Weiner Falls on his Sword

By: Jared M. Grifoni, Esq.

The media has been in an absolute frenzy over the past few days over the “sexting” fiasco that has engulfed Representative Anthony Weiner (D-NY). When the story broke, Weiner attempted to save face by claiming that his twitter account was hacked and that the picture that was sent out of his crotch was either not him or not sent by him. Despite Weiner’s best efforts to keep the story under wraps, blood was in the water and the media sharks could smell it a mile away. As the evidence piled up, inconsistencies exposed, and additional women spoke up about similar explicit contact with Weiner, he finally fessed up today that it was him in the picture and that he had been having “online affairs” for some time now.

I have one question: Did anything Weiner do waste taxpayer funds? If the answer is no then outside of feeling bad for the shame and embarrassment his new wife is now facing I couldn’t care less what idiotic things Weiner does on his own time, nor does this type of behavior surprise me. Let Weiner deal with this issue privately since the only people hurt by this are his family and if Weiner’s constituents feel he isn’t doing a good job or that his private indiscretions should prevent him from holding public office they will be able to vote him out in the next election. Minority Leader Pelosi disagrees and thinks that Weiner’s actions require an ethics inquiry however. Out of all the illegal and unconstitutional actions taking place behind closed doors on Capital Hill and the White House and Nancy Pelosi wants to waste more government resources to get to the bottom of whether or not Weiner sent a picture on a government computer?

The happiest person on the planet right now has to be President Obama who was starting to feel some heat from his unconstitutional actions in Libya that have now been completely forgotten by the 24-hour news cycle. Luckily for the President (and stated on this blog in advance) the Republican House was not serious about ending any war and was only using the issue as a method of attack. Instead of Pelosi throwing Weiner to the wolves why not hold the President responsible for initiating an undeclared war in Libya or taking the time to cut unnecessary, bloated, government programs that are pushing this nation closer and closer to default and collapse? What about taking a closer look at the extra billions that the Fannie/Freddie bailouts has cost the taxpayers or the trillions that went to bail out foreign banks?

But what if during Pelosi’s ethics investigation we find out that Weiner did use government computers to send explicit pictures? That would certainly make it worth the time and expense involved to find out the truth because then Weiner would be held accountable, right? There are no House rules that prohibit Weiner from sending any pictures on a government computer (even sex related pictures) so the only thing this “ethics investigation” would accomplish is wasting more taxpayer money “investigating” an issue that most people couldn’t care less about.

Frankly, it amazes me that these political scandals never ease to shock the media or the public. Is it really all that difficult to imagine that “Do as I say not as I do” members of a bloated, immoral government that molests us at airports, seizes our records on what books we checked out at the library or what we used our debit card for recently would possibly do something than many people would consider stupid, immoral, wasteful, etc, in private? Big government breeds this type of behavior and attracts the type of people who would want to engage in it. If you want to root out corruption in government you cannot do it by increasing its size and scope. Big government is inefficient. It creates loopholes, special interests, and causes far more harm than it prevents. It has no oversight and there is very little accountability. Is it then really a surprise that the same Congressman who sponsored legislation to “Keep the internet free of sexual predators” and stated, “Sadly, the Internet is the predator’s venue of choice today. We need to update our strategies and our laws to stop these offenders who are a mere click away from our children.” doesn’t even know if any of the sexual images he sent out of himself were sent to minors?

I’m not suggesting that in a proper, very limited government scandal would not exist. Humans are fallible creatures and therefore it is inevitable that we will always make mistakes and do stupid things but in a government that isn’t buried under 14 trillion dollars in debt that employs an endless amount of bureaucrats, in an endless number of Departments and committees, engaged in numerous wars across the globe, that operates in the secrecy and deception, it would be far more difficult to hide. The limited scope, openness, and accountability that would accompany a responsible, extremely limited government would also discourage those who may be more likely to engage in the type of behavior that thrives in the shadows from even getting in the position in the first place.

If we want to change the culture of government we need to reevaluate what we expect from government itself.