He Doesn't Dissemble Well!

(UPDATES (2), below:) Regarding Congressman Anthony Weiner's elusive yFrog account, the one in which the supposedly "hacked-in" photo resided:

In an interview, Congressman Weiner specifically told MSNBC's Rachel Maddow, the following regarding "his" yFrog account:

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

(his verbal emphasis in original).

Listen for yourself at 2:10 to 2:25:



Remember now, this took place right at the time of the incident!

So, like Curious George, the Member sees the photo of a member, clicks on it, suddenly discovers he has a yFrog account, with photos in it, and deletes the photo and/or the account!!

So, if there is any proof at all that he, a known social media "technophile," created the yFrog account, and especially if there were any (many?) prior instances of his having sent or "tweeted" photos being kept in that yFrog account, then Weiner was simply dissembling in his interview with Maddow, and she missed, or ignored the obvious opportunity for a follow-up question.

UPDATE: There is proof that he used the yFrog account (some including using the function from his Blackberry), on a few occasions recently -- several uses less than one month before making that comment to Maddow! Having myself posted some of the key information herein in a comment responding on a post at Le·gal In·sur·rec·tion, another commenter there, @VetHusbandFather quickly researched the issue and responded on the thread by identifying three such instances, two of them on May 5th, and one on February 25th. Therefore, it became clear that, contrary to what he told Rachel Maddow, Congressman Weiner was quite familiar with the yFrog photo posting application!

Details below of his frequent yFrog use, below.*

Now let's turn for a moment to the June 1, 2011 NY Times story "Lawmaker Denies Sending Suggestive Photo but Doesn’t Rule Out It's of Him" written by Raymond Hernandez.

From the story, there is this little tidbit:

. . .
Jack Levin, the chief executive of yFrog, the Twitter-affiliated image and video service that was used to upload the photo, said in an interview on Wednesday that his company did not have reason to believe that its user passwords were exposed or stolen. He said it was possible that the photo could have been sent from Mr. Weiner’s yFrog account through his Twitter password or through a yFrog password.

Mr. Levin said neither Mr. Weiner's office nor any law enforcement authorities had contacted him or his company to inquire about the photo.
. . . .

So, Congressman Weiner claims in an interview with Rachel Maddow that he knew nothing about the yFrog account. Yet his investigators, as of yesterday, had not even contacted yFrog with any inquiries whatsoever about the account, including when it was created, and by whom!

Nor have they inquired about when the specific "offending" photo was uploaded and by whom?

Nor, presumably, have they asked about other photos that were residing in the account?

He doesn't dissemble well!

# # # # #

* UPDATE details: Here are the links to several "tweets" (including two of the three identified by commenter @VetHusbandFather) demonstrating Congressman Weiner's familiarity with the yFrog photo-forwarding application associated with his Twitter account. It turns out that he sent four tweets with yFrog photos attached on May 5th alone, here, here, here, and here. Readers should note that in his hasty response to the public posting of the "underwear shot" from his "yFrog" account, the Congressman apparently deleted several, but not all of the photos from the yFrog account. There is absolutely no question that he is very familiar with the yFrog application and functioning. His statement to the contrary to Rachel Maddow was completely misleading.

In the meantime, Michelle Malkin has also explored this Congressman's familiarity with the yFrog application, and she has identified at least 6 uses of the function in which he uploaded photos from yFrog using his Blackberry.

From her post: (links in original):

Six of these instances were photos tweeted directly from his Blackberry to Twitter. Yfrog has a Twitter app for Blackberry phones and is a default photo host for the Blackberry Twitter app. In other words, Yfrog’s set-up allows a Twitter user to authorize Yfrog as one’s primary photo-hosting site — and bypass a separate sign-in process to the Yfrog site. You can snap a pic with your phone, upload it as part of a Twitter message, and have the yfrog link automatically generate and appear in your tweet.

Weiner’s backers argue that he has no familiarity with Yfrog because he never manually logged into its stand-alone site.

Once again, lets review what he told Rachel Maddow:

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

(his verbal emphasis in original).

It's not just his backers making the claim. It's him!

Weiner is a guy who relishes an opportunity to crack one-liners. That one, it seems, was downright risible -- even though he didn't intend it to be!

UPDATE II:

Not to belabor the point, but Michelle Malkin made absolute mincemeat of his claim of unfamiliarity with yFrog by pointing out at least 6 instances where he uploaded photos to the application and sent them using Twitter where he was apparently using his "official" Blackberry!

This information has particular relevance to his utterly disingenuous statement to Rachel Maddow during the interview.

So, I suppose this really raises a few pointed questions for the Congressman, and let's get specific:

Congressman Weiner, a number of messages were quite recently sent from your Twitter account having items attached to them, including digital photos, uploaded from your yFrog account.

Blogger Michelle Malkin has specifically documented a significant number of such messages, including 6 messages sent from your Blackberry.

If, as you said to Rachel Maddow, "As far as the yFrog account, I'll be very honest with you, I didn't really know for sure what that was until this thing popped up . . ." then could you please explain how is it that you were familiar enough with the operation of your yFrog account application to be able to take, upload and attach items from the account on a significant number or prior occasions, including very recently from your Blackberry, and to successfully send the photos out publicly via Twitter?

For example, two such photos you tweeted on May 5th were taken at a Presidential event on the street, both using your Blackberry.

One of them included a candid, up close photo of President Obama himself speaking to a police officer. A second photo, presumably taken at the same event while awaiting the arrival of the POTUS, was also sent from your Blackberry and even contains the twitter "hashtag" #SoIsTheOfficialTweeter."

How do you square these "tweets" with attachments with your statement claiming unfamiliarity with yFrog to Rachel Maddow?

Also, are you "#SoIsTheOfficialTweeter" -- that is, did you create that hashtag?

As a national public figure, you have a significant reputation as a "technophile" when it comes to "social media," and you have recently said you personally did the "tweeting" from your account.

Did you also personally create your yFrog account, and if so when?