say-with-certitude-when-asked-if-twitter-picture-was-of-him/

This is going to get worse before it gets better.

Worst damage control EVER.  

Here's how not to make a story go away - hold a press gaggle where you refuse to answer any actual questions and call a CNN producer who is asking for a simple yes or no answer to a simple yes or no question a "jackass".   And be super obnoxious while refusing to answer any questions.  That almost guarantees the story will go thermonuclear because now it's not only just about whether you sent the sexually suggestive photo, but also about the stonewalling and coverup.  And the media just loves stories about how a Congressman is trying to hide something from the media.

[cinyc]

Ι doubt that apart from some political junkies anybody in the US is fascinated with the whole Weiner's weiner saga.

Sure.  Nobody cares about this story.  That's why it has been on page 4 or so of the New York Post for the past few days, the top or one of the top stories on the NYC local news, (reluctantly) featured on the Daily Show and even on Nightline tonight.  If Leno and Letterman weren't in repeats this week, they'd be making multiple jokes about the story, too.  People care about Congressmen making asses out of themselves - which Weiner did, if not by actually sending the photo, by his obnoxious non-answers to simple questions.  Which leads to...

New York isn't the entire country.
And laughing with a story isn't the same thing as being fascinated with it.

New York is where Weiner's political fate will ultimately rest and once a political story reaches both the Daily Show and Nightline, it is a story that many Americans are fascinated with, whether you agree with it or not. 

This is a big deal - such a big deal that Pelosi is peeved about it sucking the political air out of the Democrats' plans and strategy for the current session.

[cinyc]

Weiner won't call police over hacking, but will call over annoying reporter

http://newyork.cbslocal.com/2011/06/02/weiner-says-hes-done-talking-about-twitter-photo-time-to-get-back-to-work/

Worst damage control ever.  The New York media likes nothing more than talking about politicians slighting the New York media.

[cinyc]

Also it kinda undermines his "I'm not going to call the police and waste their time" argument about the hacking

Yeah, that too.  Worst damage control ever.

But sending out the cops to threaten to arrest obnoxious NYC political reporters only makes those reporters to want to get the story more - and they're a tenacious breed of pitbulls to begin with.  It seems that Mayor Bloomberg doesn't much like the CBS reporter that tried to interview Weiner because she has asked tough questions that made his administration look stupid.  I remember him getting very testy with her over the botched post-Christmas snow removal operation.  And like many local New York reporters, she's not afraid to make herself part of the story.

This just might end up on the front page of the Post and Daily News again tomorrow.

[cinyc]

LOL at NYC political reporters, seeking comment from sources few of us would ever even think of:

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http://newyork.cbslocal.com/2011/06/03/weiners-constituents-speak-congressman-just-come-clean/

[cinyc]

http://www.thesmokinggun.com/documents/internet/mike-stack-weinergate-co-pilot-219073

http://www.thesmokinggun.com/documents/bizarre/dan-wolfe-anthony-weiner-weinergate-632095

So?  

Typical sleazy media behavior - the media investigating a person who only retweeted what Weiner wrote and someone with no real link to the tweet.  Just like they did with Joe the Plumber.  It makes people who know bad things about Congressmen or ask them tough questions not want to step forward for fear of having their lives ruined.

That the tweet linking to Weiner's picture was in his feed is not at all in dispute.

[cinyc]

That the tweet linking to Weiner's picture was in his feed is not at all in dispute.

But that he sent it out is.

There's no proof that he didn't, and if Weiner truly thought the vast right-wing conspiracy hacked into his twitter account and sent the photo, Weiner would have had no problem asking the FBI or Capitol Police to investigate.  That he didn't and continues to not directly answer questions pretty much tells you everything any rational person needs to know.

The simplest explanation is almost always the correct one.

[cinyc]

That the tweet linking to Weiner's picture was in his feed is not at all in dispute.

But that he sent it out is.

There's no proof that he didn't, and if Weiner truly thought the vast right-wing conspiracy hacked into his twitter account and sent the photo, Weiner would have had no problem asking the FBI or Capitol Police to investigate.  That he didn't and continues to not directly answer questions pretty much tells you everything any rational person needs to know.

The simplest explanation is almost always the correct one.

Guilty until proven innocent, eh? Garrow is rolling over in his grave...

The presumption of innocence applies to jurors hearing cases about real crimes in a court of law, not whether one thinks a sitting Congressman committed a non-crime - say, something like send a link to a lewd photo of himself to an adult - in the court of public opinion.

Let's see... There's a link to a lewd photo of a man in his underwear in Weiner's Twitter feed, which the Congressman himself controls.   First he claims his Twitter feed was hacked, then pranked - either way, likely an actual crime - but refuses to go to the Capitol Police or FBI over the incident.   He can't say with certitude that the photograph in question isn't of him.  And Congressman Weiner is often to first to blame a vast right wing conspiracy over everything - which he isn't doing here.  What inference would most rational people draw from those facts? 
 
Weiner's actions are the most damning evidence that he sent the link to the photo, most likely as a botched attempt to send a private DM.  The simplest explanation is almost always the correct one.

[cinyc]

Why is it his responsibility to try to use FBI to defend his reputation from being framed in a sex smear?  The rightwing has latched onto Weiner's reluctance to call the FBI as confirmation of his guilt yet they celebrate Nikki Haley as a conservative hero even though she's never pursued a lawsuit against either of the two people who alleged affairs with her?  (And unlike Weiner, she vowed to resign if the allegations turned out to be true.)  Nor have they wondered why John Boehner hasn't sued those who've alleged he's been carrying on an affair with a lobbyist?  Apparently, only when liberals are defamed, is it suspicious to ignore it.

People on facebook are hacked all the time and have things posted in their names all the time.  How many of these people call the FBI as opposed to just deleting the post?  The media has failed to report how easy it is to trigger a tweet "from" someone.  Even were the photo Weiner and he were to be embarrassed about it or other things opening an investigation might reveal, that doesn't eliminate the strong possibility he never sent this photo and has thus been framed.

Anthony Weiner isn't a just a "person on Facebook".  He is a sitting Congressman who publicly claimed his Twitter account was hacked.  If Weiner truly thought he was framed by the vast right wing conspiracy, he'd be repeating that daily while going to the cops - because Weiner is one of the most partisan members of Congress, and attacking Republicans is what he does daily.  But he isn't doing that.  I wonder why?

Weiner's legal issue isn't that he has been defamed or had an affair - it's that he has alleged someone hacked or pranked his Twitter account, either way, a crime.  Affairs aren't crimes.  And libel cases against public figures are almost impossible to win, so very few public figures ever bring them.

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Ah, yes! BREITBART, the scurrilous villain!  BREITBART is the one who tweeted the picture in question and framed Weiner!  Or made up the screen cap which shows the Weiner tweet!   Because we all know BREITBART just makes stuff up!  Oh wait, Tweetcongress.org also has evidence of the tweet in question? 

Still, it must be BREITBART'S fault!  It MUST be a right wing conspiracy!  Weiner couldn't have possibly tweeted the picture himself.  The most simple explanation is always wrong when BREITBART is involved - it's a CONSPIRACY!

[cinyc]

Breitbart has been associated with conspiracies to frame liberals before so that has to be considered when speculating plausible scenarios.  You were the one who said Weiner's past behavior should be considered.  I don't see why the established lack of credibility of Breitbart, Dan Wolfe and Mike Stack should not also be considered to cast doubt on their version of events.

Established lack of credibility of Andrew BREITBART?  Only in the mind of liberals with an axe to grind.  The "credibility" of Dan Wolfe has been established - unless you think TweetCongress is lying when they have an archive of the same tweet, too.  Dan Wolfe's identity is as irrelevant as yours, hiding behind the fake name "Joementum".  Dan Wolfe has every right to remain anonymous as you or I do.  And Mike Stack isn't even tangentially involved in the tweet story, despite attempts to shame him and others who dare speak out against a politician - just like the left's attempts to smear Joe the Plumber.

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Again, Nikki Haley is irrelevant.  Nobody hacked Nikki Haley.  Going to the police would do nothing to stop someone from spreading smears about her.  If Weiner went to the police, Twitter and Tweetdeck would quickly divulge the IP address of the person who allegedly framed him.  The law firm Weiner hired can't subpoena Twitter to release any such information.  So to clear his name, Weiner HAS to go to law enforcement.  That he's not interested in doing so tells me more about who sent the link to the photo than anything else - either Weiner or someone who Weiner authorized to tweet on his behalf.  If a hacker truly did it, the IP address would quickly show it, without any invasion of Weiner's privacy.  So Weiner should welcome an investigation.

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You have ZERO proof BREITBART did anything.  In any event, BREITBART hasn't framed anyone.  BREITBART has applied the same type of investigative techniques your liberal friends in the mainstream media have done against conservatives and conservative causes to expose liberal corruption in agencies like ACORN.  I get it - as a liberal, you don't like evil BREITBART!  And BREITBART Derangement Syndrome has replaced Bush Derangement Syndrome among some on the conspiratorial left, which always seems to need a boogeyman.  With your man in the Oval Office, it must be BREITBART and the evil Koch brothers' fault.

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Us "gullible" Republicans are largely irrelevant.  Weiner should be trying to persuade his own constituents that he did nothing wrong or at least have the decency not to lie to them about it.  But every time Weiner has opened his mouth, he has removed more and more doubt about who sent the tweet in question.

[cinyc]

Man, I hope you get your blood pressure checked regularly.

Please explain how your personal attack on me furthers this discussion at all.

[cinyc]

Man, I hope you get your blood pressure checked regularly.

Please explain how your personal attack on me furthers this discussion at all.

GIGO.

The only garbage is coming from those who think there was some sort of grand conspiracy to frame Weiner because the evil BREITBART was tangentially involved in publicizing the tweet.  By the way, the evil BREITBART is at it again today - and after today, there will be no doubt in any rational person's mind who sent the tweet.  Not that there should have been any doubt last week, anyway.

Maybe I'm not following this "scandal" closely enough, but is there any indication that Weiner may've violated any laws or misused his office? Is there any evidence that, at worst, he was a boorish horndog who cheated on his wife (not that I'm excusing such shameful behavior one bit)?

Agreed, no evidence of offical mis-deeds here.......if we got rid of all politicians who are boorish horndogs who cheat on their spouses.....no one would be left.......which may be a good thing

Ask Congressman Chris Lee whether the fact that he had done nothing illegal meant he got to keep his job and has a bright political future.  Or Congressman Mark Foley, for that matter - and ask yourself how Foleygate hurt the election chances of all Congressional Republicans.    After all is revealed, given the types of people Weiner was following on Twitter, I wouldn't be shocked if Weinergate ends up looking more like Foleygate.

[cinyc]

cinyc, do you really believe Weiner won't get reelected in his District, and do you really believe it will have a ripple affect in any way, shape or form? 

I can't fathom it.  Maybe I missed the whole point of your last post.......but I don't get it.

The tweet wasn't sent in a vacuum.  As the evil BREITBART is showing today, Weiner has a history of sending similar photos to others.  Some of Weiner's Twitter followers were under age 18.  If evidence surfaces that he was DMing similar pictures to underage girls, this quickly turns into something like Foleygate.

Weiner could easily get primaried in his district, or, if New York Democrats get sick enough of him, have his district eliminated as a result of redistricting.  So yes, there's a chance Weiner won't get reelected, though not by losing to a Republican.

[cinyc]

Wow, Weiner's district is only D+5.  He really could be in trouble.

It's a fools' gold D+5 district for Republicans, only so because of the blue collar white ethnic New Yorkers who make up much of NY-09 backing Bush over Kerry for national security reasons in 2004 and not much liking Obama in 2008.  On the Congressional level, the district should safely remain Democratic even if Weiner resigned - though I could see the district electing a more conservative Democrat.

[cinyc]

Weiner is expected to hold a press conference at 4PM. 

[cinyc]

Weiner is expected to hold a press conference at 4PM. 

A drink says he won't resign.  Deal?

No, because I don't think he'll resign, either.  My guess is he goes the I'm a sex addict, I'm getting treatment, please respect the privacy of my family route.  But we'll see.

[cinyc]

Weiner is expected to hold a press conference at 4PM.  

A drink says he won't resign.  Deal?

No, because I don't think he'll resign, either.  My guess is he goes the I'm a sex addict, I'm getting treatment, please respect the privacy of my family route.  But we'll see.

cinyc, cynic, cynic.......you can't refuse a drink for a bet  Ok, I'll bet you a drink he does resign, deal?

That would work - especially since NY1 says he's not resigning:
http://www.ny1.com/content/news_beats/ny1_political_itch/140451/sources--congressman-weiner-to-remain-in-office-amid-expanding-online-scandal

[cinyc]

Smart move. If he gets this out of the way now in three or four years no one is going to remember this except nasty Republican bloggers who bring it up when they write a post about him.

He's young; he can run for NYC Mayor in 2017 or whenever.

My guess is evil BREITBART has more than what he just released.  ABC News reportedly interviewed evil BREITBART's source for their evening newscast.  And once the floodgates open, more will follow.  Democrats neither want nor need the distraction - so ultimately, his Congressional career is in real jeopardy.  If he doesn't go, he might be pushed.

By the way, evil BREITBART is rumored to be at the Weiner press conference.

[cinyc]

This is clasic...Im so glad his career is destroyed, he always was the most arrogant of people. He is done.

His career isn't destroyed, his seat is safe enough that he will win re-election in 2012 and go on to lose in the mayoral primary  

You're assuming his seat will exist in 2012.  NYC is losing a seat.  He might have put a big target on his to make it the one to go.

[cinyc]

If Weiner were exposed to have behaved inappropriately for a husband, there's still little chance he'd resign (and no chance a Republican would win the district in 2012).  It would maybe hurt Weiner's frontrunner status in the primaries for the 2013 mayoral, though it could be hard for a rival to attack him without doing more damage to themselves than him.  And given that Spitzer resigned over sexual depravity and people were then horribly dissatisfied with Paterson, even if something worse came out, I'd largely expect New Yorkers to dismiss peccadilloes as having no correlation to an executive's job performance and elect him anyway.  Remember, more socially conservative upstate isn't part of the equation here.  Everyone in NYC presuming Ed Koch to be gay didn't stop them from electing him.  Not suggesting being gay is the same as infidelity, just pointing out New Yorkers largely don't give a f.

New Yorkers don't care about whether their politicians are having extramarital affairs, electronic or otherwise.  But they do care whether their politicians lie to them in such a transparent way that it insults their intelligence - which is what Weiner did.  That sound bite from his press conference is pure gold for any potential mayoral candidate.  He's extremely damaged goods.  In my opinion, the only question is whether House Democrats throw him overboard now or let him serve the rest of the term while carving up his district into 7 pieces to make sure he can't run in 2012.

Oh, sweetie, you think you speak for rational people? That's almost adorable.

Care to revise that statement?  I was right.

[cinyc]

http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/rep-anthony-weiner-picture/story?id=13774605&page=2

Later in the month, Broussard received three, more graphic images from the address RockOh77@yahoo.com, which she said was Weiner's online alias.

A Google search for the "RockOh77" email address returns only one website – a profile for the user name on Invisible.ir, which is described as a web tool that allows "hiding your images from others." On the page are three previously-unseen thumbnail photos of a bare-chested man that appears to be Weiner.

On May 18, Broussard received an image from the RockOh77 account that shows a man's erect penis.




Breitbart's got the goods.

Before it gets crowded out by other things, this was the only thing a Google search of that e-mail address turned up prior to the ABC News story:
http://www.invisible.ir/rockoh77 

[cinyc]

On both 2012 & 2013 (they're related)

1. No one is sure yet where the dust will settle.

2. Weiner has a national brand. Even if his district is dissected, he could easily give a backbencher like Ackerman a scare. Before the scandal, he might have even been able to pull a half-Kucinich run in Manhattan or something and do alright.

3. Weiner still has a crapton of money. $4.8 million in his mayoral account, significantly more than anyone else.

4. Even when Weiner was most popular, he didn't have a lot of friends in NYS politics, in either party. It's obvious why the Republicans hate him. The Democrats disliking him is partially due to his status as an Upstart who didn't/doesn't respect the established pecking order, and partially because allies of Liu/Quinn/de Blasio/Stringer and the 2013 mayoral contenders have been ingrained in an anti-Weiner worldview for the same reason that Republicans talk about being the anti-Romney.

I think it's pretty clear that Weiner made this mess all by himself.  Had Weiner just admitted that he sent the original picture up front instead of falsely claiming a hacking and calling a CNN reporter a "jackass" for daring to ask questions, the story probably would have remained largely ignored in the conservative blogosphere.  NYC residents don't really care much about sex scandals.  But Weiner upped the ante, tried to get the media to pin the blame on evil BREITBART or other nefarious hackers and lost big time.

My guess is the dust settles in NY-09 getting dismantled, with the part of Forest Hills where he lives going into the district in which he has the least chance of winning - which could even be a minority-majority one if the lines can be drawn that way.  In that way, Ackerman, Crowley or whichever white Democrat was going to lose his seat is the biggest immediate winner from Weinergate.  And the other 2013 mayoral candidates are also in a much better position than they ever have been.  An ad repeatedly using Weiner's "I lied" soundbite against him on unrelated falsehoods he tells during a hypothetical mayoral race would be deadly by reminding voters of the sex scandal and, more importantly, lies he told to cover it up.

[cinyc]

I think it's pretty clear that Weiner made this mess all by himself.  Had Weiner just admitted that he sent the original picture up front instead of falsely claiming a hacking and calling a CNN reporter a "jackass" for daring to ask questions, the story probably would have remained largely ignored in the conservative blogosphere.  NYC residents don't really care much about sex scandals.  But Weiner upped the ante, tried to get the media to pin the blame on evil BREITBART or other nefarious hackers and lost big time.

Yeah right. Is this the same Republican blogosphere that still chatters about how Obama is secretly a Muslim Kenyan?  Give me a break.

Huh?  Had Weiner just admitted he tweeted the photo up front, the story would have been largely ignored outside of the conservative blogosphere.   That's a fact.  At worst, it becomes a story for a day or so in the New York tabloids and Weiner faces minor humiliation. 

The "there" became "there" when Weiner claimed he was hacked and refused to call the police to determine who hacked him.  It became nuclear when he called a CNN producer a "jackass" for daring to ask Weiner simple yes or no questions.

[cinyc]

This is snowballing.....I really think cinyc is going to owe me a drink back.....

I feel safe that I'll owe you nothing back.  Anthony Weiner is too brazen to resign without a major push - like a really scathing ethics panel report or criminal charges.  Neither seems forthcoming - lying to the press isn't a crime, nor is telling someone else to lie to the press.  And the ethics committee whitewashes almost everything.

Weiner will be out of a job come January 2013, though - I'm willing to bet you a drink that NY-09 will cease to exist in anything close to its current form after redistricting - a point much of the media has missed.  And then, he runs for mayor, anyway...