… probably really isn’t from me.

I’m hearing that part of the Bad Guys’ whisper campaign is sending emails posing as Kimberlin/Rauhauser critics, and saying outrageous things while posing in those phony disguises. See here and here, for example.

I still remember how, in June 2011, there was a Twitter account called “Andrew Breibart” that looked just like Andrew Breitbart’s account. It went around tweeting nasty things to famous people — and I remember that more than one person got upset at Andrew himself as a result.

It actually occurred to me one night — suggested, as I recall, by Dan Wolfe! — that the supposed threat against Jennifer George by “Lee Stranahan” wasn’t necessarily made up by Jennifer George, as Lee thought at the time. Perhaps someone had posed as Lee Stranahan and had actually threatened Jennifer George. (Whoever that “Jennifer George” was.)

See the common thread? The Bad Guy poses as the good guy, and says something outrageous, thus getting the good guy in trouble. Maybe it’s “AndrewBreibart” posing as “AndrewBreitbart” — or maybe it’s someone who isn’t Lee Stranahan, posing as Lee Stranahan.

I posted that theory, said: “Hi, Neal!” — and got SWATted within a couple of hours.

Someone who wasn’t really Patrick Frey, posing as Patrick Frey.

Weird, huh?

Anyway. Trickery works. People don’t expect every comment left as “Patterico” on a random website to be a trick by a Rauhauser-style scumbag dirty trickster.

But these are the times we live in. If you can’t believe Patterico really wrote that comment, that email, or whatever . . . ask me.

Maybe I didn’t.

Talking about a run for office:

Anthony Weiner’s not shrinking from elected office.

The disgraced former congressman — who’s sitting on a $4.5 million campaign war chest — is mulling a bid for citywide office next year and “seriously considering” a mayoral run, multiple sources told The Post.

The cocky pol is also open to the post of public advocate as a backup plan, said sources, who described the Queens Democrat as “desperate” to get back into politics.

(See what they did there?)

And he’s getting back online on Facebook:

I know this page has been dry for a while . . .

Can Twitter be far behind?

If this gets serious, I have a few questions the press might want to ask Mr. Weiner. Starting with:

• Why did Friends of Weiner pay almost $40,000 in 2011 to “T&M Protective Services” — a company hired by Weiner while he was in “spin mode” regarding whether he was hacked?

• More specifically: why did Friends of Weiner pay $29,832.00 to “T&M Protective Services” on September 1, 2011, and then pay an additional $13,290.00 to the very same firm on December 30, 2011?

• Why did Anthony Weiner use a phrase (“cape and tights shit”) with a high school girl, when he also used that same phrase as a grooming line with an adult woman he talked dirty to online?

• Why did that girl initially tell the press she had received two direct messages from Weiner, but then tell the press she had received five? How many DMs did Anthony Weiner send to this girl? More than five?

That’s for starters.

So says Romney partisan Jennifer Rubin:

Why has the Obama team been publicly wailing about losing out to Mitt Romney in the money race? Why would the president accuse his opponent of not merely being wrong or unqualified but criminal? After all, the polls are tied, so why so much worry in Obamaland?

Like a mystery novel, the answer is in front of our noses: The candidates are still tied in the polls.

Luckily, even a panicking President can still find time for golf.