Anthony Weiner’s media blitz on June 1st did nothing to help his case. If you’re following WeinerGate, as it’s being called, you know everyone is scratching their heads wondering what the Congressman was thinking.
While many people are focused on the potential relationship between Weiner and the Seattle woman who was unfortunately dragged into this by whoever sent the infamous tweet, there was an interesting exchange during the Wolf Blitzter/CNN session of the whirlwind tour. Blitzer was asking about tweets which were first brought to light in a post on PrudencePaine.com:
Assuming Blitzer or his staff saw the PrudencePaine.com post, they could have pressed Weiner a little further. I’ll give Wolf the benefit of the doubt, for now. He had promised to move on after one more question. In any case, Weiner tried to brush off the question saying that the tweet from Ginger Lee was in reference to some “fairly pro-forma thing that goes out” to people who follow him. This “pro-forma” message, he claims, is a thank you and a pitch for his website. Case closed? Of course not.
Prudence Paine had pointed out a couple of other tweets, with one in particular, which Wolf could have used to challenge the Congressman’s answer. Lee was apparently asked about the tweet mentioning the direct message from Weiner. Her response:
Now, that doesn’t read like Ginger Lee is describing the “pro-forma” tweet Weiner nonchalantly deflected. Ginger Lee, if she is to be taken at her word, states the Congressman said he liked her blog and there’s a suggestion that he had seen her previous tweets about him – i.e. shout-outs. That really sounded a lot more personal than a bland thank you tweet. Was the Congressman being truthful? Was Ginger Lee embellishing the details? We don’t know because Blitzer was either not fully prepared or he chose to move on as he promised or it never occurred to him.
Congressman Weiner is right about one thing. His statements are, in fact, leading to more questions. Where he’s wrong is in the way he blames the questions on everyone else but himself. He’s the one who tried to stonewall the media and now they smell blood. You really couldn’t handle this situation any worse than Weiner has since early Saturday morning. “Friendly” media outlets are piling on.
I wonder if any journalists are exploring the discrepancy above and are planning to ask Weiner about it some time soon.
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