Weiner's weiner!

Originally posted on Babble:

In case you haven't heard, Rep. Anthony Weiner (D-NY) said this weekend that his Twitter account had been hacked Friday night. Whoever the prankster was that broke into his account, Weiner argued, sent a lewd photo to a 21-year-old college student in Seattle. (The photo isn't really that lewd if you ask me, since whoever took the photo was wearing underwear. The weiner in the pic - which is linked after the jump - is bigger than Jane Pratt's huge boobs, tho.)

The tweet and photo in question were deleted almost immediately, reportedly before the college student even saw them. The photo was allegedly sent in response to a tweet by the student, Gennette Cordova, which read, "I wonder what my boyfriend @RepWeiner is up to right now," the Washington Post reports. New York magazine adds, "Some right-wing bloggers are asserting that the photo might be evidence that Weiner is having an affair. Those bloggers note that, on Friday, Weiner tweeted about what time he'll appear on Rachel Maddow, saying, #That's5:45inSeattleIThink," implying that Weiner and the student may have been in close contact, a suggestion she vehemently denies.

Weiner got snippy with reporters today for questioning him about the so-called Weinergate, and he has hired a lawyer, a move which some see as an admission of guilt. It's hard to tell whether or not this incident was planned and executed by conservatives or was actually a misappropriation of fun on the part of Weiner. One thing's for sure, though: Anthony Weiner has a problem... flirting with high school and college girls.

Alexandra Petri of the Washington Post notes that "of the 200 people @RepWeiner follows on Twitter, a surprising number (well, more than zero, at any rate) do seem to be what might be termed nubile out-of-state houris." Conservative blogs are having a field day with the fact that "Weiner’s Twitter Friends Include Pages of Young Luscious Fans," posting photos of some of the women Weiner has followed on Twitter. (One of the girls is in high school.) The blog The Prudence Paine Papers has screenshots of tweets sent by a porn star indicating that Weiner had sent her a Direct Message. According to Paine, Weiner has also had contact with more than one high school girl on Twitter. She writes, "@Starchild111 was a high school girl who was trying to get Weiner to be her prom date. She was overjoyed when he followed her, upset when conservatives laughed that Weiner was trolling the school yard, and dismayed when he unfollowed her. Starchild has deleted her twitter account."

The bottom line is, as many bloggers have noted, it would be easy to see who posted the questionable photo - just look up the IP address of the computer it was sent from. If the photo really was sent by Weiner, clearly his career is over. Even if the photo wasn't sent by Weiner, all this scrutiny of his Twitter account is revealing an undesirable side of the Representative. We'll know soon enough how badly this has damaged his reputation. In the meantime, here's the photo for those of you who want to see it. Parents: let this be a two-fold lesson. First, remind your children to NEVER TAKE COMPROMISING PHOTOS OF THEMSELVES! Never, never, never! It always ends poorly. Second, be sure you're monitoring your children's online activity. You never know when one of them is going to fall in love with a member of Congress.