Of Boners and Weiners.

So sometimes we chuckle about a "Friday news dump", but thanks to the internet and the 24/7 news-cycle, this is actually kind of jokey anymore, right? Like, if someone just casually dropped a sketchy information-grenade on a Friday afternoon like "Hello, there is more to a story on which you've already obsessed", we could still imagine the news folks to be all over it like ants on a spit-out Jolly Rancher, right?

And so it came to pass that FBI Director James Comey loogied a watermelon Rancher (this is a thoughtful and not-biased reading of what happened, but I'm an angry partisan, so...) at the House GOP, who just freaking ant-swarmed. (Because they would.) Their line: The case is reopened (that's not how that wor....) because new evidence about Hillary' Clinton's server (that's Secretary Clinton's, wait, it doesn't even have to do with her serv...) had electronic congress with the devices once owned by (drumroll) Anthony Weiner, estranged husband of Clinton aide Huma Abedin who might have had stuff forwarded to his laptop because it was hooked up to a printer because for some godforsaken reason, olds like stuff printed out on paper to read.

But what we do know is that the additional emails weren't stored on Clinton's server nor did she send them, and wow! I really don't find myself as interested in the story here, as in the timing. Like Senator Shelby, I'm all like:

"While I am pleased that the FBI is re-opening this case in light of new information, it is imperative that the Bureau immediately evaluate the material to complete this investigation," Sen. Richard Shelby wrote in a letter to Comey on Friday. "The American people are electing their next Commander-in-Chief only days from now, and they deserve to know the conclusion of your review prior to Election Day. Let me be clear: This should be your utmost priority."

As the kids say-- "This. Exactly this." This is a story too close to the election for them to dawdle--there is either a "there, there", or there isn't. Now, there is some argument that protocol would have actually suggested slow-walking this one until after the election--and it looks like Comey really struggled with what to do here:

Of course, we don’t ordinarily tell Congress about ongoing investigations, but here I feel an obligation to do so given that I testified repeatedly in recent months that our investigation was completed. I also think it would be misleading to the American people were we not to supplement the record.  At the same time, however, given that we don’t know the significance of this newly discovered collection of emails, I don’t want to create a misleading impression.  In trying to strike that balance, in a brief letter and in the middle of an election season, there is significant risk of being misunderstood, but I wanted you to hear directly from me about it.

So--notifying Congress this minute wasn't an urgent issue in black and white, and even though the investigation has turned up nothing that seems objectionable, they decided this was the right time to drop it like it's hot.  For... reasons. (M'kay, Comey, but that seems a little "muh virtue" from you.)

Oh. I have questions. Now, I'm already decided for Herself. And I don't know who this intel would prejudice for or against out of people already voting or decided. And the way I see it, you wouldn't really sway indies with this kind of thing--they are maybe political skeptics so you just suppress them and leave us with the base of each group.

Which I think favors Clinton. This feels like so much work for so little payoff that I can't imagine Comey was trying on some kind of political strategery, maybe in violation of the Hatch Act. It looks more like he's just really stupid at messaging, because he presumably understands the relevant law. But that is definitely a form of incompetence at his level, and doesn't reflect organizational best practices. But anyway--his handling was a boner, but we can blame this on the Weiner. 2016 is a year that might just be blank pages in the history books. What do we tell the daggone children?

Some People Just Won't Grow Up

Top Clinton aide Abedin separates from scandal-plagued husband Weiner after sexting report: https://t.co/rpXnAcV7MC pic.twitter.com/6LsYjbeVT2

— Reuters Top News (@Reuters) August 29, 2016

I'm kind of surprised that Anthony Weiner once again showed phenomenal disrespect to his family by playing around online in a sexual manner, but I wouldn't say that I'm shocked. He doesn't seem to appreciate why his behavior is unacceptable and hurtful to his spouse, and while it certainly isn't my business, I do think the separation is probably for the best; it isn't Huma Abedin's problem that he's a creep--it's his problem that he's a creep.

That said, it certainly isn't a Clinton campaign issue, as such. Although Clinton is responsible for her staff in some respects, she can hardly be responsible for her staff's spouses. I don't know what the heck Donald Trump is talking about by implying that somehow, Weiner had some kind of clearance via his wife's job, but it seems to me that Weiner is sending crotch-shots and lewd sexts, not selling secrets to the Russians. It's just nonsensical.

Doesn't Seem Housebroken

I suppose that's a bit of a crude way to describe my general impression of former US Rep. Anthony Weiner's recent admissions, but I think it's safe to say, there could definitely be cruder ways to put it. As of his resignation from the House two years ago, I was pretty well done with interest in his political career, and haven't put a lot of stock in his "comeback" to run for mayor of NYC. In the first place, his original problem struck me as being a kind of gross immaturity, and if he hadn't already gotten an idea of the loaded game he was playing with his public image the first time around, well, two years isn't a lot of time for growing up and figuring out What Not to Do.  It looks like a bad case of what we'd call "boundary issues"-and learning where the acceptable boundaries are and how to respect them is best learned as a pup.

But also, with the recent revelations of alter ego "Carlos Danger", I think I'm getting the picture (just as an educated guess) that skirting the boundaries and testing reactions is a part of the thrill of the kind of transgressive play that Weiner likes. To use the "housebroken" analogy--you can't really scold someone for making a mess of things if they thrive on the scolding, or you'll just see more messes.

Now, that doesn't mean he can't be a brilliant guy or a good politician in other ways, and if he had a cause that wasn't ultimately self-serving, and wanted to throw himself into it, I'd be like--"Go! Do that thing!" But running for an office like mayor of New York and having one of these "wife awkwardly supportive at his side" press dealios as he weathers yet another self-set sex-themed media time-bomb? No, I think he's burning up the oxygen in the race and needs to take his going-up-in-flames-ass outside, now.

Does that sound prudish of me? Well, I think the problem is, he hasn't been respectful of some of the women he's been all up in the sextmoshine with before, and all speculation about how his wife feels about this aside, she is a professional politico too, and this isn't really a big help for her, either.  It isn't just a thing he does without consequences and respecting other people's consent. I could care less what he was into--if he could balance it with his public life intelligently. That sure isn't what it looks like. And it hurts his political allies.

He should probably get out of the race, is all. Maybe he can throw his support to someone else, be a  consigliere to a candidate he believes in, but just...not ...be the candidate himself. Nothing personal.

(Everything personal.)

Not a Case of "Caesar's wife", or It Shouldn't be all right if A Republican Does it, Either

Rep. Anthony Weiner announced his resignation today. At this point, I'm going to admit it was the one thing left to do. I know. Republicans in office have done as bad or worse and stayed. It doesn't really matter, though--that's their problem, and from a thoroughly partisan point of view, Rep. Weiner's Twitter incontinence wasn't just a personal problem for him, it was a problem for the Democratic Party.

I'm sympathetic to the point of view that he and Democrats could have toughed out the story until the media got bored and went away, but my first issue with that is, so long as there were more pictures or dick jokes to be made, the media was not ever going to get bored. My second issue with that is that: "It isn't the sex (in actual fact, there wasn't any); it's the stupidity."

"Dick jokes" have been updated to "Dick News".

Well, contrary to my first guess, it turns out that Rep. Weiner actually was dumb enough to use social media that way.  And then to think lying about it was going to make it go away. 

However, I think the real takeaway here is that for 20 years, Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas failed to report his wife's income on financial disclosure forms, and should recuse himself from any case that involves the Health Care Reform act for conflict of interest.  And I hope anyone bringing up this mess feels free to point that out every time it comes up.  Because the timing.  Ah. The timing.  Also, because--one of these things effects the country we live in, and the other involves dicks.

Also, Andrew Breitbart may have received some honest to goodness dick news, but it's still dick news.  And he is still Andrew Breitbart.  As a very small left-wing blogger, I will just rely on others to point out why the initial response when we hear "Breitbart" is total skepticism.

Seriously? They've got dick jokes?

This weekend's blogular distraction comes from Breitbart and his goofy gang of pranksters:

So, what seems to have happened is a picture of an erection ensconced in a pair of drawers was uploaded to something called Yfrog and then Tweeted, apparently from Rep. Anthony Weiner's account and supposedly to one of his Twitter followers.  Yes....seems.  The picture was then seized upon by an apparently clairvoyant Teahadist and linked to Big Government. For a minute, the story was all about why wasn't the congressman making a legal case out of the apparent hack--well, now he is. Which I would like to think means that if this was a set-up (ahem...if...ahem) some jack-ass feels some repercussions.

So, to recap, a US Rep. seems to have been spoofed in a childish way, an innocent Twitter-user has been harassed by jerks, and you can't believe everything you read on the Internet--although we kind of knew that last bit. Also, really, going after Rep. Weiner? Is it because he regularly tells it like is it in moments like this? Or on the Clarence Thomas conflict-of-interest issue? (More of that sort of thing, and I'll be calling him my boyfriend, too. Y'know, just like George Clooney & Keith Olbermann. As if.)

I dunno. I'm still wondering whose vanilla, laundered-shorted crotch-shot that really is. But then, I'm just a speculative old thing, really. Easily distracted, you know.  (But really--"Weiner?" A dick joke? On the order of trying too hard! Huh huh huh, I said, "hard".)