Rep. Whine-er finally admits it

So Rep. Weiner has admitted that the photographs of a barely-concealed schlong which circulated on his Twitter account last week (and about which I wrote last Thursday) really were - gasp! shock! HORROR! - his own manhood.


*Yawn*


It's not as if the entire world - with the possible exception of North Korea, where the Internet isn't all that common - hadn't already gathered that. After all, to adapt Shakespeare's famous expression, "methinks the Congressman hath protested too much". You don't make up so many (contradictory) stories, and accuse unknown parties of crimes (whilst inexplicably refusing to refer the matter to law enforcement), unless there's a real fire beneath all that smoke. The revelation that it really was his log on the fire (you should pardon the expression) won't surprise anybody. Glenn Reynolds has a good take on the matter.

I hope Rep. Weiner isn't allowed to get away with this. Many politicians have tried to do so in the past, some successfully, others less so. I firmly believe that if an elected representative screws up this badly, then lies to everyone about it (and so unconvincingly, at that!), he's past his "Best By" date. If he has any honor at all (a dubious proposition, given his behavior), Rep. Weiner should immediately resign his seat - but he's already said he doesn't intend to do so. That says a lot about him. Given that, the Democratic Party should force him to resign, and dismiss him from its ranks if he refuses; but again, given how they've treated similar malefactors in the past (*cough* Bawney Fwank *cough*), I suspect this won't happen. Failing all else, his constituents should reject him in massive numbers at the next election . . . but I'm not sure whether they will.

I won't hold my breath awaiting any of these outcomes. Honor, decency and 'doing the right thing' are very scarce commodities in modern politics - more's the pity. The fact that we don't flat-out demand them from our representatives, as of right, says all too much about us as well . . .

Peter