Does South Carolina's Mark Sanford deserve to be included in every sex scandal story?

South Carolina
 US Congressman
Mark Sanford

Without fail, TV and radio commentators drag South Carolina Republican Mark Sanford into the conversation on every new political sex scandal.

They boldly declare "America has turned the corner on holding politicians to any standard of personal conduct."

It may make democrats feel better to put him in the mix but is it a fair comparison?

I don't think so.

 

Anthony Weiner showing his support at a NYC
gay parade (June 28,2009) (Photo Credit: Thomas Good / NLN)

We all watched as the Democrat New York congressman Anthony Weiner was forced to resign because he had been saying sexually provocative things to strange women and sending them pictures of his naked body via Twitter and Facebook.

He gets caught, he resigns from congress and goes off to get help with his personal life and we all say good riddance. Yet Anthony rises from the dust to run for Mayor of New York City only for us to find out recently that he he had continued in this deviant behavior. Anthony is a pervert and if New York City elects him mayor they deserve what the get!

San Diego mayor Bob Filner

Then there is San Diego mayor Bob Filner who thinks he can say and do whatever he wants to the women in his professional life. He gets accused of some very serious sexual harassment and sexual battery charges in the workplace but in this case the workplace is the government of San Diego. This can not be handled internally by human resources. Besides, some of the allegations are coming from women who are not city employees.

He cannot just say, "Sorry!" and head off to a retreat for a couple weeks to get his head straight.

He is a major pervert and he needs to resign!                                     

      

President Bill Clinton

America's favorite pervert, Bill Clinton lied under oath to a federal judge. Then stands in front of the whole world declaring he had not had sex with "that" woman, Monica Lewinsky. Eventually we all learned he does not think oral sex "IS" sex.

This was serious sexual misconduct in the workplace. The stories of his sexual escapades are many. The media and democrats have defended this narcissistic chauvinist, sex pervert long enough. 

Our very society changed thanks to this jerk. Anyone notice we have an entire generation that thinks oral sex is no different than shaking hands? Thank you BILL CLINTON, you pervert.

The news media is covering New York City mayoral democrat candidate Anthony Weiner and San Diego mayor democrat Bob Filner non stop. They need a Republican to prove the problem is not just a democrat problem. Balancing out the reporting they include Republican Congressman Mark Sanford every time they get a chance.

They want you to think Mark Sanford, Anthony Wiener, Bob Filner (maybe it should be "Feeln'her") and Bill Clinton are all cut from the same cloth. They are mistaken!

By TheDigitel Beaufort from Beaufort, SC, USA
(Mark Sanford @ Joe Fraizer award)
[CC-BY-2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0)],
via Wikimedia Commons

Now don't you dare take me wrong, I am in no way condoning what Governor Sanford did. I don't think Mark Sanford condones what he did. I would and have declared to the world - Mark Sanford is not good husband material. But seriously, there is a huge difference between the other three men and Mark Sanford.

South Carolina's "LOVE GOV", as he is often referred to, had an affair with one woman. The powers-that-be held him to a higher standard than they hold their own selves. When the news media caught the Governor returning to SC from his get-away trip to Argentina, Sanford did the thing Mark Sanford does, he told the truth. 

Embarrassing every South Carolinian, he told the whole world. Yes, he told the whole world, "She is the love of my life". This led to his divorce from Jenny Sanford and his enemies piling on charges and eventually ethics charges and fines.

Governor Sanford reimbursed the state for all sorts of things that could be called into question and he paid those ethics fines too.

You can easily go to the SC Ethics Commission website at http://ethics.sc.gov/Debtors/Pages/index.aspx and see that paying ethics fines in SC is something most elected politicians just don't do.

You never heard Governor Mark Sanford justify his actions and, again, I don't either. But, I am tired of hearing about South Carolinian's lack of values because we elected Mark Sanford to serve in Congress after this so very public affair.

Let's look at the facts. There are 668,668 folks living in South Carolina District 1 according to the 2010 census. On May 7, 2013, the SC polls opened and 142,974 of those citizens went to cast a vote. They were voting to replace their congressman Tim Scott who had been appointed to be the Junior South Carolina US Senator after Senator Jim DeMint resigned.

These same folks had selected Tim Scott the first black Republican congressman from SC since reconstruction.

To the amazement of the entire country, 54.2% cast their vote for Mark Sanford!

Let's look at how this happened. With a field of 16 candidates to choose from, 53,793 citizens walked into the Republican Primary on March 19, 2013 to choose a republican candidate for congress. Those voters gave Mark Sanford almost 37% of the vote placing him in a run off with a former Charleston county councilman Curtis Bostic who received just over 13% of the vote.

March 19, 2013 Republican Primary - South Carolina's 1st
Congressional District Special Election Results

We need to realize that politics is a  fancy "beauty" contest. In real-life beauty pageants we must choose among the lovely contestants who are standing on the stage.

Maybe this says much more about his competitors than it says about Sanford.

You can easily do an internet search on each one of the competitors names and see for yourself why a voter might choose Sanford over any of them.

April 2, 2013 Republican Primary Runoff - South Carolina's
1st Congressional District Special Election

Two weeks later, Tuesday, April 2, 2013, run off winners Sanford and Bostic move to the next beauty contest called a republican primary run-off. Only 46,171 District 1 republican voters returned to the polls, but they selected Mark Sanford to be their candidate. Mark won that beauty contest with almost 57% of the vote.

On election day, May 7, 2013, the good citizens of South Carolina District 1 were NOT going to choose that outrageously liberal Democrat. Mark Sanford won the election with 54.2% of the vote and I'm betting he will not disappoint the good people of SC.

May 7, 2013 South Carolina House 1st District Special Election

                                  

 From his own campaign video (see above) Mark said, "More recently I have experienced how none of us goes through life without mistakes, but in their wake we can learn a lot about grace, a God of second chances, and be the better for it." It appears he has learned from his mistake but he gives God credit for the grace and the second chances. 

In fact, on the night of his victory, he brought it up again and said, “I stand before you with a whole new appreciation for the God of second chances.”

The other guys mentioned in this article haven't mentioned anything about God and His grace (that I know of).

Did Sanford use the mention of God to appeal to voters? I hope not. That is between him and God. Only his actions from here on out will answer that question.

Now if we find out tomorrow Mark has done something else like he did before or if there were more women that were never mentioned before or something of that nature then his political chances might be used up just like Anthony Weiner's should be.

Sure, Mark could still reconcile with the Lord if something new came out but he would still have to pay the consequences. Since he hasn't been involved in any other sex scandals, it appears he has turned from his sin and on May 7th voters gave him a second chance. He will have to gradually get trust back as he lives his life and serves South Carolina in congress.

Mark Sanford will probably have to weather many more stories about what he did in the same sentence with folks like Weiner, Filner or Clinton. It may be part of the continuing consequences of his sin. He appears to be on the right track even though they did catch him without his (congressional) pants last week. I saw that as dedication to cast his vote. He was willing to be ridiculed so that he could get his vote in for the folks of District 1. I wonder how many congressman didn't vote at all that day. Time will tell if Mark Sanford has learned his lesson.  

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Check the election numbers for your self at the links below: 

http://www.scvotes.org/2013/03/15/u_s_house_of_representatives_district_1_special_election

http://www.charlestoncounty.org/departments/BEVR/C-Election.htm