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Margo Howard | 07/01/2009 8:25 am

Whatever Happened to Discretion?

Margo Howard unleashes on disgraced governor Mark Sanford — and goes into ‘Dear Margo’ mode to provide the South Carolina politician with some advice.
Margo Howard

Editor’s Note: A longtime journalist, Margo Howard went into the family business (her mother was the fabled Ann Landers) in the 1990s as Dear Prudence. Her broad experience and understanding of human nature provide answers for the troubled — and entertainment for everyone else. Margo’s advice column, Dear Margo, appears twice a week — on Thursdays and Fridays — on wowOwow.com.

What’s up with Gov. Mark Sanford? I cannot remember another public confession so loaded with detail. It’s as though he were a "sinner" looking for forgiveness, and we are Oprah. Sanford is making John Edwards’s stonewalling look positively admirable. (You know … it was only one night and the baby isn’t his.)

I heard a reporter from South Carolina saying on NPR that the governor apparently “wanted to talk." I’ll say. We learned the Argentinean bombshell was his "soul mate," that he "had crossed the line before" — but "not the sex line" — on trips out of  the country to unwind with the boys. He went public with this tidbit: "This was a whole lot more than a simple affair. This was a love story."

However … let’s hear it for the little woman. Three cheers for Jenny Sanford who threw him out. How refreshing to see a political wife act like a woman instead of some humiliated helpmate who is often trying to save a political career. No Silda or Hillary she, in effect saying to the public: "If I don’t care, why should you?"

I am trying really hard not to entertain feelings of schadenfreude about love-struck dude being yet another one in a long conga line of Republican moralists who are caught with, well, their pants down. I am frankly embarrassed for the guy. How much more dignified to have sought out a therapist if he had the need to spill? In one of his confessionals he said he had blown up his career, his marriage and the lives of his children. So: what next? Putting on my advice columnist hat I would recommend that he move to Argentina to be with Chapur and become a gaucho, or something. And also that he sit down and shut up.

513 Reader Comments (so far…) Sign In or Register to comment

deber B

Actually, nothing pains me greatly.   I want what is fair and accurate.

By deber B on 07/01/2009 7:55 pm
deber B
Perhaps Clinton’s daliances embarrass you?  
By deber B on 07/01/2009 7:56 pm
MK P

The only people who even gave Clinton’s "daliances" a second thought were the Republicans who just couldn’t handle the fact Clinton was a great president — GWB’s daliances cost over 4000 American lives and over $800 Billion…………

By MK P on 07/02/2009 8:02 am
Marjorie C.

Maggie:  being right is what floats your boat. 

This personal attack is off subject.

No one is out muscled here because there is no argument being made.  Everyone has agreed that Mark Sanford has made bad choices, but the Dems are trying to make hay out of it.  Bad choices is not enough, he has to be a hypocrite, too.  Okay, Sanford is a hypocrite who makes bad choices.  Still not good enough.  The Dems have to suggest that all Republicans are hypocrites.  When Republicans say, Whoa !!  Dems cry foul.

This entire thread has been nothing but foolish mud slinging.  And lets face it, the Dems have built plenty of muscle doing that. 

By Marjorie C. on 07/02/2009 6:14 am
MK P

And, Marjorie — what party liked to call themselves the "Moral Majority" — ah, yes, it was the Republicans.  But, it seems they are no more "moral" now than they are the "majority".    Now they seem more like the hypocritical minority.

By MK P on 07/02/2009 1:57 pm
deber B

"I am trying really hard not to entertain feelings of schadenfreude about love-struck dude being yet another one in a long conga line of Republican moralists who are caught with, well, their pants down."

Try that one.

By deber B on 07/02/2009 6:51 am
Marjorie C.

deber:   …feelings of schadenfreude

The Dems are so gleeful about this scandal, that they can barely contain themselves.  They dance around the fire of Family Values as if as if they’re possessed.  Throw on more logs, whip the demon called Family Values.  Of course, Obama’s wife and daughters posing for photo ops in the fake backyard vegetable garden is not about family values…  oh, no.  The Dems are way above projecting family values…  my, my, my.          

"…congo line of Republican moralists" is a cheap shot, but what else could be expected.       

By Marjorie C. on 07/02/2009 8:08 am
Libra Lady
Marjorie…exactly…remember the photo ops of the kennedy’s all playing football…what family fun!!! RIGHT!!!  Oh, and john and Jackie on the sailboat…such a romantic couple….yeah…RIGHT!!!!  and now obama’s doing the same….maybe because vera b has left the country….do ya suppose????
By Libra Lady on 07/02/2009 9:20 am
Irish Eyes NY

Excuse you maggie, BUT: HERE ARE MARGO’S REMARKS, "……….yet another one in a long conga line of Republican moralists…………………." Is that what you were raking Deber over the coals about?????

So it looks to me that YOU immediately jumped in.

By Irish Eyes NY on 07/02/2009 8:27 pm
Maggie W

Hey there, Irish.  No need to get in such a snit over the truth.  There is a long conga line of Republican moralists!!!   LOL !

By the way, you may want to ease up on that caps key.  Yelling isn’t nice.. or maybe you didn’t know.

By Maggie W on 07/03/2009 8:23 am
Rita@ Goldivas
deber, you are correct in saying that infidelity spares no party. But the difference is that Republicans tend to moralize, and seem to want to dictate private behavior in a way that Democrats don’t.
By Rita@ Goldivas on 07/03/2009 9:53 am
R.J.B. Reed
Certainly both parties contain people who commit infidelity.  But only one party tries to shove "traditional" family values down our throats.  People don’t like hypocrites, especially hypocrites that tell them what to do.  That’s why the percentage of people in the Republican party is at an all time low.
By R.J.B. Reed on 07/01/2009 10:09 pm
Marjorie C.

R.J.B.the percentage of people in the Republican party is at an all time low.

Worry not, the Independents are taking up the slack.  We are a third of the voting block and we vote for whoever makes more sense.  At this time, it would tend to be the Republicans.  Inflation and high taxes are not my idea of fun, I’ll take Family Values and hypocrites any day.

By Marjorie C. on 07/02/2009 8:13 am
Lady Gator

RJB Reed - Do you not have "traditional family values?  What are the values of the "other party" in regard to their families?  I disagree with you there are many people I know who are both Democrats and, yes, liberals who also happen to believe in "traditional strong family values". 

I don’t like hypocrites either - and being an Independent - I see as much hypocrisy espoused from the Democrats as I do the Republicans.  This article is slanted at best.  The question should be - "Why do politicians cheat? — If that had been the question then perhaps we could all have a decent discussion about why, not just politicians but "ordinary" Joes, men feel the need to find another "conquest".  Is it the thrill of the chase?  Are their lives so boring that they feel they have to run around with a hard on for the first attractive woman? (other than their wife). 

As far as "shoving" anything down anyone’s throat - I’d say that Clinton did the best job of that sitting on my couch in my White House.  Oh, by the way - I voted for Clinton!

By Lady Gator on 07/02/2009 2:04 pm
R.J.B. Reed

No, I do not have traditional family values.  I am a bisexual women in an open marriage to a wonderful straight man.  We’ve been together for seven years (married for five) and it works very well.  But it is not traditional.

Polticians cheat for the same reason anyone cheats.  Because they can and because they want to.  As I said, I don’t really care at all, except when the politicians lobby to pass legislation that says that I can’t adopt a child because of my sexual orientation.  Now, I don’t expect sexual fidelty, but I find it absolutely insulting to be told that I should follow these rules by people who don’t.

No, the Democrats are not perfect.  (And I vote Libertarian ~90% of the time during an election.)  But, they don’t run on a family values platform.  If individuals Democrats start doing so, and then sleeping around, I’ll call them hypocrites.  But, when it comes to sex, thus far it seems the Republicans take the hypocrite cake…..

Clinton sat on your couch and shoved something down your throat?  Kinky.

By R.J.B. Reed on 07/02/2009 2:17 pm