Mark Sanford--A Profile in Courage?

photo by VEB Zardoz, the gravyboat / flickr

South Carolina does not have a moratorium on weird politicians. I used to think maybe the South provided Washington with more than its share of politicians that turned our faces red. But no--it seems that all over the country we have politicians running for yet another term in the House or the Senate whose morals are,  to say the least, shabby.

A classic example is South Carolina's Congressional representative, Mark Sanford. When Governor of our state he claimed to be on the Appalachian trail hiking while he was in Argentina with his girlfriend. After being caught he announced before God and everybody in a televised interview that "he had found his soul mate." I wondered when I heard that what his wife and his children thought.

 After this debacle he was elected to the House as our state representative in Washington. Well, he's running unopposed this time around. And just today word has come to his girlfriend-fiance from Argentina and the rest of us on Facebook, of all things, that "for the sake of his children" he is giving up his soul-mate and the marriage is off. It took 2,346 words on Facebook to explain his trials and tribulations and courageous decision to everyone. Remember TMI--too much information--well, Mr. Sanford has not learned this,

With all hell breaking loose in Washington and the world--Congressman Sanford seems to think none of this matters. It is all about him. Whatever happened to public servants? I've often said of all of us with sins and foibles--"God writes straight lines with crooked sticks." Well--some sticks are so crooked writing might just be illegible--even for God.

cartoon by Keith Tucker, whatOnowOcartoons / flickr

(You might want to read Gayle Collins' Op Ed piece in today's New York Times, "Sex is the Least Of It.")

                                       --RogerLovette / rogerlovette.blogspot.com