Many became incensed by my suggestion that a desperate-for-vindication Andrew Breitbart had engaged in a subtle form of blackmail to get what he wanted. Today, Breitbart himself has more or less confirmed that idea, except he's leaving out the subtlety:

When asked by anchor Erica Hill if he has more information to release about Weiner, Breitbart replied, "I have no intention to release any more information. I think that we're heading down the proper path."

The clear message: If we do not head down what Breitbart considers the proper path, other photos will come out. Do we call this "an implied threat" or just "a threat"? The latter, methinks.

Breitbart may hold back data, but others will release it. The New York Post reporter who misrepresented himself to get close to Gennette Cordova -- and then mischaracterized what she said -- exemplifies the new breed of journalism.

Back to Breitbart:

"And the next day, for three days - Saturday, Sunday and Monday, it was excruciating - the plan that he concocted and he's going to have to take responsibility for, and the organized left and the media framed me as the person who was the hacker.

So Anthony Weiner concocted a "plan" to have the "organized left" frame Breitbart...? And we thought Alex Jones was a conspiracy theorist! You think Andy's gonna bring George Soros into this?

(Side note: It has been ages since anyone accused yours truly of being in the pay of Evil Soros. Very disappointing.)

That said, nobody said that Breitbart did any hacking.

"They also falsely accused me of releasing the name of the girl in Seattle. They said that I savaged her. But we chose not to give her name.

Did anyone make that accusation against Breitbart? (I haven't read every story, so I'm honestly not sure.) Was it not Breitbart's sources who ultimately made the name of Gennette Cordova well-known?

Breitbart goes on to say that the Tweeted pic, in and of itself, did not prompt him to publish his story. Rather, he was spurred into action because

He took down all of his photos. The girl in Seattle took down her Facebook page. She took down her - this was all Friday evening.

Breitbart is here implying that Gennette participated in a cover-up. This statement may not qualify as "savaging" Gennette, but it is certainly unwarranted.

"I think we were vindicated at first after a three-day frenzy of trying to attack my journalism,"

His journalism was attacked first and foremost because Breitbart's own tweets indicated that he did not trust his sources, and that he had run the story without vetting the people who provided it. He did not even know the name of the person who fed him the information. Breitbart should own up to his own Twitter record, because that record was the basis of the attacks. Weiner's confession can't change the fact that Breitbart printed first and vetted later. Sloppy journalism is not justified by the final outcome. A bad driver who reaches his destination is still a bad driver.

Breitbart's implied threat goes a long ways toward vindicating my previous post. But don't expect Andrew Breitbart to ride high for long. He's more vulnerable now than ever before, although he doesn't know it. Hubris begets sloppiness. In the immortal (and deliciously appropriate) words of Han Solo: "Don't get cocky."

On a completely unrelated note: Austan Ghouls-bee is gone, baby, gone! O, frabjous day! Permalink

(If you came here from BigJournalism or some cognate site, check out my latest. You'll love it!)

Alas, I was (on THIS day, of all days) forced to go out into the world to attend to real life. So I'm playing catch-up here. I didn't hear all of Weiner's confession, but the relevant bits are pretty much inescapable.

I'm told that Andrew Breitbart was on the podium speaking at a time when everyone expected to see Weiner. That must have been quite an odd sight! I don't know what Breitbart said, but summary accounts have made it clear that he wanted everyone to know that he was right all along -- even though (as all now admit) he did not vet his sources until he had run their story.

Yes, it is proven that Anthony Weiner had highly sexualized internet relationships via email and chat with various women. Breitbart has strongly intimated that one of the photos in his possession is very, very explicit. It is fair to presume that this image involves an erection sans underwear.

Breitbart's repeated references to that photo could be taken as a subtle threat to release it.

A while back, in a comment, I said that I would not believe Anthony Weiner himself if he said that he tweeted that picture on the night of the 27th.

I also said that, were I him, I would make that very "confession." Saying "I sent that picture on the 27th" would be the quickest way to get the whole sorry business into the rear view mirror.

I've also said (from nearly the beginning) that I suspected that Breitbart's crew had gained access to one or more photos sent to, or taken by, a woman other than Gennette Cordova. A lot of people shared those suspicions -- which have, of course, been justified.

I became confident that the picture did not depict Anthony Weiner. At least, it appeared that something other than his penis inhabited his underwear. Frankly, it still looks like a shot of a man who is literally playing "hide the salami." After making an embarrassingly close study of various Weiner photographs, I simply could not believe that he's that well-hung. To put the matter crudely. (Many of my readers suggested that he had thrust a forearm into his undies.)

Anthony Weiner today said that he sent the picture via Twitter to Gennette Cordova. He said that he had never spoken to her on a personal level. She tells the same story, and there is no reason to doubt her.

Thus, Weiner made the most amazing confession conceivable: That he just sent a crotch shot out of the blue to someone he did not know. Worse, he used Twitter -- which places all images on public display, even when sent as a direct message. (The example here proves the point; that painting was sent by "Chalice" as a DM, yet it is also public.) Moreover, he did this incredible thing knowing full well that there were political enemies tracking his every move on Twitter.

Sorry.

I don't believe that scenario. I accept every part of his confession except for the statement about the night of the 27th.

I wouldn't believe that part if Weiner personally called me up and insisted.

Lots of guys have made incredibly dumb mistakes when thinking with their "downstairs" brain. Lord knows I have. But I've never encountered a sufferer from "testosterone poisoning" who has ever done anything quite that foolish. Even a private citizen would not (unless protected by anonymity) send out a crotch shot to a woman he did not know.

A congressman...?

My imagination is as good as anyone else's, but my brain refuses to accept the possibility.

Why would he lie about the night of the 27th? Because, as is now established, and as we have all long suspected, there is a lot else in his history that he does not want investigated or discussed further.

In particular, Breitbart has made it clear that he possesses an explicit shot, probably involving an erection. If I were Weiner, I might say anything -- anything -- to forestall that image from being made public.

Breitbart clearly demanded public justification for his decision to run a story based on a shady source whose name he does not know, and whom he himself had come to suspect of malfeasance.

Did Breitbart contact the congressman and blackmail him?

That's hardly necessary. Breitbart's own words this day constitute an implied threat. He has said that he possesses an extremely explicit photo which he would prefer not to show. That as-yet unseen photo constitutes a Sword of Damocles (no pun intended). Perhaps without realizing the implications, Breitbart has today made statements which place him perilously close to the "Charles Augustus Milverton" category.

If I were Weiner, I would have said exactly what he said today, even if I had not sent the picture on the 27th.

Now that he has said what so many wanted him to say, he hopes that the whole affair will go away within a couple of weeks. Perhaps it will. Already, some newsfolk seem bored. (That was fast!) Even one Republican commentator has said that the story won't have legs because no laws were broken and the congressman's constituency will probably forgive him.

Suppose that Weiner had said: "I am guilty of improper relationships with half a dozen women, and I am guilty of sending these women erotic photos, but I did not send that picture to Gennette Cordova on the 27th." What would be the result?

Obviously, the journalistic feeding frenzy would continue for months.

More importantly, Breitbart would, under those circumstances, release the ultra-explicit photo, which probably depicts an erection. That shot would be published ad infinitum for the rest of Weiner's life.

Faced with that rotten choice, I would have gone with the "Get it over with as soon as possible" option.

That said, the question arises: Will the erection photo come out anyways? Probably. The people who possess it cannot be trusted. Breitbart probably won't release it, but someone else may.

I really don't care who gets pissed off by what I'm saying. This blog has pissed off people before. It survived the 2008 attacks.

No-one can deny that a "Get Weiner" conspiracy existed. No one can deny that one member of this group bragged about his knowledge as a "cyber sleuth." As I learned only recently, Twitter passwords are notoriously easy to to crack. There's an inexpensive app that can do the job quickly.

Since most people use one password (or minute variations on that password) across many accounts, anyone who had Weiner's Twitter password would probably have gained access to the man's Yahoo, AOL and Facebook pages. That is probably how the photos came into the possession of Breitbart's sources.

It is noteworthy that, before this scandal blew open, Weiner complained about his Facebook account being "hacked." At least some of the defamatory information concerned a Facebook relationship.

Would I recant what I'm saying here if an IP trace indicated that Weiner sent the Tweet? No. Here's why.

Will I ever apologize to Andrew Breitbart? Only if he goes back in time and erases his whole history.

His brand of sexual "gotcha" journalism and his reliance on iffy sources were hardly justified by anything Weiner said today. When Drudge broke the Monica Lewinski story, he relied on a single source that mainstream journalists had rejected. Just because that story proved true doesn't mean that Drudge acted responsibly, or that he is anything but a slimeball. Why should we hold a differing view of Breitbart?

As noted earlier, I've long known of a potential sexual scandal which, if revealed, could do enormous harm to Barack Obama's White House, even though the story is not about him. I despise Obama. But I won't try to damage his administration (or a Republican administration) via a single-source story about sex -- a story involving no broken laws.

(Incidentally, that story concerns something worse than anything Anthony Weiner spoke about today.)

Will I apologize to Dan Wolfe? No. In the first place, "Dan Wolfe" appears to be a fake name, and one should not apologize to fictional characters. In the second place, I said that Dan Wolfe tried to frame a congressman. Even if we were to stipulate that everything Weiner said today was true, it is still provably the case that the man who called himself Dan Wolfe tried to frame a congressman.

Is it technically possible for the Yfrog exploit (the subject of one of the most popular posts in this blog's history) to be used to create a fake Tweet sent "via Tweetdeck"? Earlier today, I was going to backtrack on that assertion. This morning, however, I received a private communication from someone who claimed to know about hacking. This person insisted that the "sent via Tweetdeck" message can be spoofed. Alas, he didn't go into much detail. I don't know this fellow and don't know if what he says is on the level; he hasn't explained in layman's terms just how one goes about doing such a thing.

But as a matter of general principle, if an IP address can be spoofed, then one can only imagine what else is possible.

Underaged? Let's talk about an issue which, I understand, played some role in the press conference. Weiner was asked how he knew that the women with whom he had sexually-charged communications were, in fact, of age.

That's a damned good point.

This very day, thousands -- perhaps millions -- of men and women all over the globe will have sexualized cyber-dialogue with other men and women. How much do these people truly know about the person on the other side?

I've never told the following story to anyone, and it's pretty easy to guess what use my enemies will make of it. Nevertheless...

Way back in 1995, not long after I first acquired an internet-ready computer, I made the cyber acquaintance of a lady we will here call Madeleine. She claimed to be 44 years old -- older than I was at the time. She also claimed to be a former research scientist living in another state. Our dialogue soon became...hmm. How to put this? It was much (much) heavier than flirtation but could not be classified as cybersex. Although we never exchanged photos or spoke voice, I repeatedly asked to meet her.

This woman was phenomenally articulate, intelligent, well-read and well-traveled. She demonstrated knowledge of foreign languages. Anyone chatting with her would presume that she had been to graduate school.

After some time, we drifted apart.

Two years later, Madeleine contacted me and apologized for her impersonation. She admitted that she was 17 at the time we met online. Seventeen was above the age of consent in her state but not in mine. For the first time, she sent me a photo, and I cringed to see the face of someone young enough to be my daughter.

Sweartagod, I had no idea. She could have fooled anyone.

So...yeah: Trusting the other person is a very real problem.

One final request: I still have not heard the whole of the press conference. Can anyone tell me if Weiner admitted to physical contact with any of the women with whom he had cyber relationships?

Oh...and do I forgive Weiner? Well, doing this research required two Twitter accounts, even though one is too many. That's unforgivable. Permalink

I think the most pertinent paragraph is this one from Mediaite:

To Breitbart’s assertion that this alleged evidence “undermine(s) severely” Weiner’s position that the previous tweeted picture (that caused so much controversy last week) was a result of a hack or prank, we’re not sure how that is. It is entirely plausible that the “intimate” communications of which Breitbart is now claiming to be aware were privately shared by to consenting adults, one of whom no longer feels the need to protect the other’s private identity. Put another way, Weiner could easily have participated in online sharing of private images and messages and still have been the victim of some sort of online fabrication that launched the so-called “Weinergate” scandal.

I've suggested all along -- and, truth be told, Weiner has pretty much said the same thing -- that Weiner was concerned that a political enemy had somehow gotten hold of images involving an earlier cyber-dalliance with someone other than Gennette Cordova. (Yes, I wrote that. Many times.) I've also consistently stated that the Twitter "scandal" was manufactured to set the stage for a fishing expedition, the purpose of which was to grill the congressman about his entire life, not just about the night of the 27th.

That is precisely the scenario now being played out.

Note that in the latest revelations, we learn that Weiner was bright enough to send photos via private email. We may fairly presume that the recipient was someone he had gotten to know and whom he considered trustworthy. So far, the images are hardly salacious, though Breitbart intimates that this situation will change. Weiner knew that Twitter places photos in one's personal "twitterstream," which is available to all -- even when the images are sent via direct message.

Nothing undermines Gennette Cordova's claim that the Congressman's communication with her was entirely appropriate. The idea that he would send "the crotch shot" out of the blue, via Twitter, to a woman he did not know, remains inane and risible.

Given the very worst interpretation, what are we seeing here? In several earlier comments, I called the shot: This is a replay of the Whitewater scenario. A bullshit charge sets the stage for a fishing expedition.

Added note: As far as we know, the "woman" who received the new Breitbart pictures was Mike Stack in cyber-drag. He has impersonated females online before.

Update: Breitbart is reporting that the crotch shot appeared in an email sent via a private Yahoo account. That is the only part of this whole story that surprises the hell out of me. If he were built like that -- well, his other photos would read differently! At any rate, it is pretty clear now that the Brietbart crew got the shot from this source. Perhaps via a hack...? Keep in mind: If the password for one account is compromised, most of the accounts go wide open -- because most people do not use more than one or two passwords.

From the Breitbart comment stream:

Face reality PeePee, this wasn't a big deal until you abused the power of your office to cover it up.

Abused power how? What cover-up?

A married man sending photos to young girls? Imagine the fathers rage?

Which young girls?

Further update: From Slate...

Is it possible that a hacker got access to Weiner's sexy photo trove and hacked his Twitter account? Sure, like that matters.

It matters a great deal.

The conspirators obviously have had these photos for a while: It has previously been established that images were sent to a top conservative blogger on May 12. (Mike has said that the blogger was Drudge.) That fact alone -- along with many others -- buttresses the contention that the events of the 27th were engineered by outsiders.

Obviously, the conspirators did not think that communication between two consenting adults would shock many people. The record clearly indicates that they were trying to make the situation look far worse than it was. That's why they were cyber-stalking an uninvolved college student and two underaged girls.

If the current pictures were obtained because Yahoo, AOL and/or Facebook email accounts were hacked, then the Breitbart crew could face jail time.

One must wonder about the woman to whom the emails were sent: Why is she divulging this material? Has she, in fact, done so voluntarily? If she volunteered the photos to Breitbart's crew, then we may fairly suspect a classic honeytrap.

If this is a honeytrap, then we should ask just when the photos were sent; they might have been traded before the congressman's marriage. We cannot take the word of someone who acted as bait in a honeytrap. And we cannot take Breitbart's word. Permalink

No, that's not Weiner in the infamous "crotch shot." (He's just not built that way.) Yes, his account was tampered with. Yes, there really was a conspiracy against him. We're learning a lot more about the conspirators. Deal with it.

See here and here and here.

Update: Also here and here and here.

By the way -- here's an advertisement (click to enlarge) for a little program that claims to break Twitter passwords automatically. Does it work? Dunno. This may be a scam or a malware-dropper -- or it may function as advertised. I won't try it, and I won't tell you where to find your own copy. But it's interesting to know that such things are available...

Permalink

I'm sending word out to see how easy it is to spoof the "From TweetDeck" thing. (See post below.) In the meantime, let's mull over Weiner's odd mention of his Facebook account being hacked. That remark has always gnawed at me. FB and Twitter and connected; how easy are they to hack?

Real damn easy, as it turns out. See here and here. (But for god's sake, don't actually follow those instructions!)

Ignore all those hacking services, facebook hacks and hackers that charge you money for something you can do on your own for free. Hack the password of any of your friends accounts and get their password even as a prank or joke (you may also be interested in trying our How To Hack Twitter Accounts tutorial)

Twitter says that they plugged a similar hole circa 2009, but the hacker who wrote the above says that his script was updated as of "6/4/2011." Around the same time, a phishing scam snagged the passwords of several notables. Those passwords were reset -- but only if the victims knew that there was a problem. One can easily see a situation in which passwords were held in reserve. Permalink

A journal called The Daily has reconstituted a false argument first offered by The Mighty Seixon in order to "debunk" what I said about the Yfrog exploit.

But according to data provided exclusively to The Daily from TweetCongress.org, a nonprofit website that captures each member of Congress’s Twitter feeds in real time, the shot seen round the world was transmitted using TweetDeck — a popular Adobe desktop application that links up with social networking sites.

Chet Wisniewski, a senior security adviser at security software company SophosLabs, said the TweetDeck stamp “does make it more plausible that it did come from him.

Let's knock this one down quickly, shall we?

I revealed in this blog -- long before the Daily published its "exclusively" provided "data" -- that Weiner used TweetDeck that night. But so what?

The poor schlub writing for the Daily -- his name is Daniel Libit -- doesn't understand that Seixon's entire "TweetDeck" argument was based on the presupposition that the congressman used TweetDeck or some similar app EVERY SINGLE TIME. Thus, he never established a Yfrog account.

Yet even the Daily stipulates that this was not the case.

So there goes the argument. Poof.

Furthermore, TweetDeck and similar apps (such as the divinely-named Twitterberry) always append an identifying signature: "via TweetDeck" and "via Twitterberry." Something like that. Weiner's previous photos didn't have that data. They were labelled "via Yfrog" and "via Twitter."

Let's take it a step further. Suppose Weiner had used TweetDeck and nothing but TweetDeck during his entire career as a twitterer. Again: So what?

TweetDeck automatically establishes a Yfrog account for you. When you try to send a pic, it even flashes a message: "Sending via Yfrog." Don't take my word for it. Download the app for yourself and try it out.

I downloaded TweetDeck and had one of my fictional creations send a pic to another. "Chalice153" had never set up a Yfrog account -- and yet one was set up for her. Here it is. (That's Angela, my model. Pretty, isn't she?) That account was open to the very same exploit which I pointed out in my post.

Seixon, a known Republican operative with a long and irrefutable history of flim-flammery, tried to pretend that this was not the case. Interestingly, he set up his blog to make that argument on the very day when Yfrog plugged its security hole. The plugging made it impossible to prove him wrong via a real-world, real-time test.

Still, I don't think that such a test is necessary. Chalice153 has granted a Yfrog account the moment she sent a picture, even though she did not go to Yfrog's website to set one up. In the days before the security hole was plugged, anyone could have uploaded anything to that account.

So the entire argument is bogus. The Daily has given us techno-babble.

Weiner clearly did not use a TweetDeck-like app all the time -- and even if he had, his automatically-created Yfrog page was open to the same security exploit.

Just in case you are wondering whether the conspirators (in this case, that much-overused term is justified) lacked the computer savvy to make use of that exploit, let us recall what Dan Wolfe's partner Mike Stack has to say about himself:

In one 2009 post, Stack fired back at some of his online enemies, warning them to “be careful of what you say.” He claimed, “I can find out anything about anyone. The software and programs that I have at my disposal, in addition to the people who work in the wi-fi and technology field that I am partnered with make me a virtual cyber detective.”

Let's have another quote from Wisniewski:

“If I had his password, I could add his account into my TweetDeck and start sending tweets, and it would all say ‘TweetDeck,’” Wisniewski explained.

This statement proves that he hasn't been following the case. My entire point was based on the fact that Yfrog had a security loophole which allowed others to post to your account without knowing your password. That point was proven beyond rational debate when Yfrog closed that very loophole soon after my post became widely-read.

Does Weiner's use of TweetDeck that night constitute an "extra hurdle" for the conspirators? Of course not. The statement is nonsensical on its face.

It is stipulated by all sides that the anti-Weiner conspirators were watching his twitter feed the way a lioness studies her prey. That constant, careful scrutiny is (allegedly) the reason why Dan Wolfe just happened to see the photo immediately. They knew full well what Weiner was doing that evening. Anyone can download TweetDeck; it's a free app and takes a short time to set up.

Time to make a point which I should have mentioned earlier. Twitter is not like email. If you send a picture via Twitter to a private party (even if you use TweetDeck), that picture also shows up in your own Twitter record. For everyone to see. An experienced user of Twitter would have known that. I discovered that fact my first time out, and Weiner had been using the app for years.

If we are to take Gennette Cordova at her word (and I doubt that The Daily will take the legal or ethical risk of calling her a liar), then she and the congressman had never engaged in personal chit-chat. He had no way of knowing anything about her. Are we to believe that he suddenly -- and very non-anonymously -- sent a lewd photo to a girl he did not know and whose reaction he could not gauge? And that he did so knowing that the same image would be visible to anyone, including enemies like Dan Wolfe (whose Weiner-obsessive behavior was known to the congressman)?

Again: If you believe that, then Jonathan Lebed has some penny stocks to sell you.

I think that George "The Mighty Seixon" Gooding or one of his allied 'wingers contacted the Daily and got this story into the newstream. It's clear that the writer for the Daily did not even fully comprehend the argument. And I doubt that he had seen this.

Seixon has an established history of trying to buttress dubious assertions with highly-detailed arguments which ultimately prove to be bogus. He did they same thing when he "proved" that Saddam really did have WMDs. The guy is a classic flim-flammer.

Oh -- and Mr. Wisniewski? Hope you're reading this. Sophos is a good product, but: A while back, I had a nasty little rootkit which Sophos completely missed. Emsisoft caught it.

Nobody's perfect, eh wot?

Added point: People presume that Weiner's statement that he "can't be 100% sure" that the photo isn't of him means that is of him. If so, his consistent denials that he uploaded the photo would be a lie. But if he's willing to lie about uploading the photo, why wouldn't he simply say "Not me"?

As I've said many times, I think he was worried that that some photo-funnies between him and a former girlfriend had somehow escaped into the hands of an enemy.

The first time I got a camera phone, my ladyfriend and I took some shots which we might not want you to see. (They were by no means pornographic -- just unflattering.) I don't know if those shots still exist anywhere, and I have only a vague memory as to what they looked like. If you ever see those photos online, know that I didn't upload them. Permalink

I noticed something odd about the notorious crotch photo: Everyone is displaying it upside down. The table legs visible in the photo reveal the proper orientation.

Here, I have displayed the photograph correctly. Click to enlarge.

The original version was (intentionally?) cropped to make it appear that the subject of the photo was standing. In this version, it is clear that subject is sitting. (The cropped and reversed version -- the one you've all seen -- is below.) Once the image is oriented correctly, it becomes pretty clear that someone else might have snapped it from behind the left shoulder.

It's also pretty clear that the subject is not Weiner. The guy in this shot is massive -- incredibly huge -- and he's not even erect. In fact, he seems flaccid. The universe of possible candidates is actually pretty small. Judging from other photos of Weiner, the congressman is not in that universe.

Incidentally: Those of you who have said that "he hasn't denied" are guilty of selective quotation. Weiner has denied. He has made clear that he isn't built like this. (His words to Rachel Maddow: "I wish.")

I don't think that this image has been Photoshopped. For one thing, enlarging the penis to cartoonish proportions hardly helped the framer make his case. If anything, enlargement of that area would have been a supremely foolish move. The smear job would have been more persuasive if a the photo depicted a normal-sized man. Besides, I can see no "tells" indicating image manipulation, and I have some experience with Photoshop. Permalink

...you're wrong. This day, and hardly for the first time, I made a classic error: By opening my fat yap, I have potentially tipped off an enemy. Such blundering is unforgivable. Permalink

In light of the new information that has come out, anyone who doesn't acknowledge Dan Wolfe's guilt must be ignorant, insane or purchased. We now have a better understanding of why Breitbart has turned on Dan Wolfe.

It seems that Dan had cohorts. Of course, we've known that fact all along; but we're learning more about the other conspirators.

Update: The Smoking Gun has lots of new info on Mike Stack, Dan Wolfe's partner and fellow zealot. Very pertinent stuff...

Stack fought frequently with a woman who accused him of stalking her online, and alleged that he admitted to opening numerous Twitter accounts posing as her.

In one 2009 post, Stack fired back at some of his online enemies, warning them to “be careful of what you say.” He claimed, “I can find out anything about anyone. The software and programs that I have at my disposal, in addition to the people who work in the wi-fi and technology field that I am partnered with make me a virtual cyber detective.”

So: Stack had the know-how to get the photo onto the account. And he has posed as other people before. The net closes...

And now back to our post:

Tommy Christopher delivers a great deal of truly new information about the events of that evening. I hope both Christopher and the readers will forgive lengthy quotation (a bad blogging practice which this site usually eschews):

It was Betty [pseudonym for an underaged Weiner follower] who pointed out the activities of Dan Wolfe (@patriotusa76) and his clique, including a man named Mike Stack (@goatsred). She had a lot of information that I could not verify, but those facts that were independently verifiable formed the basis of our reporting on Wolfe Sunday afternoon. Wolfe and Stack, along with several others, had engaged in a campaign of harassing young, mostly-underage girls who were being followed by Rep. Weiner, as well as a constant stream of vitriol, homophobic innuendo, and rumormongering against Rep. Weiner. Betty was one of those young girls, and their unwanted attention, she says, caused her to shut down her Twitter feed.

Betty’s mother (we’ll call her Mrs. Betty) says that she and her husband monitor all of Betty’s internet usage, and were incensed by this group’s behavior. Rep. Weiner, she confirms, never contacted Betty privately, with the exception of a Direct Message welcoming her to his Twitter stream, a message Mrs. Betty assumed was automatically generated.

Another underaged girl, named Veronica, became desperate for attention and decided to start telling lies. She told Mike Stack (Wolfe's partner) that Weiner had made inappropriate comments to her and Betty. This was not true. (This is the stripped-down version of a complex tale.) Veronica's false story was part of what Dan Wolfe referred to when he said "We have more!"

Once we published our story about Dan Wolfe, Andrew called me again, and it was clear from the conversation that he had genuine concerns about Wolfe as a source, and that he had been unaware of his prior activity on Twitter. Through our contemporaneous conversations throughout this story, it has been clear that Andrew Breitbart followed leads that were submitted to him, rather than that he engineered any of this, and as far as presentation of documentary evidence, has acted responsibly throughout.

I disagree with this exoneration of Breitbart. No mainstream or "new media" journalist should ever use a source like Dan Wolfe.

Mediaite then goes on to excoriate Markos Moulitsas for printing the names of the two underaged girls mentioned above, one of whom (Betty) had nothing to do with her friend's fabrications. You gotta read the exchange between Christopher and Moulitsas, who proves to be utterly infuriating and flabbergasting.

I've long despised Moulitsas, but after reading this outrage, I would like to....hmm. How to word this? Let's be careful: I hereby promise never to punch Markos Moulitsas in the face or to commit any other illegal acts against his person. But if someone else were to come up to MM and insure that, behind those super-sized lips, a few teeth went missing, I would like to buy that individual a fine bottle of ale.

Now let's get back to the conspiracy. The following comes from a statement offered by Betty's mother:

When Rep Weiner followed my daughter the one and only message he sent her was welcoming her to his twitter followers and suggested he go to his website for more information. My husband and I were delighted with this message as it furthered our daughter’s interest in learning about government. We were very grateful to Rep Weiner for this and saw nothing wrong or inappropriate with this message.

This was the one and only message that Rep Weiner sent our daughter. Our daughter sent a message thanking Rep Weiner for following her and thanking him for the welcome message. This was the one and only message our daughter sent to Rep Weiner.

Soon after she was following Rep Weiner, a group of grown men and a few grown woman who described themselves as “concerned mothers” began harassing my daughter. I can assure you, as a mother, I’ve never heard of such disgusting behavior. My daughter, with our permission, responded to these attacks on Rep Weiner following her with grace and maturity – which is something that cannot be said for these “mothers” and their fellow grown men involved in the attack.

These mothers and their grown male friends attacked the intentions and character of Rep Weiner to our daughter and suggested that he was somehow perverse for following her. This disgusted myself and my husband. They were attacking a man, who has done nothing to them and has done nothing wrong.

Ultimately, Rep Weiner had to unfollow our daughter as a favor to her so these attacks would stop. We were sorry that these bullies caused this and we were disgusted to see that even after he unfollowed her, this group of so called mothers and grown men — continued to try and contact my daughter.

The following comes from Betty:

I was so excited because we were learning about politics in school and he is a great hero of mine. This excitement turned to fear when a group of women and men started harassing me for following Rep Weiner and for being followed by him. They said the most terrible things about him.

He was forced to unfollow me so they would stop harassing me. But they did not stop. One man, goatsred – tried to contact me. I locked my account. After I locked my account he tried to follow me and I denied him. My parents made me shut down my account as a result.

In light of this, how can anyone not think that these conspirators -- that much-abused word is here perfectly appropriate -- are responsible for the "crotch shot" upload? Consider the facts:

1. At the time of the upload, there was -- incontestably -- a conspiracy to besmirch Congressman Weiner. The conspirators were zealous, paranoid, and organized.

2. The political operatives involved in this conspiracy were so thoroughly unscrupulous that they harassed and stalked underaged girls and attempted to get them to make false accusations.

3. The members of this conspiracy had noteworthy computer skills. We may presume that they possessed enough tech savvy to use the Yfrog exploit described in earlier posts (and which apparently has been known to computer security experts for some time).

4. The conspirators were also willing to adopt fake personas and to tell false stories in order to get the information they sought.

5. Conspirator Dan Wolfe "happened" upon the crotch shot immediately. He drew attention to it via various tweets -- tweets which hardly read like he had accidentally stumbled across the thing.

6. Conspirator Dan Wolfe lied about the 640x480 version of the picture, which ought to have been in his browser cache. Based on experiments published in earlier posts, we have very good reason to believe that the 640x480 version of the image probably would have the EXIF metadata indicating camera make and date creation.

7. Conspirator Dan Wolfe lied when he said that he found the 800x600 version of the image in his browser cache. The image bears a date stamp of May 30. There is no innocent explanation for this -- at least, none that I can conceive of. (Odd, isn't it, that Weiner's attackers never talk about this problem? Arguably, that image is the only piece of hard evidence in the case -- and the date stamp is all wrong!)

8. The format of the Yfrog page indicates that an outsider uploaded the offending photo.

9. Conspirator Dan Wolfe lied when he said that he has nothing to hide and that he welcomes an investigation. He has, in fact, gone into hiding. He won't reveal his real name. (It may not be Dan Wolfe.) He won't communicate. He deleted his Twitter account. I accused him in print of framing Weiner and then invited him to sue me, with the understanding that I would exercise my right of discovery. He has not contacted me.

10. Judging from this tweet, Breitbart himself now believes or suspects that Dan Wolfe is responsible.

11. Dan had predicted the sex scandal with the jackass confidence of one who intended to make his prophecy come true. He later said that he had heard a rumor that a scandal was in the offing, but that he did not know that Weiner was involved. Once again, Dan Wolfe lied. On May 12, he wrote that "top5 RightWing blogger has sexscandal pics" of Weiner. (Emphasis added.)

12. Dan's use of the word "has" indicates the present, not the future. If the photo existed on May 12 -- as Dan's statement strongly implies -- then the fraudulence of his account of May 27 becomes incontestable.

I am curious about this "top5 RightWing blogger," who may hold the key to unraveling the mystery.

As readers know, I've suspected for a while that the photo was obtained from one of Anthony Weiner's former lovers. If this theory is true, Weiner may have been sleeping when the shot was taken.

I now suspect that this photo (and others?) were given to a conservative blogger on May 12. The conspirators may have decided that the story would have done no significant damage to Weiner, and that it would be better to use it in a much more devious way. The "top5 RightWing blogger" is thus a co-conspirator.

Any guesses as to the identity of that blogger? I note that Michelle Malkin is a follower of George Gooding. If that lady has scruples, they haven't been brought to my attention.

I have to give these conspirators credit: They somehow knew that the media would tell and retell false versions of this story. Take, for example this story, which is filled with lies -- including the presumption that Weiner and Gennette Cordova had an online romantic relationship. In other words, the writer claims that Gennette's statement was false. She should sue.

We saw a similar aura of dangerous smugness in the early days of Whitewater. Back then, writers and journalists radiated false hipness: Oh, everyone knows the Clintons are guilty; of course they are; don't be naive...

One last word about Breitbart and "new media" ethics. This entire story was based on Breitbart's willingness to accept the word of a man he had never met, a source whose voice he had never heard and whose real name remains unknown. No "lamestream" journalist would have contemplated using such a source. Breitbart cannot be absolved.

By contrast: For over two years, I have sat on a real "extramarital" story involving a member of the Obama administration. The tale is rather tawdry but in no way criminal. My decision to let the story lie dormant has nothing to do with any love for this administration; regular readers know my feelings. What keeps me from pursuing the matter is the fact that I have only one source. I've met her and do not believe her to be a fantasist. She is an infinitely more credible source than is someone like Dan Wolfe. But a single-source story is, in the end, a single-source story. Besides, I have no desire to place this woman in a position where she must confront hordes of reporters. Permalink

This is an open letter to Luke Broadwater of the Baltimore Sun, who published a deceptive, ignorant and rather smarmy piece entitled "The evidence is clear: Weiner sent the Tweet."


Mr. Broadwater, one of your commenters has asked: Who debunked this story? Lots of people have done so, including myself.

When my blog revealed the gaping security hole in Yfrog (that's the service which allows one to tweet pictures), the company shut down service for a day in order to patch the problem.

Yfrog's security problem allowed any outsider to upload an image to someone else's twiiterstream. The result would look as though the account holder had uploaded the picture himself. The outsider need not know the password to do this -- therefore, this was not really a hack. It was, however, VERY sloppy security.

Imagine what could happen if anyone who knew your email address could post a story to the Baltimore Sun under your byline. That, believe it or not, is more or less the way Yfrog worked.

There was one small "tell," however. The formatting of a Yfrog page is slightly different if someone other than the account holder uploads a picture. There is an oddity in the header.

That oddity is present in the screen capture of the Yfrog page taken on the night of the 27th.

The anomaly may be subtle, but it proves the congressman's innocence. My blog post explicating this issue (with copious illustrations) is here:

http://cannonfire.blogspot.com/2011/06/weiner-affair-close-to-solution-but-i.html

An independent expert in hacking double-checks my work here:

http://www.hackerfactor.com/blog/index.php?/archives/433-We-Have-A-Weiner.html

Many, many people replicated the experiment to prove that the security flaw existed. The fact that Yfrog changed their application proves that I was right.

It was always absurd to presume that Weiner uploaded that picture. Gennette Cordova, the college student who allegedly was supposed to receive the picture (she never got it) says that the congressman had previously sent her only brief, appropriate messages. Unless you are calling her a liar -- and even Weiner's enemies are now unwilling to do that -- then we must presume that she was largely unknown to Weiner.

How could he have known how old she was or what she looked like?

The idea that any man, let alone a married congressman, would send a crotch shot out of the blue to a woman he did not know at all and whose reaction he could not gauge -- well, that notion is, on its face, ridiculous.

If you are saying that Weiner DID know Gennette, then you are calling her a liar. That accusation bears a legal and ethical responsibility.

Gennette had been cyber-stalked by a pathologically obsessed Weiner foe named Dan Wolfe, who has also been bothering other people following the congressman. She describes his despicable behavior in her statement. When she learned of the photo, Gennette immediately presumed that Dan was responsible.

By "happenstance," Dan Wolfe was the first (and nearly the only) person to note the presence of the picture, almost immediately after it was uploaded. He then tried to draw as much attention to the picture as possible. His own tweets that night read like someone crudely drawing attention to his own handiwork.

Previously, he had "predicted" the scandal in absurd detail. Those alleged "prophecies" give the lie to his claim that he came across the photo by happenstance.

After the scandal broke, Dan produced a larger version of the photo allegedly found on his browser cache. The EXIF metadata on this photo indicates a creation date of May 30 -- three days after the incident. There is no innocent explanation for this date.

Andrew Brietbart, the person who published Dan's "find," now suspects that Dan uploaded the photo. Brietbart has stated as much in his own tweets.

Your other points are easily refuted. Why doesn't Weiner ask for an investigation? The answer is obvious. First, since the account was (in a strictly technical sense) not hacked, it is an open question whether any laws were broken. Second, and more importantly: If Weiner were to sue Dan or to ask for an investigation, he would open himself up for Discovery and Deposition.

That's the key point which people like you never tell your readers.

In a deposition, Weiner would be asked questions, on the record, not just about the events of the 27th but also about his entire life history. In other words, the frame-up conducted on the 27th would set the stage for a Ken Starr-style fishing expedition.

Any lawyer worth his salt would counsel Weiner to steer clear of that nightmare situation.

Frankly, I think that a fishing expedition is precisely what you want.

You say Weiner has engaged in some sort of cover-up. No, he hasn't. Refusal to provide his enemies with their much longed-for fishing expedition hardly constitutes a cover-up.

Is the photo of Anthony Weiner? I don't know. What if it is? It might well have been a joke photo, a shot taken during a night of drinking at a frat house, or detritus from an online dalliance conducted years ago. Or it might be someone else. We do not know. Moreover, we have no business making the inquiry.

As noted above, and as all agree, Dan Wolfe is obsessed. I can easily see him contacting Weiner's old girlfriends, one of whom may bear both a grudge and a few embarrassing old photos.

Dan hinted as much when he told Breitbart (in recently released emails) that "There is more." Those three words indicate that what occurred on the 27th was not happenstance but the first stage of an ongoing defamation campaign.

Can you honestly say that this attempt to frame the congressman should give rise to a situation where investigators ask him "Have you ever in your life taken a photo of your crotch"? No one has any right to ask such a question.

Have you ever seen a movie called The Contender? Same situation. You're playing the Gary Oldman role. That whole movie was about Joan Allen's principled refusal to answer questions about her sexual history.

Under the pretext of trying to clear up a specific situation, you want to ask deeply personal and intrusive questions about a man's entire history.

Anyone who wants to ask Weiner, as Wolf Blitzer tried to ask, "Have you ever pointed a camera lens at your groin?" is simply fishing for scandal. That is the most odious form of journalism imaginable.

Incidentally, in 1988, when a CNN reporter asked George H.W. Bush whether he had an affair (as some evidence suggested), he refused to answer. That, in my opinion, was the correct response.

The only question you or any other reporter may properly ask Weiner concerns the night of the 27th. Weiner has been consistent in his denials that he uploaded the shot. And that is that is that.

No laws were broken or brushed. The woman insists that the congressman did nothing inappropriate. Having dealt with Dan Wolfe before, she immediately presumed that Dan uploaded the photo. I, for one, respect her judgment. Dan's own publisher now suspects or believes that Dan did it.

The tech involved clearly indicates that Weiner was innocent. The evidence is clear: Weiner did NOT send the tweet.

You want to go fishing? Find a lake. Permalink

This is an update to the previous post. Parts of it may not make sense unless you've read what came before. In short and in sum: I've been attacked by a creature named George Gooding, the new darling of the "get Weiner" brigade.

I've uncovered something very unnerving about this fellow. The truth emerged only after a sleepless night of sparring with George in the comments. (You can read the play-by-play if you scroll down to the post below) We had hours of techno-battle, and then...samsara.

We'll get to that great revelation soon. First, let's get up to speed on the tech argument. (If this section confuses you, read the previous post first. Or just skim and get the gist.)

Turns out George didn't know -- and neither did I -- that Weiner really did use a PC-based app called TweetDeck on May 27. His record indicates that he never used it before that date. Weird.

Is that fact germane? No. George's whole argument hinges on the presupposition that Weiner used TweetDeck or some similar app during his entire Twittering career, and thus never established a Yfrog account -- which would mean that he never had a "secret" Yfrog address appended to his images.

Well, that presupposition is wrong. Weiner had sent images via his Blackberry on previous occasions. He had to have established a Yfrog account at some point, because you can't use Tweetdeck on a Blackberry. (George deceptively refused to tell people about that.) There is at least one tweet marked "from Yfrog."

As far as Milowent could determine (he is examining the available record), Weiner never did the Tweetdeck thing before the 27th. Again: Weird. But that fact hardly impacts what I said about the Yfrog exploit.

I opened a Twitter account as "Chalice153" and used Tweetdeck to send a picture to Dowson. (It's so cute to watch your fictional creations talk to each other!) Even though Chalice never opened a Yfrog page, an account was created for her. Could someone have used the exploit to send a pic to that account? Gooding says no. I think the answer is yes. We can't test the proposition now that Yfrog has changed its policies.

Isn't that conveeeeeenient?

When Weiner got started on Twitter, the only app for the Blackberry that sent pics is something called Twitterberry -- ye gods, what a puerile name! And that app appends the words "from Twitterberry" to the messages. We can't see those words anywhere in Weiner's twitterings.

Nope. George's theory is a no-go.

Weiner had a Yfrog account. And he never said otherwise on the Rachel Maddow show, despite George's lying claims to the contrary. Weiner actually claimed that he was kind of fuzzy about what Yfrog actually did -- as are a lot of other non-techie Twitter users, no doubt. (I give the full quote in the previous post. George has an aversion to accurate quotation.)

Let this sink in. George falsely claimed that Weiner had said something to Maddow which he did not actually say. And then George maintained this false claim even after I typed up the direct quote.

That is very strange behavior, to say the least. But it gets stranger.

Read the comments and you'll see: Turns out George made a slip up which revealed that he never even saw the Maddow interview in question! Thus, he never heard the words that he twisted and transformed into the heart of his argument.

That's the moment when I started to wonder: Who IS this guy?

So I had a better look at his site. Check it out. Notice something strange?

George is a ghost.

Well, at least his site is ghostly.

My now-notorious post called that site into existence. His "blog" contains not a single post predating it.

He gives no background. No history. No indication of being any sort of real human being. His site is a bare-bones affair.

Yet all of a sudden, he is in communication with all the superstars of the right (even though he claims to be non-partisan.) They are all twittering away with him. Look at his (brief) record.

Last night, I was inundated with a zillion taunting messages from righties. It was obviously a coordinated effort. (Many regular Cannonfire readers witnessed similar coordination when the Obots went on the rampage back in 2008. We know what this sort of thing feels like. Axelrod is an amateur compared to his right-wing counterparts.) The taunters all screeched about how the famous, fabulous George Gooding had kicked my ass.

Uh huh. Right. Question: How did zillions of righties even hear about a blog that is so new that Google still doesn't even list it? How did these people learn about that blog on its FIRST NIGHT OF EXISTENCE?

Now, when I say that George is a ghost, I refer to his current spectral existence as a blogger. His site has no existence preceding the Weiner affair.

In a previous life, however, George did have a presence in Norway. Here, Mr. NonPartisan denounces "Bush hate." (Most of the rest is in Norwegian.) His Norwegian site is here. Running the page through Google translate reveals that Mr. Nonpartisan is pretty damned partisan.

Let's dig further. Turns out George used to write under another name -- one that I had encountered before, although I could recall it only vaguely. Forgive the hazy memory, George, but 2006 was five years ago and I don't travel in rightist circles. (And I don't usually read Think Progress.)

Back in 2006, George wrote for the National Review and other ever-so-non-partisan venues. At the time, he used the mysterious byline Seixon.

Seixon focused on Plame-gate, always siding with rightists while pretending to be centrist. He was involved with a weird contretemps I did not follow involving Jason Leopold, Larisa Alexandrovna and Larry Johnson. Seixon/Gooding seems to think that Larisa was involved with a huge conspiracy, and that claim is ridiculous. (I have no stake in defending that woman, but she sure as hell ain't what Gooding imagines her to be.)

Basically, Gooding's National Review piece argued that "Plame-gate" was a con-job, a huge conspiracy against the Bush administration, concocted by a "tight knit group of intelligence professionals."

Around the same time, Gooding argued that Iraq really did have WMDs. Also see here. What does he offer? Lots of complex, highly abstruse argumentation. Lots of bullshit. All delivered to you in a flat, made-by-committee prose style free of authorial voice, sort of like Gerry Posner's.

Despite his continual defense of the W administration, "Seixon" claims to be a Democrat -- no, I'm not kidding. Obviously, that is a pose. He is a Republican operative who gets dragged out every so often.

The timing tells you all you need to know. My post had rattled some cages, so Georgie-poo established his blog. His first order of business was to spew some technoblather to try to undermine a point that a whole buncha of computer savvy people (even the guys on Little Green Footballs) had verified. And all of a sudden, literally overnight, everyone who is anyone on the right knows about this guy's out-of-nowhere insta-blog.

Do such things "just happen"? Come to your own conclusions.

The Republican point man leading the attack on Plame and Wilson created an entire damn website just to slam me. Wow!

Is George right about the Weiner controversy (and about yours truly)? Well, ask yourself: Do you think that Valerie Plame and Joe Wilson are evil conspirators against the saintly W? Do you think that Bush was right about Saddam's WMDs?

If you think that way, get a shrink.

Gooding pretends to be a computer expert, but most of what he has said is dazzling, meaningless blather. Yeah, it's true: I dislike the very idea of Twitter and refuse to use it. But many seasoned Twitterers and computer experts have verified the existence of the Yfrog exploit which this blog publicized. I ran my first post on this topic past a very computer-savvy friend, just to make sure there weren't any major mistakes. The security hole was real -- as Yfrog itself now admits.

The folks at Yfrog have quietly shut down the ability to post from random email accounts. They claim that there have been no security compromises, and they obviously don't want anyone thinking that the changes have any link to Wiener. But the timing tells the real story. If my post was wrong, why did they do such a thing now?

As for George: His is a familiar type. When the Wiener controversy is done, Gooding's new insta-site will go away. He'll ruminate in Oslo for awhile until a new task arises -- and then he'll start a new new site. We've seen this sort of thing before. Permalink

A person named George Gooding has posted what he claims to be a devastating riposte to my now-famous piece (a few posts down).

Joseph Cannon has no clue what he’s talking about, as he has demonstrated in several blog posts where he makes things up as he goes along, without any technical knowledge to back it up.

I say this as a web developer with a BE in Computer Engineering, and an avid Twitter user.

Wow. So Gooding's BE means that the Yfrog pictures in my "gdowson" account aren't there? Fancy that. It seems that I am imagining that stuff. And so are the zillions of others (including people working for major news organizations) who replicated my experiment -- at least until Yfrog decided to plug the security hole.

But waitaminute.... If I'm wrong, then why is Yfrog plugging that security hole at this time (as ABC News verifies)? That's an awfully damned suspicious thing for them to do.

Let's get back to Gooding. He relies on an analysis by Gateway Pundit, which I have already dealt with (line by line) and rendered risible. Gooding's work is almost as funny. Let's study his post and have a laugh:

As has been pointed out by Gateway Pundit by now, you can use Yfrog’s image service without ever signing up for Yfrog, and more importantly, they cannot cross-post to Twitter without authorization.

What does this have to do with anything I wrote? How do these words contradict my (proven) contention that you can invisibly place a pic on someone else's Yfrog account?

"On May 28th, I posted a picture to Twitter with the TweetDeck application from my phone. TweetDeck and other applications use Yfrog as an image service by default. I had not signed up or in at Yfrog prior to this, and did not need to do so in order for images to be pushed to Yfrog from TweetDeck.

So? On May 28th, I had lunch at McDonalds. Does this mean that Gooding or Weiner did as well? Gooding is making a presumption that everyone else does what he does.

I checked out TweetDeck. It's primarily a desktop app and an iPhone app. You can't download TweetDeck for the Blackberry.

Oops. Gooding kinda sorta forgot to tell us that.

Since we know that Weiner was using his Blackberry to Twitter that night, Gooding has shot himself in the foot.

Through using TweetDeck, I gave the application permission to post to Twitter; TweetDeck uses Yfrog without any further authorization from me, as do many other applications. This does not give Yfrog permission to post to my Twitter account!

Utterly irrelevant.

A layman way of explaining how this works:

I tell the phone application that I want to send an image to Twitter

It sends the image to Yfrog and Yfrog returns a URL to the application

The application then posts to Twitter with the URL and any message I put in along with it

In other words, the application (TweetDeck in my case) is using Yfrog as an asset, it isn’t Yfrog doing the posting to Twitter."

Gooding seems to be writing an ad for Tweetdeck. Alas, his ad copy has no link to anything I wrote or to Congressman Weiner's Twitter habits.

Now, Weiner has stated on the record that he had no idea what Yfrog was, and there is no reason to suppose that he ever signed into or gave Yfrog permission to post to Twitter on his behalf.

This is pure bullshit.

Weiner stated no such thing. When I originally asked for the proof for this statement, the righties cited an interview with Wolf Blitzer. Absolutely nothing in that interview buttressed the contention. I was a little stunned by the some people's ability to see and hear things that clearly were not there.

Then an interview with Rachel Maddow was referenced. Perhaps Gooding is referring to this interview; if so, his refusal to cite it or quote from it demonstrated crappy scholarship. Unlike him, I am not afraid to offer citations. Here it is.

First and foremost, Weiner is clearly not a tech head. He says in the interview "You completely lost me with all of the technical stuff" -- in reference to a not-particularly-technical comment by Rachel Maddow. Here are some more quotes:

"This thing was sent by someone else. They were on my Twitter page. I have since read a few articles like you have that it's not that hard to do."

"As far as the Yfrog account, I'll be honest with you, I didn't really know for sure what that thing was until this thing popped up. And then I clicked on it and it directed me to where these photographs were being kept. And I kind of quickly deleted it and moved on with my life."

From those words, Gooding thinks that he has proof that Weiner changed all of his usual Twitter habits and used an app called Tweetdeck. Unbelievable!

This is a classic example of a partisan attack dog parsing a statement for every hemi-demi-semiquaver of pseudo-meaning until he can make it say something other than what it plainly says.

Did Weiner sign up for a Yfrog account? Yes. Indisputably.

As I noted earlier, vis-a-vis this very same quote:

Take a few seconds to feast your eyeballs on this very site. Blogger works in a strange way: The images that appear in the center column (that is, within the posts themselves) are uploaded via Blogger's in-house service. But all the images on the right and the left -- as well as the really cool cannon picture up at the very top -- have to be uploaded to the internet via a third-party image storage service.

In my case, the name of that service is Imageshack. Imageshack is Yfrog under another name.

But y'know what? If you had asked me a year ago -- two years ago, three years ago -- to name a good online image storage facility, my response might have been: "I dunno."

Would that response have made me a pants-on-fire liar? No. That response means that I use the Imageshack interface maybe once a year. During the in-between times, I usually forgot the name of the thing. On the rare occasions when the need for a new image upload arose, I would hit Google. After the name "Imageshack" sprang up, it would trigger a memory: "Oh yeah. Those guys."

(Russian proverb: "Memory is a crazy old woman who picks up scattered bits of rag while ignoring diamonds.)

Weiner twittered or tweeted or twitted using his Blackberry. The first time he tried to transmit an image, he had to go through a sign-in rigamarole -- and during the rigamarole, the name "Yfrog" no doubt passed in front of his eyeballs. He clicked through, and then forgot all about it. The vast majority of Blackberry-based twitterers surely do the same.

Weiner's unfamiliarity with Yfrog hardly matters. It has no bearing whatsoever on the case. The "Professor Harold Hill" types on the right are simply tossing around techno-jargon to bamboozle the easily bamboozled.

Gooding's BE cannot change the fact that Weiner clearly DID have a Yfrog account of his own (even if this non-techie didn't really "know for sure" what Yfrog was all about).

How do we know that he had an account? Because he hopped onto Yfrog and deleted the images. And we have EXIF data for at least one of these images. It was made on a Blackberry. Also see this post, which has an agonizing number of details about Weiner's Twitter usage, and which proves the Yfrog connection:

Weiner's history shows he has tweeted links to yfrog pictures 7 times (excluding the now deleted tweet.). On six of those occasions, he did so by posting "via Twitter for Blackberry". (4 times on May 5, 2011; once on November 3, 2010, and once on September 26, 2010.) On the other remaining occasion (on 2/25/2011) he posted "via Yfrog."

To repeat: You can't use TweetDeck from a Blackberry.

And the tweet said "via Twitter for Blackberry." And the tweet said "via Yfrog."

Game set and match. George Gooding is a proven liar.

Gooding bases his entire non-argument on the presupposition that, on one night and one night only, Weiner used an app that is not in evidence. Using that app would have required Weiner to use a device other than the one he habitually uses.

Oh, but it gets better than that: He would have had to take a picture snapped with a Blackberry (the EXIF data on the 800x600 does not specify make or model, but it does tell us that a Blackberry was used) and transfer it to a PC or an iPhone (but why?) on the same night that he was provably using his Blackberry as usual. Then he transmitted the pic using an app unfamiliar to him, and which he would have downloaded and learned for that single occasion.

All to send a crotch shot to a female who was, as far as he knew, 73 years old.

If you believe that scenario, Jonathan Lebed has some penny stocks he would like to sell to you.

Quite a few of the people who have replicated the "dowson" experiment did use Blackberries. The results did indeed cause tweets exactly resembling the one attributed to Weiner. The proof is in my "gdowson153" Yfrog account. I've shown screen shots. So have lots of other people, working in total independence.

By the way: If I'm wrong about the URL thing, then what's the explanation for the screen caps I presented? Once again, Gooding is blowing smoke.

The fact is, a whole lotta people replicated my little experiment. A lot of those people were avid Twitter users, as Gooding claims to be. (Everyone knows my own feelings about Twitter.)

Not only that. My post -- and posts based on my post -- were read by many thousands of people. Perhaps hundreds of thousands. It's fair to presume that many of those folks have computer skills which equal or match those of Mr. Gooding.

Gooding's basic honesty (or lack thereof) can be judged by the fact that he neglects to tell his readers that Tweetdeck is not for the Blackberry. That's called "lying by omission," folks.

Gooding also bases his argument on a weird (and patently deceptive) misreading of Weiner's words. As good old Uncle Aleister once said: "Never forget how easy it is to make a maniac's hell's broth out of any proposition, however plain to common sense."

Incidentally, our old friend milowent has an achingly technical (and quite convincing) analysis of this very this topic. Here it is.

When are the right-wingers going to give it up? Even Breitbart now admits that the man called Dan Wolfe was the likely author of these events.

Come out, come out wherever you are 'Dan Wolfe' @patriotUSA76! Stop hiding behind anonymity! Own up to your role & motivation.

Is that a statement open to manifold interpretation? I don't think so.

I may not agree with Breitbart, but he (unlike most of his ideological confreres) is bright. Bright enough to understand the implications of Dan's emails to him, which were recently leaked. Dan bragged "we have more." Those three ominous words indicate that the crotch shot was part of an orchestrated campaign, not a happenstance find.

But we already knew that, of course...

On May 5, Wolfe floated a rumor that compromising photos of a “big time” congressman were in the hands of a “top 5 Right Wing blogger.” He tweeted, “@RepWeiner are you this Congressman?” He reprised this photo rumor in a May 11 tweet.

Come on, rightwingers. If you don't even have Breitbart on your side any more, it's time to give it up.

It is achingly obvious that you righties want to go on a fishing expedition. You want an investigation for one purpose: So you can ask Weiner humiliating questions about his entire life history. But it won't happen. This isn't Whitewater redux. No laws were broken or even touched, and the lady in question says that he never tweeted an inappropriate word. If you say otherwise, then you are calling her a liar. Permalink

The rightwingers are mounting a campaign: "We want an investigation of the Weiner affair!" They shout they words, they purr the words, they sometimes pose as liberals and try to make a reasonable-sounding case.

Obviously, we are dealing with an organized campaign. The overall picture is becoming clearer.

There are, in fact, no grounds for a federal investigation. Gennette has denied that she received any inappropriate words from the Congressman. Weiner has denied sending the picture or tweeting the tweet. He sent her nothing but boilerplate. Neither he nor she have broken or even brushed any laws.

Clearly, the security loophole described in my previous post was the device which allowed a miscreant to try to frame Weiner. We know this because Yfrog is closing that loophole at this very moment. And that is that.

So why do the righties want an investigation? For one reason: They want to go fishing.

Remember Whitewater? It was bullshit. Everyone now agrees that it was bullshit. The Republicans used bullshit charges to go on a fishing expedition against Bill Clinton.

What the Republicans want is a scenario where Anthony Weiner -- the victim of a frame job -- is forced to sit in a chair and answer questions like the one Wolf Blitzer (infuriatingly and inapproriately) tried to ask: Have you ever in your life taken a picture of your groin?

Appalling.

Weiner is the victim here. There is no justification for placing him in a situation where political enemies can ask him humiliating questions about his entire life history.

The righties are guessing that Weiner played some naughty online games back in the days before he was married. They may even have secret info to that effect.

I've posited in various comments that Weiner, in his bachelor days, may have traded naughty photos with an online paramour, and that the crotch shot, or a version thereof, may be leftover detritus from some dalliance that took place a long time ago. Millions of other people trade such pics.

As everyone knows, dumped lovers tend to turn vengeful.

Please understand: I do not know that there is a vengeful ex lurking behind the scenes. (And I have no idea if the congressman has ever pointed a camera lens crotch-ward.) But I would not be surprised.

If such a personage exists, the Republicans would keep her offstage until the right moment. First and foremost, they would want to see Weiner respond to the question that they have no right to ask: "Have you ever in your life pointed a camera at your crotch?"

Nota bene: Dan Wolfe has said that he has more info and possibly more photos to use against Weiner. Those claims, in and of themselves, imply that the events of the 27th were was a set-up, not happenstance.

If Weiner were to sue the presumed framer for libel or defamation, the accused would have the right to discovery. During a deposition, Weiner would be asked that question. The question would probably be allowed, despite being in no way germane to the issue at hand.

He'd have to be nuts to walk into that nightmare.

Nevertheless, the righties keep saying that if Weiner will not sue or investigate, then he must be guilty.

Oh really?

That logic works two ways. And so does the threat of deposition.

Let me make this statement loud and clear, in boldface, with no caveats or qualifications:

The person who tried to frame Anthony Weiner is DAN WOLFE! DAN WOLFE! DAN WOLFE! Dan Wolfe is 100% guilty of a serious ethical offense, and that fact should be made known to everyone who ever considers employing him!

I've read up on the libel laws. I know full well the import of what I am saying. I've never before used this column to level an accusation of that sort against a private citizen. I'm usually very careful about wrapping my statements in qualifying language.

By rightwinger logic, if Dan does not sue me, then he must be guilty as charged.

Dan says that he welcomes an investigation. But he's lying. You know how I know he is lying? Because he won't sue me. He knows full well that if he sues me, I will have powers of discovery.

(Will someone please pass this post along to Dan Wolfe, Dan Wolfe, Dan Wolfe, the man who definitely, positively tried to frame a congressman, DAN WOLFE?)

Come and get me, Dannikins. I want your C drive.

Let's talk about that browser cache of yours. If you found that 800x600 image in your browser cache, then you damn well ought to have the 640x480 -- and that image would have the all-important EXIF data. If the image has been deleted, then we will know that you tried to cover your tracks.

How can you say you have nothing to hide when you have refused to cough up that 640x480?

I just talked the matter over with a top paralegal who has worked with lots of really good lawyers here in Baltimore. She told me all about discovery. She also said "Sometimes it's good to tweak the Devil's nose."

Am I worth suing, financially? No. In fact, I'm pretty much as judgment-proof as an individual can be. The most that DW! DW! DW! could get from me is the Hippo, the loss of which would pain me, even though the gain of the thing would probably be inconsequential to Danny.

But Dan -- we're talking about principle here. You say you welcome an investigation. Well, let's have at it.

Write to me, and I'll arrange a meeting. I'm too poor to travel, so you'll have to have someone in your network serve me the papers. You probably know someone in the DC area, right? Let's meet in the Starbucks in the Barnes and Noble by the Chesapeake Bay. Just tell me when.

If you don't sue me, Dan, you must be (in the words of that great old Doonesbury cartoon) GUILTY GUILTY GUILTY! Permalink

This post is yet another follow-up to the Weinertail tale. Critics have asked how the framer...

(And the name of that framer is Dan Wolfe! Dan Wolfe! Dan Wolfe! Remember: If Dan doesn't sue me -- if he does not use the justice system to clear his name -- then he must be guilty. At least, so runs the logic offered by the right-wingers who accuse Weiner.)

Where was I? Oh yes.

Critics have asked how the framer could possibly have hacked Congressman Weiner's Yfrog "secret" email address. The task, they say, is impossible, or nearly so.

Oh really? Will Femia at the Rachel Maddow blog recounts a bit of experimentation which proves that the job can be done rather easily. Little Green Footballs, of all places, discusses the logic behind the "randomly" assigned five-letter code. Also see this Kos diary. (I'm still banned from Kos, by the way. Guess Markos "Lips" Moulitsas didn't like the cartoons I drew of him.)

For my part, I never thought that Dan Wolfe! Dan Wolfe! Dan Wolfe! did any hacking at all. Why? Because it is now universally acknowledged that Dannikins was the "annoying" personage who quasi-stalked Gennette Cordova. Her statement offers insight into his modus operandi:

The account that these tweets were sent from was familiar to me; this person had harassed me many times after the Congressman followed me on Twitter a month or so ago

My friends have received phone calls from people claiming to be old friends of mine, attempting to obtain my contact information. My siblings have received tweets that are similar in nature.

Despite all the tales we hear of high tech hacking and spying, the best methods often turn out to be low tech. I happen to know a very good P.I. Despite all the equipment at his disposal, he still has to spend a lot of time in parked vehicles doing surveillance.

Circa 1981, I read a book by a young college student who caused a now-forgotten national stir when he wrote a paper outlining how to make a small nuclear weapon. (Was the book called Mushroom? I think so, but memory is a tricky beast.) He was able to piece together the bomb recipe through public sources -- all except for one key missing ingredient. So our intrepid young researcher asked himself the question that all good detectives learn to ask: Who would know? Once he had a name, he telephoned the fellow, and -- using a plausible pretext -- engaged him in a long, friendly conversation. By chat's end, the young man knew how to make a bomb.

In the real world, that's how these things get done. No need for black bag jobs or secret decoder rings.

It's pretty obvious that when Dan Wolfe! Dan Wolfe! Dan Wolfe! called up Gennette's relations, he was trying to do what that young bomb-maker did.

Now let's go back to the words of reader milowent. (He's the fellow who got the ball rolling vis-a-vis the Yfrog security hole.)

the chance that somewhere along the way that weiners yfrog address had been leaked? pretty damn high. it would happen if weiner or an aide simply forwarded a pic he emailed to his yfrog account to anyone else (thus showing the yfrog email address in the chain).

We know that Dan Wolfe! Dan Wolfe! Dan Wolfe! has long had a rather sick obsession with Anthony Weiner. If Dannikins was willing to harass Gennette's friends and family, then he certainly could have adopted a false identity to contact Weiner, his aide, or (most likely) his followers.

Keep in mind that DW! DW! DW! was tracking anyone whom Weiner had followed (or friended, or whatever the stupid verb might be in Twitterworld). I suspect that, cloaked under a Weiner-friendly identity, he struck up a relationship with one of those followers.

If that follower had passed along a single photograph that had originated on Weiner's Blackberry -- well. C'est tout.

(My alternate theory is that, back in his bachelor days, Weiner really did trade naughty photos with some lady. Millions of other people do the same thing. The dumped oft-times become vengeful. You now have enough clues to figure out the rest of the scenario.)

Yfrog: I've been puzzled by the righties who insist that Weiner falsely denied ever using Yfrog. They've cited his interview with Wolf Blitzer, where he offers no such denial. So where did they get this story?

I finally caught up with Weiner's interview with Rachel Maddow, in which the congressman does claim to be unfamiliar with Yfrog. Obviously, he must have used the service previously, because Yfrog is how Twitter users trade pics, and it is universally acknowledged that Weiner had twitted (tweeted?) uncontroversial images to various people in the past.

So does that make Weiner (gasp!) a pants-on-fire liar?

Nope. Let me explain via a personal example.

Take a few seconds to feast your eyeballs on this very site. Blogger works in a strange way: The images that appear in the center column (that is, within the posts themselves) are uploaded via Blogger's in-house service. But all the images on the right and the left -- as well as the really cool cannon picture up at the very top -- have to be uploaded to the internet via a third-party image storage service.

In my case, the name of that service is Imageshack. Imageshack is Yfrog under another name.

But y'know what? If you had asked me a year ago -- two years ago, three years ago -- to name a good online image storage facility, my response might have been: "I dunno."

Would that response have made me a pants-on-fire liar? No. That response means that I use the Imageshack interface maybe once a year. During the in-between times, I usually forgot the name of the thing. On the rare occasions when the need for a new image upload arose, I would hit Google. After the name "Imageshack" sprang up, it would trigger a memory: "Oh yeah. Those guys."

(Russian proverb: "Memory is a crazy old woman who picks up scattered bits of rag while ignoring diamonds.)

Weiner twittered or tweeted or twitted using his Blackberry. The first time he tried to transmit an image, he had to go through a sign-in rigamarole -- and during the rigamarole, the name "Yfrog" no doubt passed in front of his eyeballs. He clicked through, and then forgot all about it. The vast majority of Blackberry-based twitterers surely do the same.

Weiner's unfamiliarity with Yfrog hardly matters. It has no bearing whatsoever on the case. The "Professor Harold Hill" types on the right are simply tossing around techno-jargon to bamboozle the easily bamboozled.

"None": One of the recurrent themes sounded by my right-wing critics holds that a spoofed Twitter message (of the sort that seems to have bedeviled Weiner) will always contain the word "None."

Ridiculous. How do these ideas get started?

The comparison to your left should explain everything. Remember, I have never sent a tweet in my life; the tweet here is a spoof.

On a less-serious note: Weiner seems sensitive about his name. With good reason, perhaps: He probably had to undergo a lot of schoolyard taunting. The name alone forbids him from national office.

Actually, the nicest guy I ever met is named Weiner. (He is not related to the congressman.) He pronounces the name "WHY-ner" -- which happens to be historically correct.

The name is Germanic. In the German language, the rule is: "When I and E go walking, the second does the talking." Learn how to spell and pronounce the dreaded words Sieg heil! and you'll always know how to pronounce a German word containing the "ie" or "ei" combination.

If the congressman really wants to be historically correct, he should pronounce his name "Viner" with a long I. There is no W sound in German. (Rotten old joke: If the answer is "9W," what is the question? "Do you spell your name with a V, Mr. Wagner?")

"Wein" is how German-speaking people refer to Vienna. Thus, "Weiner" means "Viennese." The congressman's Austrian ancestry caused him a whole bunch of schoolyard grief.

Update: Damn. Even though an ex-gf was a professional German translator, I've forgotten much of what she told me about that language. The word for "Viennese" is actually "Wiener." (Being an old Bruckner fan, I really have no excuse for a mistake of that sort.) "Wein" is wine. So the congressman's name means "wine-maker" or something of that nature. Permalink