Mark Sanford: The Stupidity of Republican Politicians Goes Nuclear

Since Dan brought it up in his comment to the previous headlie (without even waiting for the article that went with the headline), I decided to mention the South Carolina Governor today.


I have thought for some time that I do need to throw REPUBLICAN POLITICIANS into the grouping of the generally stupidest people on Earth, along with mainstream "journalists" and men who kill their wives/girlfriends. I generally don't add the Republicans, and men who kill when they KNOW they will be the ONLY supspects, into my mention of stupid groups for two reasons. The main reason is that stupid Republicans, on this level, and men who actually kill their wives, are not THAT numerous (although inexplicably numerous). Pluls, I really can't try to enumerate all INDIVIDUAL stupid people when referring to groups who are almost universally stupid. Repubican politicians are pretty stupid, as a group, but are they really MORE stupdi than leftist Democrats? Politicaly, they may be. But the level of stupidity is just not at that truely extreme level of Mark Sanford.


Now Eliot Spitzer (patornizing hooker while governor of the state) is right up there with the most stupid, there is a reason I refer to REPUBLICAN POLITIICIANS. Bill Clinton got away with it. A number of Democrats have been able to get away with incredible stuff. And that assumes they are CAUGHT. Almost no one is TARGETING Democrats, who are EXPECTED to have low morals. The NEW governor of New York admitted to NUMBEROUS "mistakes", and the Democratic replacement for Mark Foley, in Florida, ALMOST got away with MULTIPLE affairs and misconduct.


The point? Republicans like Mark Sanford KNOW that they cannot get away with this stuff. Yet they keep doing it. Just like men who kill their wives KNOW that the oldds are against them, and yet they keep doing it. Larry Flynt has a BOUNTY on Republican sexual misconduct, after all. John Edwards might get a (somewhat) sympathetic mainstream media "hearing" as to why he was at a hotel with his mistress at 2 in the morning, and why he RAN AWAY from a National Enquirer reporter. Mark Sanford was never going to have a chance (not that even a Democrat would hav had much of a shot with this one, although I would have once thought the same thing about sex with an intern in the Oval Office. I can see President Obama getting away with this kind of thing. Makr Sanford had no chance.


But Repubicans KEEP doing it. Senator John Ensign of Nevada recently admitted to an affair (an affair, by the way, NOT disqualifying a person from being a Senator). There is Senator Vitter from Louisiana. Newt and Livingstone (respective Republican Speakers of the House) had to step down, in quick succession (although I think stepping down for an affair was a MISTAKE). Mark Sanford, of course, has gone beyond a mere affair with behavior so bizarre as to bring into question his mental stability. Is it that Republicans are so staright and narrow that hey CAN'T HANDLE an affair? Maybe.


We KNOW why Republicans get less leewaly. That is entirely thenuclear hypocrisy of the mainstream media, which wannts to turn even the misconduct of a teenage daughter (evil as the mainstream media is) into an "hyocrisy" issue against a Repubican. Is it "hypocristy" to simply not be able to live up to your own princiiples--as distinguished from the intellectual DISHONESTY of David Letterman and the mainstream media? Npe. It MAY be, if those are really not your principles. But people are WEAK. That is the entire basis of the Chirstian religion, and the doctrine of Oringinal Sin. So I reject the idea that Republicans are more "hypocritical" than Democrats to argue for "family values", and yet prove to be humanly weak. However, there is no doubt hey are STUPID, because they know they will be hled to a higher standard than Democrats.


WHY are Democrats held to a lesser standard (aside from the hypocrisy of the mainstream media--how many Dmeocrats say they BELIEVE in adultery)? I think it is a matter of what the mainstream media, and hypocrites on the left, think they can get away with. They think the pubic holds Republicans to a higher standard, while they EXPECT Demcrats to be slezeballs (usually correctly). I think it goes further than that. I think conservatives DO have higher standards than Democrats of the leftist kind, and that the hypocrites on the left try to USE those higher standards against them. In other words, CONSERVATIVE REPUBICANS turn against Republicans who fall from grace (despite the Christian religion), while Democrats DO NOT CARE if their politicians fall from grace. I have said before that I think this is short sighted, and just a little hypocirtical, on the part of holier than thou Republicans who refuse to give any slack for moral weakness.


All of th eabove being said, I agree with Dan. It is hard to imagine anyone MORE stupid than Mark Sanford. As I said, it calls into question his mental stability. I am perfectly willing to "forgive" him an affair. His actual bizarre behavior is beyond belief