Political Fallout From Sanford's Affair

(CBS)  The Atlantic's Marc Ambinder, CBS News' chief political consultant, examines the impact of South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford's announcement on Wednesday that he had an affair while he was missing for a week in Argentina.

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Will Sanford's admission change politics?

Yes it will:

1. He's the latest in a line of potential GOP presidential candidates to fall victim to his personal appetites. This means that the GOP primary electorate is more likely to choose a nominee with stellar, unimpeachable family-values, socially conservative credentials, which means that anyone who evinces moderation hasn't got a shot. Remember: Rudy Giuliani lost the presidential race because news reminded voters about his previous indiscretions.

2. Gov. Haley Barbour, as the new RGA chair, is the most powerful Republican in politics today, second only, I think, to Mitt Romney. Barbour has always craved a return to the respectable power circles in Washington. The race just lost a real Southerner, ceding to Barbour the GOP's juiciest territory. Watch for Barbour to be more aggressive about his national ambitions. (I'm not saying he WILL run for president, just that he wants to.)

3. The GOP loses one of its most articulate anti-spending, anti-deficit spokespersons. Sanford's machinations may not have been popular, but he articulated a view of the world that many conservatives share. He was to many the face of opposition to President Obama's increasingly unpopular stimulus bill.

4. The topsy-turvy world of South Carolina Republican politics is now even more chaotic, if you can believe that. This may give Democrats a chance to move in that state.

5. The media will have more license to investigate rumors of personal indiscretions, and politicians will be more defensive. A few years ago, the media would ignore the rumors, owing to a post-Clinton detente/public wariness about the private lives of politicians. Not anymore.

6. This may be a tipping point: a few examples of conservative moralists who cheat on their wives (Vitter, Ensign) can be, perhaps, accepted as evidence that human beings are normal. But at some point, the liberal talking point about GOP hypocrisy starts to have the ring of truth, even though plenty of Democrats have been implicated in affairs of their own. Moralizers in politics don't have the clout they once did, and Sanford joins the list of politicians who are responsible. The usual "blame the culture of New York and Washington" line, which was used to explain the indiscretions of the two most recent New York Democratic governors and of Senators Ensign and Vitter, don't apply to Sanford. He was as South Carolinian as all get out.

7. The GOP will find itself distracted at a time when the party needs to be disciplined on health care and energy. Every GOP officeholder will be forced to spend valuable time explaining why their party stands for family values.

No, it won't:

1. As one correspondent put it to me, the GOP is at a market bottom already. The public's image of the party can't really go down much further.

2. Most Americans probably didn't know who Sanford was before today, so it'll hard to attribute any massive change in politics to his sudden emergence.

3. Sanford was never a viable 2012 candidate because of his eccentricity; to put him in the same category as a Mitt Romney or a Sarah Palin misjudges the impact he would have had.

4. What policy will change because of this? It's a fantasy to think that voters will get the joke about how gay people keep ruining straight politician's lives.

5. Enough already. Wars, economic crises, major reform of health care and fiscal policy, Jon and Kate, the Iranian revolution: our collective bandwidth may be at capacity.

6. Logically, Mark Sanford's affair tells us nothing about the rightness or wrongness of policy (although it does hurt the way one particular brand is sold.)

What I really think:

Once again, Americans have another reason to throw their hands up and say, "There's another politician who couldn't keep it in his pants, and who abused the public trust." Confidence in political institutions is as low as it was after Watergate, and the less confidence the public has in politicians, the less competitive elections will be; fewer good people decide to run for office, and the cycle perpetuates.

Read More: Sanford Admits Affair

Steve Chaggaris: GOP Rising Stars Falling To Earth

Photo Essay: Political Sex Scandals

[licht1]

Oh great. First the Republicans ruin the US economy, now they're even outsourcing adultery.

See:

http://notionscapital.wordpress.com/2009/06/24/gop-governor-outsources-adultery/

[polisigh]

I have seen Gov. Sanford interviewed on CBS News, MSNBC, CNN, FOX, and he has probably been on other outlets explaining his refusal of stimulus money. His political views were dismissed by the court, his emotional state is shaky. He is not a viable representative of the state for which he is governor.

[nanc12]

The repubs posting just don't seem to get the irony and hypocrisy involved in this story. repubs claim the moral high ground, being the party of family values, the moral majority, the Christian conservatives. They rail against gay marriage, birth control, preach abstinence, all the while doing everything they're supposedly too good to do. When they are found out, it's doubly embarrassing.

Especially when this moron, when voting to impeach Clinton, said that he was voting to impeach because Clinton broke an important vow - the vow to his wife. You can't make stuff like this up.

Saying all that, it is overkill to have about 6 or 7 stories about this on the main political page. It's not life or death, here, people.

[speakinup22]

"(Self serving "confessions do not count as apologies.) I'll cheer the day weak men like Sanford cede the political stage to strong men like Barack Obama. yoyo


Oh Pa-leeze !

Spare me the liberal, self-serving rant will you. Yup - this guy did the wrong thing. And, he is ashamed. But, the BIG difference is he came right out and ADMITTED to it.

He didn't claim "I did not have sex with that woman, Monica Lewinsky."

Should ALL politicians be moral and upstanding characters, YES !

BUT - I believe YOU should face facts about your own party before casting indignation that is party related.

And as for Obama's "squeeky clean" character as you'd like us to believe, think about the Bill Ayers start to Barry's world, wonder about how Barry didn't know about the character of his own minister after 20 years, and few other small details about barry; AND THEN tell me how honest the man is, and self-serving he's not.

[antoniof123]

But at some point, the liberal talking point about GOP hypocrisy starts to have the ring of truth, even though plenty of Democrats have been implicated in affairs of their own.

First of all hypocrisy has already been reach and all the damage control can not hide it. The next statement about Democrats is true but the difference is they do not take the moral high ground and say the are morally superior to the rest of us.

That is hypocrisy if you don't understand it and to call for the President to resign well why and then did he follow like Vitter and Ensign and the rest of the gang did they resign. NO they did not that once again is hypocrisy.

Now wing nuts do you get it.

[ponygal]

He chose sex over being with his kids on Father's day! He just dropped everything, his family, his job, his duties for sex. If I did that, I wouldn't have a job or a family when I got back.

[endurorob]

5 of the top political headlines on CBSNEWS.com are about this guy. Do wew really need 5 reporters from the same agency covering this J.a.c.k.a.s.s?

[cydygitt1]

Just more absolute proof that the republican't party of NO NEW IDEAS or SOLUTIONS, has taken hyprocisy to new limits, preaching morals and family values, yet showing they have neither!

[cbsantispin]

Republicans are snake bit and need no opposition since Republicans continue to do a superb job self destructing. At this rate Republicans are guaranteed to be out of power for a long time to come and can't gain any traction against Democrats because of political blunders like this current scandal. Democrats can sit back and enjoy the show, as in, when your opponents are making mistakes, don't interrupt them!

[ponygal]

Geez, wasn't there several Democrats who let sex get in the way, Humm, Kennedy, Clinton... it's not about which party they belong to, neither is perfect. Feel for his family not for your political party.

[chitown639]

It's always nice to see these politicans that piously preach morality and good family values be exposed as the hypocritics they are.

[anthempolitico]

I am tired of the hypocrisy of the GOP party. They want to preach morals to the rest of us, but it seems their politicians have none. Sanford needs to resign, just like he called for President Clinton's resignation in 1999.