For the second time in as many years, Anthony Weiner has held a press conference where he confirmed the unidentified naughty bits in a photo transmitted across the Internet belonged to him.
Elsewhere The Post reports the details. The most striking aspect is not so much the graphic nature of this sexual correspondence as the timing: after Weiner had resigned, and under a fake handle — Carlos Danger — he used to disguise it.
At yesterday’s presser, Weiner claimed there’s no news here because he’d admitted at the outset of this campaign there were more women out there. As we can now see, those were weasel words, because the couple knew most people would simply assume his contact with these other women had taken place before his humiliating resignation from Congress.
It’s nice that Huma Abedin has forgiven him. But she has also put herself front and center of his campaign. Last August, she was the focus of what People magazine described as the couple’s first joint interview since his resignation from Congress. Under a family photo with their new baby, she assured readers that “Anthony has spent every day since [the scandal] trying to be the best dad and husband he can be.”
That appeared at a time when Anthony was apparently sending out the explicit messages we are reading about today. Maybe the couple didn’t outright lie, but they didn’t tell the full truth, either.
In another day, Weiner would be a punchline instead of a leading candidate for mayor. Which is as revealing of New York politics as it is of Anthony Weiner.