Panto's Weiner Defense: "I Was Hacked!"

Last week, I outed Easton Mayor Sal Panto for using two sock puppets - roverfan73 and tom18017 - to post comments online at LehighValleyLive. This is in addition to comments he was already posting under his own name. In fact, that's what caused the problem. He'd start a conversation using his own name, and then would finish using one of his alter egos, but thinking that he was still posting as the Mayor. This happened with each of the phony names he was using. He now has an explanation for what happened. He was hacked. Apparently, some evil person - possibly me - broke into both of his accounts and impersonated him. This is the same defense Anthony Weiner had when he was first caught sending pictures of his peeper to a woman. Then another woman came forward. His explanation compounds dishonest behavior with more of the same.

Before I published my story, I gave Panto a chance to tell me about it, but he never responded. Later that week, Dennis Lieb asked Mayor Panto to explain himself during a City Council meeting. Panto refused.

But on Sunday, Panto was among his frenemies at a meeting of Democrats that was strangely held at the very exclusive and very Republican Pomfret Club While there, he told his audience that he had been hacked and that it wasn't really him saying all those nasty things about his supposed friends.He advised everyone to make sure they have really good passwords or it could happen to them, too.

Of course, nobody actually believed him. Panto's explanation is actually an admission that he set up these false accounts. Essentially, he admitted to dishonest behavior.

It gets better. Someone who is more technologically savvy than he - and that would apparently include everyone in the room - eventually pointed out that Panto had just admitted to dishonest behavior.

Don't worry. He had an explanation for that, too. He claimed the accounts were only set up in anticipation of last year's election. So it's OK to be dishonest as long as you are doing it for political reasons.

But guess what? That explanation is bullshit, too. Comments under the name tom18017 extend as far back as July 2014, six months before the election year started. Also, given Panto's fascination with every comment on LehighValleyLive, he surely would have seen the comments under his two pseudonyms. If someone really had hacked two different false names that he set up, Panto had ample opportunity to notice and do something about it.

Also, if these accounts were hacked and not really him, wouldn't the comments continue? There have been no comments under either of his false names since I outed him.

Mark Twain once said, "If you tell the truth you don't have to remember anything." Panto was caught posting under two pseudonyms.Rather than just fess up, he has compounded that simple lie with more lies.

If he wants to give advice to other Democrats, he might offer a word or two on the importance of honesty. But he seems to be inexperienced in that field, as are most politicians.