When you pair El Weiner's performance in the ABC video below with the lewd comments he made to Emily Miller here, you get a portrait of what John Hinderaker calls a very bad man:
Ann Althouse on that:
This interview with ABC's Jonathan Karl is now hilarious. Don't just read it. Play the clip to experience the intensity of the pressure Weiner brazenly applies to Karl. He tries to shame Karl: you did "zero research," you don't "understand how social networks work," you're impugning the ordinary people who follow me, you're making "a pretty charged supposition," "Do you really think that’s fair question? I mean do you?," I am "a person who’s married"...Yes. Watch his face. His feigned but dripping contempt for Karl and his questions is a tour de force of deceit and cunning. He doesn't just lie, but attacks and impugns anyone in his way. As Althouse writes, "this is what lying looks like."
Jack Shafer gets it mostly right:
Deeply regret, deeply regret, regret, regret, regrettable, regrettable thing, Weiner chanted. He dug deeper, saying he wasn't making "any excuses for his behavior" and that he accepted "full responsibility" for what he had done. Ever since Mickey Kaus ripped Attorney General Janet Reno for saying she accepted "full responsibility" for the torching of the Branch Davidian compound, I've been suspicious of politicians in a jam who embrace the I-take-full-responsibility formula. It means nothing—except, perhaps, get off my back—unless the politician 1) makes things right, 2) resigns, or 3) moves to another planet. [. . .]And by the way, what exactly did Weiner mean about the girls not being young "per se"? He doesn't seem particularly worried about the possibility that some of his sexting BFFs might have been underage, and were certainly, as one reporter exclaimed, "young enough to be your children!" El Weiner:
For me, when the mass of lies equals the mass of apologies, the whole package congeals into some new sociopathic form for which there is yet no name. (Weinerite, perhaps?) That he was caught lying about his personal life, and not about public policy, doesn't really matter to me. By demonstrating that he's as good a liar as he is an apologizer, Weiner tells us everything we need to know about him.
“I don’t know the exact ages of the women,” he said. “But they’re all adults, at least to the best of my knowledge, they were all adults and they were engaging in these conversations consensually. Someone could theoretically have been fibbing about [their age] and that’s a risk.”Oy. Words fail. This guy has got to go.
Thanks to Dan Collins and Michelle Malkin for linking.
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What did the 45 thousand followers do wrong? They followed a lying sack o' sh*t. And obviously a psychopath, too.
ReplyDeleted(^_^)b
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"Because the Only Good Progressive is a Failed Progressive"
Having watched the now somewhat chilling video of the righteously offended Weiner, defending, with measured passion, the honor of those who follow him on Twitter, I see no reason to believe there is any sincerity in the apologies he has since offered publicly.
ReplyDeleteFrankly, if he told me the sun had risen this morning, I'd be a little uneasy until I could check it out for myself.
This is the new America Jill. I spent too many years inside the new society dealing with adults and kids who simply didn't understand morality.
ReplyDeleteI don't judge people, mostly because it is almost too hard to find some sort of moral certainty. Clinton got "you know what" from an INTERN in the White House and as troubling as it was, he not only didn't resign, he is now considered an "elder statesman" of the Democrat party!
Dick Morris had prostitutes licking his toes! Ted Kennedy and his buddies were groping a waitress in a fountain! Charlie Rangel didn't pay taxes, because he found the tax code THAT HE WROTE to confusing!
So where does Weiner fall into this spectrum?
I notice you caught the key question in the press conference. How did Weiner know if the people he was sexting were adults? He couldn't know and I saw the realization in his eyes when the question was said. It simply never occurred to him. This is the key to Weiner. Think of his background, his young life, his demeanor, his build. I'll bet money he was a young skinny kid with a messed up name that promised he'd get his one day.
He followed Schumer into office and LIVES for the power. Even his co-workers don't like him. You know the type. That then turned to his private life where his inflated ego and sense of invulnerability gave him the green light to do what he did there. He really didn't get the risk or the demented nature because HE was doing it and that excused all the actions.
He really seemed confused as to why he got caught, that he got caught and that some people were offended and turned on him. He had a charmed life. Possibly the next mayor of NYC. He married a woman who was a friend of HRC, earning him their blessing. His world is gone, he just doesn't know it or maybe can't accept it. Who would he be without the manufactured power of his political position. A host on CNN?