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xiphiasFirst, is "certitude" really a world? The spelling checker recognizes it . . . ah, I see. "Certainty" is a measure of confidence in the accuracy of a factual question, while "certitude" is a measure of confidence in a matter of opinion.
Um. I think Representative Weiner is using the wrong word.
Anyway, for those of you who haven't been following this, a photo of a very well-filled pair of boxer-briefs was sent from the Twitter account of Representative Anthony Weiner to a female journalism student who was a follower of his Twitter feed, and who he, also followed.
Or, possibly, was sent from a spoof account that was set up to look like Weiner's account.
The journalism student and Representative Weiner have never met in person, and have apparently communicated only to the degree that relative strangers who follow each other's Twitter accounts would be expected to do so. So, there you go. Non-story, right? Somebody hacks the account of a public figure named Weiner to send someone a picture of someone's weiner, claiming that it's Weiner's weiner, and that Weiner is the kind of weiner who would send a picture of his weiner to someone. Okay. Not really that funny, but, whatever. Tasteless, but, heck, the picture isn't even particularly lewd -- it's completely covered, and even the networks don't feel that there's a real problem with showing the photo uncensored. Stupid prank, let's go on to the next story.
But it's still in the news cycle. Why? Because, while Weiner is flatly denying that he sent the picture to the student, he HASN'T, exactly, denied that it's a picture of HIS underwear. He's said that he doesn't RECOGNIZE the picture, but he can't say, "with certitude", that it's not him. Now, why won't he just come out and say, "That's not my crotch"?
Well, there are a couple important reasons, I think.
The first is it's still in the news cycle. Nobody who would possibly vote for Weiner believes that this was actually him, so the story isn't damaging him. But, by not doing the categorical denial, he's keeping the story alive, and keeping his name out there. That's important. He's getting name recognition in a dead-easy way, without actually doing anything wrong, and without, actually, hurting himself.
Second, if it does turn out that this was a prank done by someone significant, he has kept the story alive long enough that he'll be able to turn around and use the "THAT PERSON IS THE ONE WHO FRAMED ME" to whack THAT person. If it's some nobody, no big deal. But if the person who did it is someone who Weiner can benefit from attacking, well, that person just handed Weiner a weapon, (do you know how difficult it is to not keep doing dick jokes in this? I really wanted to say, "just put a big stick in Weiner's hands. . . ") that he can later use -- but only if everyone still remembers this story.
Second-and-half, it looks like there may be some sort of connection between this thing and Andrew Breitbart. Who, you may remember, is the person behind the trumped-up "ACORN helps pimps defraud the government" thing, in which he took a bunch of out-of-context . . . stuff . . . and made a bunch of pretty much innocuous comments look like a really hideous breach of ethics. And he has done similar things another two or three times.
Nothing he's ever said in any of those things has been actually a lie -- but he arranges stuff to be deceptive. And he manipulates people in order to put them in situations where he knows they will say certain categories of things that he will be able to use.
So.
The following is a complete "what-if". I have no evidence, I don't even really have a suspicion here. All I've got is a "what-if" situation.
Let's say that Breitbart got a photo of Weiner wearing a swimsuit. From somewhere. News photo. Whatever. And he handed it to a friend, who added a fly and generally made it look like a pair of boxers instead of a swimsuit. Then either hacked Weiner's account, or made a spoof account, or whatever, and then posted that as a comment on someone's Twitter feed. Or whatever it is that one does on Twitter.
The journalism student deleted the pic as soon as she noticed it, but, before she managed to delete it, someone had sent it to Breitbart.
Now -- remember, we're playing "what-if" only -- Breitbart waits for Weiner to make a denial that it's a photo of him, then reveals the original photo. He reports that Weiner has lied about it not being a photo of him, because he's FOUND the original photo which has Weiner's face.
This would, of course, be true, but completely and totally misleading. Which is what Breitbart does -- he posts technically true but totally misleading things to attack liberal targets.
What does Weiner do? He plays it both ways. He denies sending the thing, which he CAN do, because he didn't send it. But he backs off categorically denying that it's a photo of him, in case someone is holding back some sort of trick like that. If Breitbart, or someone else, is playing THAT game, Weiner can hold off playing his obvious move to set up Breitbart's move.
It's a bit paranoid, but it's not outside the realm of possibility.
And now let's go on to the third reason, which I think is the most important of all.
The guy in the photo? Is hung. By not denying that this is him, Weiner is implying that, fake photo or not, it's completely plausible that it's him because Weiner is that well-hung, too.
No guy is going to give up a chance like that, not even if there's a political cost. Weiner COULD say, "Nope, that's not me -- I would only look like that if I'd run out of convenient ways to carry cucumbers." But no guy is going to say that. He wants to make sure that it's in the public record that, even if that's not a picture of what is in HIS pants, what IS in his pants is comparable.
Edited To Add: Or, I guess, he could be guilty as charged. Which, honestly, really surprises me. And saddens me. But it's a reminder to myself to keep in mind that, just because I like someone and dislike their accuser, doesn't make the person I like automatically right.
Um. I think Representative Weiner is using the wrong word.
Anyway, for those of you who haven't been following this, a photo of a very well-filled pair of boxer-briefs was sent from the Twitter account of Representative Anthony Weiner to a female journalism student who was a follower of his Twitter feed, and who he, also followed.
Or, possibly, was sent from a spoof account that was set up to look like Weiner's account.
The journalism student and Representative Weiner have never met in person, and have apparently communicated only to the degree that relative strangers who follow each other's Twitter accounts would be expected to do so. So, there you go. Non-story, right? Somebody hacks the account of a public figure named Weiner to send someone a picture of someone's weiner, claiming that it's Weiner's weiner, and that Weiner is the kind of weiner who would send a picture of his weiner to someone. Okay. Not really that funny, but, whatever. Tasteless, but, heck, the picture isn't even particularly lewd -- it's completely covered, and even the networks don't feel that there's a real problem with showing the photo uncensored. Stupid prank, let's go on to the next story.
But it's still in the news cycle. Why? Because, while Weiner is flatly denying that he sent the picture to the student, he HASN'T, exactly, denied that it's a picture of HIS underwear. He's said that he doesn't RECOGNIZE the picture, but he can't say, "with certitude", that it's not him. Now, why won't he just come out and say, "That's not my crotch"?
Well, there are a couple important reasons, I think.
The first is it's still in the news cycle. Nobody who would possibly vote for Weiner believes that this was actually him, so the story isn't damaging him. But, by not doing the categorical denial, he's keeping the story alive, and keeping his name out there. That's important. He's getting name recognition in a dead-easy way, without actually doing anything wrong, and without, actually, hurting himself.
Second, if it does turn out that this was a prank done by someone significant, he has kept the story alive long enough that he'll be able to turn around and use the "THAT PERSON IS THE ONE WHO FRAMED ME" to whack THAT person. If it's some nobody, no big deal. But if the person who did it is someone who Weiner can benefit from attacking, well, that person just handed Weiner a weapon, (do you know how difficult it is to not keep doing dick jokes in this? I really wanted to say, "just put a big stick in Weiner's hands. . . ") that he can later use -- but only if everyone still remembers this story.
Second-and-half, it looks like there may be some sort of connection between this thing and Andrew Breitbart. Who, you may remember, is the person behind the trumped-up "ACORN helps pimps defraud the government" thing, in which he took a bunch of out-of-context . . . stuff . . . and made a bunch of pretty much innocuous comments look like a really hideous breach of ethics. And he has done similar things another two or three times.
Nothing he's ever said in any of those things has been actually a lie -- but he arranges stuff to be deceptive. And he manipulates people in order to put them in situations where he knows they will say certain categories of things that he will be able to use.
So.
The following is a complete "what-if". I have no evidence, I don't even really have a suspicion here. All I've got is a "what-if" situation.
Let's say that Breitbart got a photo of Weiner wearing a swimsuit. From somewhere. News photo. Whatever. And he handed it to a friend, who added a fly and generally made it look like a pair of boxers instead of a swimsuit. Then either hacked Weiner's account, or made a spoof account, or whatever, and then posted that as a comment on someone's Twitter feed. Or whatever it is that one does on Twitter.
The journalism student deleted the pic as soon as she noticed it, but, before she managed to delete it, someone had sent it to Breitbart.
Now -- remember, we're playing "what-if" only -- Breitbart waits for Weiner to make a denial that it's a photo of him, then reveals the original photo. He reports that Weiner has lied about it not being a photo of him, because he's FOUND the original photo which has Weiner's face.
This would, of course, be true, but completely and totally misleading. Which is what Breitbart does -- he posts technically true but totally misleading things to attack liberal targets.
What does Weiner do? He plays it both ways. He denies sending the thing, which he CAN do, because he didn't send it. But he backs off categorically denying that it's a photo of him, in case someone is holding back some sort of trick like that. If Breitbart, or someone else, is playing THAT game, Weiner can hold off playing his obvious move to set up Breitbart's move.
It's a bit paranoid, but it's not outside the realm of possibility.
And now let's go on to the third reason, which I think is the most important of all.
The guy in the photo? Is hung. By not denying that this is him, Weiner is implying that, fake photo or not, it's completely plausible that it's him because Weiner is that well-hung, too.
No guy is going to give up a chance like that, not even if there's a political cost. Weiner COULD say, "Nope, that's not me -- I would only look like that if I'd run out of convenient ways to carry cucumbers." But no guy is going to say that. He wants to make sure that it's in the public record that, even if that's not a picture of what is in HIS pants, what IS in his pants is comparable.
Edited To Add: Or, I guess, he could be guilty as charged. Which, honestly, really surprises me. And saddens me. But it's a reminder to myself to keep in mind that, just because I like someone and dislike their accuser, doesn't make the person I like automatically right.
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(no subject)
Date: 2011-06-03 07:10 pm (UTC)It's no secret that Weiner wants to be the next mayor here (and FWIW, I think he'd be damn good at the job and would vote for him, sure), and that kind of sustained name recognition is going to be critical for anyone who wants to be a serious candidate. Bloomberg has held on to the job for so (too!) long that candidates (from any party) basically need to clear the hurdle of the current guy's media saturation, too.
(no subject)
Date: 2011-06-03 07:12 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2011-06-03 07:31 pm (UTC)Now, if it is an attack by the far right, that could get a lot of pro-Weiner play (there is no good way to say that) locally. 4 of 5 NYC boroughs go blue in every election, right? Like, really blue. (Insert your usual Staten Island joke here.) So it shores up already-strong Democratic support, because so many people are frustrated with the right-wing smear machine. It's the "that jackass Breitbart went after one of our own!" vote. And if it is an attack, I think Weiner could raise a lot of money. I don't think $$ will be quite as important in the next mayoral race as it was in the last one (Bloomberg and his billions), but it will help.
I think that the nature of the equipment featured in the photo is part of what keeps it in the news cycle, but I'm not sure it's as important as the other two. (Of course, I am famous among my girlfriends for never really noticing men at all...) Weiner wants it made clear that he is well-equipped, sure, but I thought he was already playing that up with the gorgeous smart wife and everything. So it's one part of a bigger image thing he's doing, yes, but it's not as important in my eyes. I could be wrong, though. Maybe it's the catalyst that's making the first thing possible.
(no subject)
Date: 2011-06-03 10:25 pm (UTC)And then I had to go find a picture of the infamous photo. Yeah, even if that isn't him, he wants people to think it could be. Damn. ;-)
(no subject)
Date: 2011-06-03 11:23 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2011-06-04 12:34 am (UTC)A simpler explanation is, that Weiner is simply telling the truth. He doesn't know whose photo it is. He's had several girlfriends in the past, girlfriends have cameras, so there's means and opportunity for such a photo of him to have been taken and for the prankster to have got hold of it, oh damn. So he can't say it's impossible, in case the girlfriend comes forward, damn, and proves it was him.
Btw, Cannonfire has been testing the hole in yFrog and Twitter that made this possible. I wish they'd run some funny photos through some GOP's accounts before yFrog plugged it. And Cannonfire has a better suspect, who may have conned Breitbart.
(no subject)
Date: 2011-06-04 03:26 pm (UTC)*takes notes*
what was in Anthony's pants
Date: 2011-06-07 08:26 pm (UTC)http://www.dailykos.com/story/2011/06/05/982416/-The-Photo-Is-Upside-Down-(NSFW)
Re: what was in Anthony's pants
Date: 2011-06-08 08:50 pm (UTC)Let's say that's true. It doesn't change anything. Weiner admitted to sending it. Okay, maybe it's a junior-high-school level trick. If so, it's a junior-high-school level trick Weiner did.
He did something childish and stupid. He's finally admitted it. I'm disappointed, but what can you do?