The crotch shot heard 'round the world

If you've been watching television or reading newspapers at all this week, you probably cannot have escaped seeing the picture of a man's bulging crotch in his tidy whities that is alleged to be of Rep. Anthony Weiner (D-NY). Weiner is alleged by right-wing scumbag Andrew Breitbart to have taken the picture and sent it via Twitter to a young college student. Weiner denies that he sent the picture. He says his Twitter account was hacked and he has hired a legal firm to look into what happened.

Several bloggers, doing what the mainstream media would do if it had not completly abdicated its responsibility, have investigated the matter and turned up some evidence supporting Weiner's denial. Personally, I am inclined to give the benefit of a doubt to anyone attacked by Breitbart, given his history of fabrication of scandals such as the ACORN vs. the pimp story or the tale of Shirley Sherrod's racism.

Both stories were completely false, but Breitbart and his henchmen, along with their Republican cohorts in Congress, did manage nevertheless to destroy ACORN, the advocacy group that had, for decades, worked with the poor and disadvantaged of the country to ensure that their rights were not trampled. They did not destroy Shirley Sherrod because a full tape of the speech where she was alleged to have made racist comments soon came out and proved that what she had actually said was just the opposite of what Breitbart's doctored tape had claimed.

So Breitbart is a despicable liar and we cannot believe anything that he says. I would accept Anthony Weiner's denial and give him a full pass on the story except for one thing. He says that although he didn't send the picture he cannot say "with certitude" that the picture is not of him. Really, Anthony?

So, how many pictures of your bulging crotch are out there, Rep. Weiner? Are there really so many and are they so available that you just can't say whether this one is one of yours? Or not?

And what is it with men and their penises anyway? Why are they so sure that the whole world is jonesing for a look? Or to put it another way, why do men take crotch shots? Apparently a lot of them do, although I admit that I live in such a naive sheltered world that I wasn't aware of it until this story came out.

Frankly, I'll never understand why a man, particularly a man in the public eye, would be so stupid as to do such a thing - i.e., take a picture of his penis and post it ANYWHERE electronically so that any hacker can grab it (so to speak) and distribute it to the world. Perhaps it just goes to prove once again that the hubris and utter fecklessness of male political figures know no bounds when it comes to sex. They all think they are God's gift to women - or men, as the case may be.

Maybe you just have to be a man to understand.