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Paul Ryan and Anthony Weiner Do Not Appreciate Being Confused With One Another

Anthony Weiner, a leading candidate for New York City mayor, answers questions at a press conference on July 23, 2013 in New York City. Weiner addressed news of new allegations that he engaged in lewd online conversations with a woman after he resigned from Congress for similar previous incidents.
Photo: John Moore/Getty Images; Justin Sullivan/Getty Images

Paul Ryan and Anthony Weiner don’t have much in common besides both being 40-something dudes who have both gone by “Congressman” at some point. And yet Ryan recently told a crowd of Michigan Republicans that he has twice been mistaken for the prominent sexter and failed New York mayoral candidate. “I went on this flight a week later. And the flight attendants were looking at me and kind of whispering at each other and pointing,” Ryan recalled. “And then, finally one of them comes up to me and says, ‘You’re somebody famous, aren’t you? Are you Anthony Weiner?’” 

But while the anecdote succeeded in showing off the Wisconsin Representative’s signature faux humility, he might want to stick with the story about the woman who thought he was Governor Scott Walker — we can’t imagine that Ryan wants to remind people that he has his own embarrassing photos floating around online. Weiner, for his part, told Business Insider that learning that someone had confused him with the free-school-lunch-hating Ryan is “the final insult.” Together, these two are an attention-getting machine larger than the sum of their parts.

Ryan Says He’s Been Mistaken for Weiner