Now, I have a nice collection of vintage copies of Emily Post and Amy Vanderbilt. I’ve even contemplated trying to live my life according to my 1942 version of Emily Post’s Etiquette and blog about the experience.

However, I sometimes wear pants after 7 p.m., and people would stare at me if I started wearing white gloves and hats to the grocery store. (It would be a fun experiment though!)

While etiquette has changed over the last few decades, the need for manners has not. I once read somewhere (sadly, I can’t remember where) that manners exist to put other at ease. Maintaining manners isn’t about snobbery, but about maintaining an awareness of others.

Recently, my mother gave me a copy of How to Live Like a Lady: Lessons in Life, Manners, and Style by Sarah Tomczak.

I love this book! It’s not pretentious or stuffy and has extremely valuable life lessons. In fact, I’m tempted to start giving this as gifts.

You’re probably thinking, “But Adrienne, of course you would like this book. You have some kind of 1950s fetish going on.”

While you’re likely right, this book is written for the modern woman. In the introduction, Tomczak writes:

Social graces not only make the world a much more pleasant place, but they make you a much more pleasant person. Behaving like a lady can ensure you a place on every party guest list, make you the most popular girl in the office, and yes, even help you procure the man of your dreams.

However, many of the old rules no longer apply. It’s not necessary to let a man order for you in a restaurant and it’s become de rigueur to air-kiss your friends when greeting them. Sending a text message is now a perfectly acceptable way to invite a friend for dinner and you no longer have to home-cook every course you serve up. With our fast-paced lives and never-ending advancement of modern communication, only the most conscientious of ladies can be bothered to switch off her cell phone, turn down her iPod avoid hitting “reply all” on her e-mail, and get out her pen and paper to send a thank-you note.

Manners are still needed in this modern era, and this 125-paged little book is the perfect guide. It covers the art of conversation, how to dress, landing the perfect job and workplace etiquette, how to eat tricky appetizers at a party, what to carry in your purse to be prepared for anything.

Every time I pick it up, I find a helpful tip. This book should be mandatory reading if you have two X chromosomes.

Now to go catch up on some thank you notes…

Prior to the Republican debate on Monday, Congresswoman Michele Bachmann was some lesser-known clone of Palin: Brown hair, large family, good looks, conservative, nasal accents… They treated her the same way because of some ridiculous tech issues last winter after the State of the Union and some very sexist comments made by Chris Matthews.

While I’ve yet to figure out who I’m supporting, I’ve always liked Bachmann. I met her two years ago at the height of the ACORN scandal when she spoke at a Heritage Blogger’s Briefing. She was very personable and took the time to individually meet all the attendees in the room. She was also one of the few members of Congress that kept urging activists to protest on Capitol Hill during the Obamacare fight.

Bachmann is sharp and highly-educated woman who often gets dismissed because of her accent and conservative views. As a Southern, conservative woman, who has been discriminated against because of my accent (and I barely have one), that always upsets me.

It’s also intensely sexist of the media to act as though only one conservative woman can be in the spotlight at once. Look at the others in the field. With the exception of Herman Cain, are any other contenders that different? All are white, middle-aged, educated males. Romney, Pawlenty (and Huntsman) are former governors. Gingrich, Santorum and Paul either were or are in Congress, and Pawlenty, Gingrich and Santorum are all vying for the religious right vote.

Funny, how no one is saying that we can only have one candidate appealing to the religious right or one candidate with a strong business background, yet that’s exactly what Mark McKinnon did at the Daily Beast:

Sarah Palin can’t be happy to be suddenly sidelined by a new political American Idol. So, don’t be surprised to see her come out swinging hard and soon to reclaim the stage. She will not give up her crown easily.

This could get very entertaining.

Palin and Bachmann share many of the same views and have campaigned together, but that doesn’t mean that there isn’t room for both in politics. At this point, we don’t even know if Palin is running!

Even the Daily Telegraph in the UK all but admits they only view Palin and Bachmann as one-dimensional clones:

And how eloquent she was! Bachmann is seen by the liberal press as a rival to Sarah Palin because the two are conservative women. But while Palin has a “complex relationship” with the English language, and often wings it with generalities, Bachmann came off like a policy wonk. She reminded the audience of how much legislation she had either authored or tried to scrap, and made frequent reference to her trailblazing leadership of the Tea Party in the House. Her answer on abortion was rather beautiful. The debate’s hosts tried to trap her by asking about what she would do in cases of rape and incest. Bachmann replied with a lyrical explanation of the value of life, side-stepping the specifics completely. Right-to-lifers will understand what she really meant; independents won’t care because it sounded so good. That’s how you sell conservatism.

As The Right Scoop noted, Martin Bashir tried to trick SE Cupp into bashing Palin on MSNBC when he asked, “Is Bachmann the thinking person’s Sarah Palin.”

S.E. Cupp succinctly put it as “I hate these comparisons to Sarah Palin because they both have a uterus.”

Cupp nailed it, but not apparently all women even get it. Jessica Grose at Double X posted a story about Bachmann under the headline, “Michele Bachmann’s Maverick-y Move at the GOP Debate: Impressive or Insulting?”

Hmmm…Maverick was the word frequently used by John McCain in 2008 and was adopted by Palin. It’s most associated with her.

Can’t event the feminists see past the labels in this race?

Women are just as complex as men. Just because there are fewer of us in elected office doesn’t mean that we’re all clones of one another. Would anyone dare to treat Mitt Romney or Tim Pawlenty as clones of each other? Never!

Why does this continue to happen with women? Why are women continuing to perpetuate this stereotype? This isn’t helpful to women running for office on the right or left.

Image: CNN

“Our position is that American women are the most fortunate class of people who ever lived on the face of the earth. … We have every opportunity and they were not created by feminists.”

Throughout my career, I’ve had equal opportunities to men and I’ve seized them. Some men haven’t liked that, it’s true — but, to be honest, neither have some women.

So now when I read about the ‘new feminism’, as bandied about this week by the publishers of a new book, How To Be A Woman by Caitlin Moran, I find myself wondering: what new feminism?

In the Western world, the feminist argument has been definitively won — and all the silly and, frankly, somewhat pathetic ‘slut walks’ in the world won’t refute that.

As far as I can tell, the new feminism aims to make men share more of the childcare. And, of course, it’s true that children prevent many women from going further in their careers. But it’s also true that it’s usually the woman’s choice. The maternal instinct is so powerful that most mothers want to do a larger share of the childcare.

3. Joe Scarborough wins the hypocrite prize for the day. He penned an op-ed in Politico making the startling pronouncement that the media is “obsessed” with Palin and it’s “downright creepy.”

Hmm… so in order to write this, Scarborough hasn’t spent much on Palin? That’s the only thing that makes sense after reading this graf, right?

There is a question of why is Palin is so loathed by the national press. She served only two years as governor of Alaska and hasn’t held political office since. She has not declared a run for president, and 42 percent of Republicans say they definitely would not vote for her if she were to run. She is an eccentric political celebrity of marginal relevance.

Perhaps if he’s tired of the media obsession, he should start with his own columns and TV show seeing how many times he’s talked or written about her.

Then a bunch of stuff happened including moving back to Tennessee, several trips and starting a new job. Hence the big gaps in blogging. The past few months have been a whirlwind.

Life has finally settled down (I think), so I’m hoping to return to full CosmoCon duty. Don’t be surprised if you see a few changes around here aside from the recent makeover.

Now back to women in the news.

1. Dana Loesch investigates how the lefty gals have “justified” the disgusting actions of Anthony Weiner at Big Journalism. Fess up people. Defending a creep, no matter how much you love the way he votes, just makes you look like a bigger fraud. This is not the side that feminists want to be defending. Time to give up, ladies.

2. Amanda Marcotte somehow claims that women are suffering the “latest backlash” from our horrible, patriarchal society for dressing like sluts. I think. It really doesn’t make that much sense and somehow involves Bristol Palin. Marcotte is nearly obsessed with her in the same way that Andrew Sullivan is obsessed with Trig. If Marcotte is using her bully pulpit to defend that important “right” to wear a miniskirt, we really have come a long way, baby.

3. Finally some common sense regarding Slut Walks from across the pond. I’m not that familiar with Melanie Phillips, but she nails it in the Daily Mail:

The insistence that women’s behaviour never contributes to any harm that may befall them is profoundly anti-feminist — and indeed, anti-human. This is because it robs women of that responsibility for their own actions which lies at the heart of what it is to be a human being.

And it betrays feminism in other ways, too. The feminist pioneers battled to obtain political representation, equality in education and the workplace and in other areas of public life.

These truly heroic struggles against real, tangible discrimination are belittled and mocked by the vacuous, self-indulgent and self-defeating posturing of Slut Walks.

But there’s an even deeper betrayal. For those pioneering feminists believed that women represented moral values superior to those of men. If women ended up merely behaving like men, they argue, that would negate everything they were fighting for.

Alas, this is precisely what has happened. By claiming that degraded behaviour empowers women, these Slut Walkers are turning back the feminist clock. If women claim to be sluts, that’s how they will be seen.

We live in a society which has degraded the whole notion of human sexuality. It has voided it of spirituality or love, and turned it instead into little more than a heartless and even predatory means of self-gratification.

And modern feminism has been a powerful factor in that dismal process.

Feminism has evolved into a movement of crybaby women who insist on doing whatever they want and then refusing to take responsibility for those actions.

They leave out that in order to pass the school lunch bill, they had to make sizable cuts to SNAP, the new name for food stamps, so this was a situation of “cutting off your nose to spite your face.” However, Mrs. O wanted legislation passed to give her ridiculous “Let’s Move” program some cover and to be known for something more than hula hooping on the White House lawn. The President didn’t want to spend the holidays sleeping on the couch, so arms were twisted, nonprofits dealing with food and hunger issues were told to shut up, and the bill passed as Democrats wound down their majority before Christmas.

It’s almost funny how Mrs. Obama is much more in the Laura Bush style than Hillary (at least in public). After she got her hand slapped from her “I’m now proud to be an American comments,” she hasn’t ventured out of the First Lady mold very much. That must be such a disappointment for progressives.

On Friday, June 24, the Network of enlightened Women will hold their annual conference at the Heritage Foundation. This one-day event will feature Kate O’Beirne, author of Women Who Made the World Worse, and other opportunities to network with like-minded conservative women. According to NeW’s, Sarah Davis, director of programs and development:

Participants at the conference will hear from NeW’s top leaders as they discuss starting NeW chapters, increasing membership, fostering intellectual group discussions, organizing campus events, and promoting conservative principles on campus and beyond.  NeW will also honor one woman as the “NeW Leader of the Year” for her campus leadership and activism.  Space is limited, so be sure to sign up today.

Don’t miss this once-a-year opportunity to meet other conservative university women from across the country, share ideas about leading successful NeW chapters, and find out how YOU can make a difference on your campus.

Started as a book club in 2004 at the University of Virginia, NeW is the nation’s premier organization for conservative college women.  With chapters located on over 20 college campuses, NeW aims to foster the education and leadership of conservative college women, while promoting conservative principles and expanding intellectual diversity on college campuses.  NeW members meet regularly to discuss the opportunities and challenges facing women today, as well as current political issues.

Since being a conservative woman in college is one of hardest scenarios for those on the right, this is a great opportunity for interns or staffers in the Beltway. Sign up to attend the conference here.

The evening before, on Thursday, June 23, NeW will host a reception for all the attendees and interested folks in DC from 5:30-7:30 p.m. at Heritage. RSVP here.

Head over to the Network of Enlightened Women for more information.

The Twitter scandal of Anthony Weiner, aka “Weinergate” took a bizarre turn today that even political satire writers could have imagined.

This morning, Big Government, part of the Breitbart family of websites, released two photos that were allegedly of Weiner and proved that he had engaged in sexually inappropriate online activities with a number of women.

Amidst rumors of even more photo evidence,  Weiner called a press conference where he fully admitted to engaging in “inappropriate” sexual activities with at least six women via Twitter, Facebook and phone calls. This afternoon, ABC published an interview with the same woman who initially approached Breitbart.

Despite his admitted lies and witch hunt of the conservative blogger, Andrew Breitbart, Weiner refuses to resign.

This twist is particularly interesting because in many ways it displays the hypocrisy of women on the left.

Despite having a lengthy history of being a womanizer since 2001 and audio recordings of Weiner publicly using sexual innuendos with a female reporter in the hallway of the Capitol, feminists and lady blogs have been slow in calling out the actions of Rep. Weiner. If they covered it, it was to make jokes about Weiner’s last name or what guys should sext.

Why are avowed feminists allowing Weiner to call himself a “victim” and attempting to justify his lecherous behavior?

At this point, it’s unclear if Weiner broke any laws by conducting these activities on government equipment in both his office and home, but he did clearly break his wedding vows.

But it’s ok to “stalk” women and at least emotionally cheat on his wife because Weiner has never engaged in any of those “family values” policies. According to Amanda Marcotte:

It seems that even a year ago, the grounds with which a politician’s sex life became a matter of public interest depended on said politician’s own stance on sexual privacy.  ”Family values” politicians who supported government enforcement of their religious sexual mores open the door to having their private lives investigated for hypocrisy, and those who didn’t were left alone.  As far as I know, Anthony Weiner has never suggested that it’s appropriate for the law to try to control the sex lives of consenting adults, either through abortion bans, restrictions on contraception, or discrimination against gay people.  Even with Eliot Spitzer, the question was that  he was soliciting prostitutes while prosecuting others for the same behavior.

Her colleague Emily Yoffe agrees:

Weiner acknowledged he informed House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi that he had been lying previously when he said he didn’t send the dirty picture of himself, but he was not going to resign. As we saw from the instantaneous departure of Chris Lee, had Weiner had been a Republican, under John Boehner’s leadership there wouldn’t have been a press conference, there simply would have been no more Weiner.

Are feminists really this easy (pun intended)? They’re willing to allow a man with an apparent sex addiction and a blatant disrespect for women to stay in office because he supports abortion? That’s precisely what they’re doing as Jessica Grose outlined last week:

Why didn’t this salacious, potentially career-destroying story generate the same insta-circus as “Craigslist Congressman” Chris Lee’s beefcake photos or any one of the many GOP sex scandals over the last several years? It’s due in part to the journalistic torpor of the long holiday weekend, but—let’s be honest—it’s also because he’s an outspoken liberal. And that’s not a bad thing.

Conservatives might cry foul over the double standard in reporting on sex scandals for Democrats and Republicans, but it’s justified. There’s the low-hanging fruit of hypocritical “family values” zealots who get caught, quite literally, with their pants down cheating on a spouse. But it’s more than that. In the case of Republicans, who have been waging a fierce legislative war on women, they’re not just screwing around on their wives, they’re screwing over millions of American women and families by eliminating reproductive freedom, undermining equal pay laws, and restricting access to affordable health and child care.

Bottom line: Weiner used his position in Congress to start inappropriate relationships with women on social networks. He’s not even positive all of them were of legal age. In any other situation where a man used his power and authority to engage in a sexual relationship, that would be harassment, and he would be fired.

While I liked my old template, this week I noticed that it was broken in the new version of Firefox. Since it’s never worked correctly in Chrome, I decided it was time to give up on it.

This theme came from Organic Themes, one of my favorite WordPress skin designers. I’ve used Organic for a few professional projects, and I’ve always been happy with how the skins were built.

There are a few more tweaks to make, but I’m happy.

Generally, a farmers market is not something that would be associated with Hixson, one of Chattanooga’s suburbs in Hamilton County.

Seeing a need in the community, Dee Clark decided to start the St. Alban’s Farmers Market. Getting permission from her church, St. Alban’s Episcopal Church, to use their property on Saturday mornings, the market launched last August and recently opened for its second season.

“I’ve always had a backyard garden and believed in local food,” said Clark, who voluntarily manages the Hixson market. “I saw that the Brainerd market worked. I work full-time, and sometimes it’s hard to get downtown.”

Local Hixson resident, Vickie DeRight agreed. After moving to Chattanooga from Atlanta 18 months ago, she generally goes garage sale shopping on Saturday mornings.

“I always stop by to see what they have,” she explained since the market is located near her house.

Located on Hixson Pike near Chester Frost Park, the market maintains 10 to 12 vendors each week and offers fresh and locally grown produce, eggs, poultry, red meat, honey, hand-woven baskets, soap, handmade reusable totes, embroidery, and other items typically associated with farmers markets.

Like other markets in the area, Clark has some requirements for vendors.

In order to participate, vendors must have local produce. Any processed foods must meet USDA standards, and she encourages vendors to use recycled materials as much as possible. While St. Alban’s doesn’t charge for the use of their property, vendors independently voted to donate 5 percent of their sales, not to exceed $10, to the church for the use of their property.

Most of the vendors at the Hixson market are small business owners, and many of them turned to selling at regional farmers markets to cope with the challenging economy.

Barb Smrcina and her husband, Brad, decided to focus on their business after they both lost their jobs in the past year. After years of making steak jerky for friends and family, the couple launched Buffalo Brad’s Steak Jerky. Using steak and high-quality meats and seasoning with natural ingredients, they set out to sell more of this niche product. The Smrcinas see it as the perfect snack for outdoor enthusiasts in Chattanooga since the jerky maintains long shelf life, is rich in protein, and is easy to eat while hiking or rock climbing.

Walter Bates, another Hixson market vendor, got into his business of selling organic, GMO-free chickens and eggs in order to be a stay-at-home dad at Hoe Hop Valley Farm in Parksville, Tenn.

“My wife is a school teacher,” he said. “I’m a stay-at-home dad, which is how I got into it.”

Bates produces Parksville Pastured Poultry in addition to having fresh eggs year round. He maintains a small processing facility on his property that allows him to sell free-range whole and half chickens directly to the public.

As a small business owner, he was the first person in the state of Tennessee to open a home-based processing facility. Under USDA regulations, he can operate as long as he processes fewer than 20,000 birds per year. He describes his services as “baby chick to the Ziploc bag.”

Between the Main Street Market on Wednesdays and the Hixson market, Bates generally sells out of his product and views the Hixson market as a success.

Brady’s Farm Direct Meat has also found success from the Hixson market. Run by the father and son team of Curtis and Stanley Brady, the small farmers sell locally grown beef and hogs at the market each Saturday.

“All my advertising is done by word of mouth,” said Curtis Brady. “I’m really picking up more customers each week.”

Located in Dayton, the Brady’s started their business last year and partner with neighbors to provide pork products.

The St. Alban’s Farmers Market also features local artisans like Bill Haley, who makes one-of-a-kind baskets from natural local products such as kudzoo, vinca, wisteria, mulberry bark, grapevine and honeysuckle.

After getting laid off from work 26 years ago at Christmas time, he decided to experiment in order to make Christmas presents.

“I found a magazine [article] called, ‘Weave a honeysuckle basket,’” Haley said. “It was the worst basket you’ve ever seen, but I kept making them.”

Now employed at the Tennessee Aquarium, Haley also sells his handmade baskets at the Brainerd market for $25 to $100 apiece.

With the market’s second season underway, Dee Clark is working with other organizers of local farmers markets and local food enthusiasts to improve the St. Alban’s location. In the coming months, she hopes to find vendors specializing in coffee, cheese, bread and jam, as well as participate in other local food initiatives. Every week, she posts updates about the Hixson market on the Chattanooga Farmers Market Facebook group and emails local residents to alert them to specials.

The Hixson Farmers Market is open every Saturday from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. and is located at St. Alban’s Episcopal Church at 7514 Hixson Pike.

Cross-posted at Chattarati.

Today, the Heritage Foundation released a few infographics to help explain the seriousness of this crisis.

Via: Federal Budget in Pictures by The Heritage Foundation

Every day, I get a number of Google alerts on various issues. Most of them have articles with headlines like, “GOP goes after poor people,” “Republicans’ War on Women,” or my current favorite, Deadly Tornadoes Reveal The Failure Of Today’s Perverse GOP Ideology.

This is when I want to stomp my foot and shake the shoulders of every person who considers himself or herself to be a Democrat or liberal. Quite simply, WE WON’T HAVE A COUNTRY TO CARE ABOUT IF WE DON’T RESOLVE THIS FISCAL CRISIS AND DO SOMETHING ABOUT ENTITLEMENT SPENDING.

Can I make myself any clearer?

Do I want to help people? Absolutely. I’ve done far more than most of the bleeding heart liberals to help the unfortunate, and perhaps that’s the problem. Well meaning liberals don’t understand that change must come from the individual, and that families and communities need to be the social welfare net rather than the federal government.

However, if you don’t volunteer or make personal charitable donations, you’ll never get that. You’ll never see how massive, one-size-fits all programs can’t address widespread issues like urban vs. rural poverty and hunger.

Instead, you expect the federal government to keep taxes higher and make those decisions for you rather than pull out your debit card or write a check.

It’s time to end this “GOP doesn’t care” nonsense and admit that we’re enter (or have already entered) one of the biggest financial crises in history. We need to cut these programs and reign in spending if we’re going to survive this.

Until the Drudge Report picked up this story on Thursday, only a few conservative blogs even noticed.

The entire conversation was recorded and transcribed. According to Miller’s comments on the Washington Times website:

I saw the congressman walk out the the glass doors that lead off the House floor to the Speaker’s Lobby, an area reserved only for the media to interview Members as they go to and from votes.  As he walked into the hallway, I quickly turned to approach him. To my shock, he stopped directly in front of me and offered to answer questions. He stood a mere six inches away from me while he rebutted our questions, while bizarrely making repeated penis jokes.

Miller tweeted her shock that a standing member of Congress, a married man who is already facing a scandal for potentially sexually inappropriate behavior, was making lewd jokes directed at her. Per the transcript:

Weiner: We don’t know where the photograph came from. We don’t know for sure what’s on it. We don’t know for sure if it was manipulated. If it was taken out of one place and dropped something else. And I’m going to let this firm get to the bottom of all that. Jon Stewart might have actually been right last night.

Miller: Are there pictures out there of you have undressed? Do you have pictures that exist?

Weiner: You know this is part of the problem with the way in which this has progressed and one of the reasons that I was,  perhaps — you’ll forgive me — a little bit stiff yesterday…. [laughter as Weiner smirks at a male reporter]

Reporter: We’ve used the word firm, we’ve used the word…

Weiner: Can I ask, is there a weiner joke that hasn’t been used in this context?

Miller: You’re making them all, though…

Weiner: I’m making them all?

Miller: You’re making all those….

Weiner: I would refer you to any of the coverage of this case, the jokes kind of write themselves.

Is that an appropriate way to respond to reporter asking legitimate questions about a news story? Perhaps I’m old fashioned, but should a member of Congress be making lewd jokes in public at all?

Why has no one (meaning liberal women) called Weiner out for his response to Miller? Under what circumstances is it appropriate to respond to a professional woman in that way? How is this not harassment?

In fact, the only mention in the ladyblog world is Jessica Grose at Double X pulling the out the feminists’ card from the 90s in reacting to Bill Clinton:

Why didn’t this salacious, potentially career-destroying story generate the same insta-circus as “Craigslist Congressman” Chris Lee’s beefcake photos or any one of the many GOP sex scandals over the last several years? It’s due in part to the journalistic torpor of the long holiday weekend, but—let’s be honest—it’s also because he’s an outspoken liberal. And that’s not a bad thing.

Excuse me? A sitting member of Congress made wildly inappropriate comments to a reporter, which were recorded in front of other press members, and a blog that supposedly covers “women’s issues,” including sexual harassment, doesn’t think this is a big deal?

However, Weiner’s comments got worse:

Weiner: We don’t know that it’s a police matter. I got spam yesterday….

Reporter: How can it not be?

Weiner: How can it not be? Very easily. Every day all of us get spam. Every day all of us have people responding to us, ‘“ can’t believe you’re sending me this.”

Reporter: You’re a Member of Congress

Weiner: I’m a Member of Congress. I’m also a citizen. There’s nothing official about someone sending… by the way….

Miller: You’re standing in the Speaker’s Lobby, having 40, 75 reporters around you. If this is an issue of the Capitol Police, if this is….

Weiner: Why?

Miller: Because you’re a Member of Congress standing in this Capitol…

Weiner: But a Member of Congress doesn’t mean when someone sends a piece of spam to my account, doesn’t make it a federal offense

Miller: But this whole issue could go away….

Weiner: I am trying to find out, and I think I have taken steps to do so. If you’ll forgive me, I know we’re now in the weeds of a particular issue. If you can take a step back– not literally– you can step as close as you like.

The comment from Weiner sounds like a horrible pick up line that a drunk guy would use at a bar. Weiner has been in Congress since 1999 and represents a part of New York City. He knows how to interact with the media.

Why has no one picked up on this? While the bruhaha over whether his Twitter account was hacked or if he got caught sending sexually explicit pictures is newsworthy, to me this is a worst offense. The fact that Weiner was willing to make these kinds of comments towards a woman in public in front of recorders and cameras makes him look that more culpable in the original scandal.

And his excuse that he’s just making jokes about his last name doesn’t carry water. I understand name jokes. When you are named “Adrienne,” you face a lifetime of Rocky jokes. After a certain point — generally junior high — you become desensitized to it. Even in times of high stress or anger, reiterating jokes about your name is the absolute last place that you go.

As Weiner digs a deeper and deeper hole for himself by not answering basic questions or asking the FBI to investigate the alleged hacking of U.S. Congressman (security risks, anyone?), reporters are digging in his past and pulling out some not very savory things.

In the DC world, there’s a post-9/11 Vanity Fair article that has become legendary about the partying habits of Hill Staffers and interns. It’s used as an example for interns on how not to act. Guess who’s in the article? The New Republic’s Jonathan Chait dug it up:

The next day, New York’s Anthony Weiner finds the time to hunt down Diana’s E-mail address. He writes that he hopes they might meet again. Diana is overwhelmed that he’s managed to think of her on a day that must be heavy with import and emotional intensity. Last night he mentioned that he’d be going to Manhattan to inspect the World Trade Center wreckage with the president. They’d be traveling together on Air Force One.

…

She has left Anthony Weiner dangling, after he E-mailed her that she should come and visit his office “in person.” “I thought that was kind of cheesy,” sniffs Diana.

At the very best, this man appears to act like a frat boy around women and has a long documented history in DC of this behavior. However, it’s ok to let “boys be boys” when that person in question is a good liberal.

Image: Emily Miller