Bill Clinton v Mark Sanford

This week South Carolina's legislature censured governor Mark Sanford, falling short of calling for his impeachment or resignation. Sanford remains estranged from his wife and family after he went hiking on the Appalachian trail. Let's compare this case to Bill Clinton's affair back in the 1990's. Both men cheated on their wives, and both men committed the lying that seems to be par for the course with these sorts of affairs. As far as government is concerned, Sanford committed the greater sin when he was absent and unaccounted-for for five days as he sparked with his Argentine lover, and he also cost the taxpayers money when he extended a South American trade mission to Argentina, apparently only for the purpose of sparking.

On the sex and emotional side of things, Clinton seems to once again come out ahead (har, har). His escapades with Monica Lewinsky consisted of little more than a BJ and some cigar play, whereas Sanford had a five-day sex vacation and publicly declared his love for this woman. So what accounts for the difference? I doubt that we can credit changing societal views. Americans seem to have little more tolerance for these sorts of things than they did in the '90s. There may be a little bit of scandal fatigue: so many Republicans have imploded so dramatically lately that it's hard to focus the ire on any one thing.

We can speculate that Sanford's Family connections helped by pulling some strings for him in the S. Carolina legislature, which my also partially account for the differences. But I think the problem is more fundamental: conservatives have no innate sense of hypocrisy. Some people have suggested that Republicans get harsher treatment when they cross moral lines because of the apparent hypocrisy, but I think that the opposite is true. Conservatives would rather see someone advocate for 'family values' but fall short than see someone who fails to push their version of morality come to power.

Romans 3:23 says that "all have sinned an fallen short of the glory of God." One of the tenets of Pauline Protestantism is that mankind is inherently sinful and therefore requires divine intervention in order to be saved. Therefore politicians who fall as Mark Sanford has haven't done anything unexpected or even particularly wrong. The blame shifts to Satan and to Eve the original sinner.

In order to break this cycle, it will never work to compare the wrongs of Republicans and Democrats. No matter how many more tallies end up on the Republican side, the Democrats will still be seen by the fundamentalist base as Satan's representatives on earth. I propose we hit back at a more basic level. When a politician starts invoking the name of Jesus, when he says "we are called by God to serve as examples to others" or something along those lines, we should vote him out of office. We don't need to see headlines about his missteps to know right away at that point that he is a hypocritical bastard.