No Tears For Mark Sanford

It's not you he speaking to-this is salvage his political future with his party time.

Michael,
tell me. Why do journos feel compelled to attended these pressers and report on this kind of stuff? I think Sanford is milking the initial reaction to his confession for all it's worth. Remember, initially his confession and apology got excellent reviews from journos. They (you, Klein among'em) gave him all kinds of praise and sympathy Why do they continue to report on this stuff religiously, as if it had some kind of importance. I don't get it.
.

Every other cheap trick a GOP politician tries on you guys works, I'm surprised you aren't buying it. I bet Kurtz takes the bait.

Well, Ondaatje wrote that "the heart is an organ of fire." And the heart, love, moral failing, hubris, this is all excellent material for novelists to consider, but as I just wrote on JNS' Edwards' sex thread:
~
"Just to go on the record: I care no more about Edwards' sex life than Sanford's. The fact that a "congressional correspondent" for Time mag, a product of Tufts and Col SOJ, felt compelled to post on this.... When time folds (not if) I'm sure the E Network or Nat. Enq. will pick up some of you."
~
Insert your own title, schools and the comment stands up pretty well.
~
I found a piece on you at your alma mater's site the other day. In it you mention a "white-collar fantasy" in relation to the West Wing. "The premise of West Wing is that you can work incredibly hard at something that matters, and that it's not just about making money, and that it can be fulfilling. I've always wanted a job like that, and I guess I've got it now."
~
So, I ask of you, MS, does this matter? If he's not so special as you say, why the onslaught of words from you and yours over the last couple weeks? Isn't it an inherent contradiction of the lack of substance/meaning to be found in someone's sex life, at least as it intersects with your own vocation, covering politics? If what he's been saying makes him look smaller and less significant, what does your reporting reflect about you? Honestly, square all this for us.

Well said, Michael. I feel like the claims of the heart are sometimes given short shrift, both by traditional values types and by a hook-up culture that seems not to believe in love. But Sanford lost me with the bit about David and Bathsheba. He can go away now, please.

"He is not so special."
.
Don't be so hasty. Full-blown Narcissism is actually fairly uncommon (though not as much as some might think). But it is probably highly concentrated where you work, so you can be forgiven for seeing it as pretty normal.

Honestly, what kind of man brings his "spiritual advisor" with him to break it off with his mistress. He needs someone to hold his hand and go to dinner with him and his girlfriend so he can break it off with her? Good grief, Charlie Brown.
.
He either loves his wife or he loves the wonderful and exotic Maria. He needs to pick one and get on with it.
.
Maybe the real problem is that he really only loves himself.
.
In any case it seems pretty clear that he isn't fit to run a lemonade stand right now, much less being the head of a State or the head of a Family.

shepherdwong -- I logged in just to say, Well done. Couldn't have said it better myself.

"...all of it makes him look smaller and less significant."
.
Hardy seems possible.
.
Imagine if political reporters focused on the implications of political decisions by politicians on their constituents with equal focus. I rather thought Sanford's considerable efforts to deny his state desperately needed stimulus funds in order to advance his standing with "right thinking" people in preparation for a future presidential run told us all we needed to know about him.
.
And presaged this titillating event that led MS to say "the more I watch Mark Sanford, the more I think he is conflating love with self-absorption."
.
Well, duh!

BTW, let's be clear. Sanford, like all Republicans, is small and insignificant. His actions regarding the stimulus revealed a person lacking in either the intellectual depth to understand macro-economics, or basic compassion for the people of his state. Probably both.
.
His actions with his personal life reveal a person with absolutely no emotional or intellectual grounding. When someone is as self-absorbed as Sanford, so capable of using others to fulfill his emotional needs or to achieve a goal, then we usually refer to them as sociopaths.
.
One need not be capable of killing others to be a sociopath. The real definition of a sociopath is being capable of using others.

Sanford is not done confessing. There is much more to come (no pun intended.)
.
"I am on principle a defender of romantic love."
.
Seriously Michael? Sanford is in romantic love alright he is in love with every lady he wants to screw. I'm not sure why you guys in gals in the media even attempted to pass on this BS about him being just a romantic and that somehow makes what he did okay without knowing the full story. And this part of the story is pure BS. With more to come.

Let me be more clear Michael. Sanford is a proven whore and if he was a woman you people would not be buying a word coming out her mouth and you wouldn't have even thought up the romantic love line.

Okay, he's not that special, I agree.

And yet on this day and over the time of the Sanford scandal there have been thousands of truly tragic, or truly touching or truly meaningful stories of romantic love, betrayal, want, desire and lust, and yet the media only chooses to report on his story.

So... either he actually is special or you guys should force him into the lot of most people who have a sad romance story -- let 'em tell it to a bartender.

Michael Scherer:
.
I don't care about his private pain.
.
Then why give this person a nanosecond of your time?
.
I get a distinct sense that he really wants me to care, that he wants us all to care, as if his pain might somehow be...something worthy of forgiveness.
.
So don't. Don't care. Don't make us feel the need to discuss whether we care or not, by writing about this person --a person who is not in any real sense affecting the course of the nation, or who makes a difference in the lives of tens of millions of Americans living outside of his medium-small state.
.
Why are you writing about this, Michael Scherer? What compels you?
.
Why lower yourself as a writer; why expend your prose on the truly banal in politics?
.
Why aren't you better than this?

I am on principle a defender of the right to run down Main Street at high noon in one's tightie whities, but we legitimately expect rather more restraint from our elected leaders. Those leaders who preach "family values" as a means to gain and retain personal power bring even higher constraints upon themselves. I'd say those constraints should preclude this sort of self-analysis without end (and MSM coverage of it) but if the fool wants to keep rolling out evidence of his Inner Spaceman, let it roll.

"Sanford is a proven whore"
.
Weird- my sister stopped by to toast Franken and she used that exact word to describe Sanford.

Better title: No More Words For Mark Sanford.

"Weird- my sister stopped by to toast Franken and she used that exact word to describe Sanford."
.
Wise woman.

My apologies for this intrusion.
~
JC
I just posed a question for you in "How Diplomacy Works." When you have time would you take a look and let me know what you think? Thanks.

I can see a book coming out of this:

The Loneliness of the Long-distance Governor.

Or perhaps:

Somebody Writes to the Governor...

(if you want a more Latin American theme..... (h/t Garcia Marquez))

'I am on principle a defender of romantic love...'
.
Sanford's latest admission is that he was cheating on his mistress at the same time that he was cheating on his wife. He says he 'crossed the line' with other women. He's beginning to sound less like someone obsessed with romantic love and more like someone who just wanted to get laid when the chance presented itself.
.
Given the judgmental statements he made about Clinton, maybe he should be reading the biblical passages about hypocrites rather than those about David.
.
I'm curious whether he is going to get away with reimbursing the state for the travel expenses he took to pursue his philandering. Normally, giving back the money doesn't get a bank robber off the hook. Why should a governor's misappropriation of tax money be any different?

Pretty good turn of phrase, and something I agree with..thanks Michael!

Sanford's pain elicits a very low Boo-Hoo score. He may have a pain in his heart, but he is proving that he is mostly a pain in the ass. He disgraced his family. He disgraced his state. He cheated on the tax-payers dime. He's damaged the remnants of the republican party (OK, that's in his favor). What does he expect from us? A Hallmark card? His handlers need to sit his cheating ass down and tell him that every new revelation is just doing more damage.
.
Whatever details remain should be vomitted up all at once. Putting out this stuff piecemeal isn't going to accomplishment anything positive unless he plans on writing a tell-all book and going on Oprah to plug it. He needs to stop playing this soap opera out in the media and try to make amends with his sons. I admit that there is a certain satisfaction in seeing a pompous self righteous fool getting reamed out in public, but why isn't he trying to salvage what little he can?

I may be getting old and grouchy, but given that Sanford has now basically confessed to rubbing up against women at dance halls in order to get some thrills, I can't see where romantic love comes into it. Lechery, yes.Adultery, yes. Self-gratification, yes. Romantic love is rarely so generously distributed across the landscape. I feel sorry for Maria Chapur and jenny Sanford. The one person I find no goodwill towards is the sleazy old fraud who used both of them, as well as several other innocent women. As a wise woman once sang: what's love got to do with it?

Why are you writing about this, Michael Scherer? What compels you?
.
MS desperately wants us to care about his artistical sensitivity and his journalistic chops, I suspect.