The fact that Governor Mark Sanford had an affair doesn’t particularly interest me. How he conducts his romantic life has little bearing on how he chooses to govern his state. His record as governor provides ample fodder for criticism, enough to land him on Time‘s “Worst Governors” list a few years ago. But he also presumed to use the bully pulpit of his office to make moral judgments on others. When he served in Congress, he was a vociferous critic of Clinton’s marital infidelity and, more recently, an outspoken opponent of same-sex marriage.
It takes a special kind of douchebaggery to build a political career on one’s staunch defense of “traditional values”, but then make a complete break with those values in one’s private life. It’s not surprising, it’s not interesting, but it’s douchebaggery nonetheless and it seems endemic among conservatives. You would think Republicans would have a clue by now. You would think it might begin to dawn on them that they should stick to their low-taxes, limited-government schtick and tone down the self-righteous scolding. But they aren’t big on self-awareness, which guarantees a steady parade of middle-aged white men coming before the cameras to lay their hypocrisy bare.
