mark sanford

                                           It is quite difficult to say who is or isn’t running for the Republican Presidential nomination in 2010. I suspect that Mitt Romney is. By all historic measures he is next in line and current levels of activity make it likely that he is running.  I also suspect that Mississippi’s Governor, Haley Barbour is seriously looking at the nomination. John Ensign of Nevada was running. That is until an extramarital affair of his could no longer be hidden and the secret attempts by his mommy and daddy to pay off his mistress all came to light and put an end to that ridiculous notion. 

Some sectors were already campaigning for South Carolina’s Governor Mark Sanford. With “Draft Sanford” web site’s and rampant prognostications, Sanford was riding a wave of public enthusiasm for a run at the Republican nomination. Then he disappeared from sight for more than 5 days, leaving everyone to wonder what happened to Governor Sanford and where in the world is Mark? The answer to that quickly brought down those “Draft Sanford for President” sites. He was in Argentina with his “soul mate”, a pretty young thing he met some years ago and fell  more in love with her than he was with his wife.

But still riding high as potential candidates in 2010 are Mitt Romney, who trailed McCain in the delegate count in 2008, and Sarah Palin, who McCain chose for Vice President.

Such speculation about Romney can be made out of the level and type of activity that he is wading into.

With his political action committee, Free and Strong America PAC, he is actively involved in critical races throughout the nation, including this years gubernatorial races in New Jersey and Virginia and gaining the favor of future elected officials who will be crucial supporters in the future.

He has also become a part of the National Council for a New America, a group of leaders that include Republicans such as former Florida Governor Jeb, Bush, Congressman Eric Cantor and Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal. This group intends to have a serious national discussion about the challenges facing America, small businesses and working families and they are taking the discussion on the road all across the nation.

Additionally, Romney is bringing in the mother’s milk of political campaigning…….money. His fundraising is constant, consistent and high.

So all are indications that in 2012, Romney will be running for the nomination that he was denied by the Republican establishment in 2008.

As for Sarah Palin, she confused pundits with her surprise resignation as Governor of Alaska and confounded the status quo. Opponents of Palin do not take the reasons she gave for resigning at face value. Instead they claim she is a quitter or that she can’t take the heat. What they neglect to realize is that Sarah Palin is not your average politician. They can’t seem to comprehend that Sarah Palin is genuine. She is a real person with personal beliefs and convictions that are not affected by political ambition, opinion polls or inside the beltway political games. They also fail to realize that Sarah Palin does not live for politics or allow  politics to change her life or principles. To the contrary she stands for her life changing politics.

As such, Sarah Palin made it clear that as a national target of liberal antics geared at attacking her, her agenda for Alaska was being hampered by frivolous legal challenges against every breathe she took, word she muttered and garment she wore. Therefore Sarah Palin decided to circumvent these tactics. Confident that her Lieutenant Governor was dedicated to the agenda that she has taken to this point, she took away the target that hampered its further expeditious advancement . Herself.

Now, no longer an available official government target for the hate-based liberal establishment, Sarah Palin is free and what the left does not realize is that freedom is much more powerful than any government office or liberal government program. With the power of freedom now in her hands, Sarah Palin just might be more of a threat to the left than she ever was and as she uses that freedom, she just might take them on by starting a run for the Republican presidential nomination.

Former Vice Presidents and Vice Presidential nominees don’t always have the best shot at being elected President or at getting their parties presidential nomination.

Al Gore got the nomination in 2000 but lost the election. Lieberman was his VP nominee but failed to get the presidential nomination in 2004.

John Edwards got the VP slot in 2004 but failed to get his parties presidential nomination in ’08.

Before them George H.W. Bush and Richard Nixon before him, where the only contemporary Vice President’s to eventually move on and win their parties nomination for President, in their own right, and then the presidency itself.

In 1984 Jimmy Carter’s vice president, Walter Mondale won the Democrat’s nomination in ‘84 but lost and Bush 41’s vice president, Dan Quayle, fell off the radar before the Iowa Caucuses took place during his brief attempt to win the Republican nomination in 2000.

So vice presidents and vice presidential nominees don’t necessarily have the inside track to their party’s nomination for President and as we look toward 2012, Sarah Palin will not be on the fast track for it either. If she seeks the nomination, she will still be the target of liberal hypocrisy and their fear driven propaganda and attacks and she will have to fight hard and truly earn the nomination amidst a field that will have a number of formidable choices. Only now the left will not be able to bog her down with frivolous and unwarranted government ethics charges and lawsuits.

Now that Palin has just officially resigned as Governor, she could easily enjoin that race and begin to lace up her running shoes for a long marathon to the White House.

It is hard to tell though.

Sarah could be so pissed at those who have tried to destroy her and her family and who have tried to impede progress in Alaska, that she is either fed up and leaving politics for a more civil path for the promotion of her beliefs or she may simply be reloading her ideological guns as she prepares to take aim at the liberal philosophy and its purveyors who have run amuck and now control government.

So far, there are no concrete indications that make it clear either way. At least there are no indications of the likes that we see with Mitt Romney.

But there is one little clue that could be telling.

The domain names sarahpalinforpresident.com and sarahpalin2012 have recently been claimed and registered.

Normally that could simply be the doing of some dreamy eyed, entrepreneurial, get rich quick minded person who figures on selling those domains to Sarah Palin for big bucks if she does make it official.

However a closer look reveals that these two domain names were registered by Jay Griffin of Anchorage Alaska. Where he is from is not half as important as the fact that he is a close confidant of Sarah Palin and that, along with Palin, he is a member of the Alaska Republican Party Central Committee.

Could Griffin be hoping to make some money off of his friend Sarah Palin if she does run for President? Or, is he and his new domain names just the start of a long campaign to evict Barack Obama from the White House and to take back America from the Pelosi/Reid liberal mentality that is currently infecting our government in flu-like fashion?

Odds are that an exploratory committee for that possibility are in the works.

Click below for more from

If you'd told my hardline libertarian, militantly atheistic Objectivist self of the past that I'd be ever write a defense of socially conservative political views, I'd probably have called you crazy in between fits of laughter and remarks about how that particular group of people was a roadblock to human evolution. Which goes to show that everyone must sometimes eat crow.

There's been a lot of talk about how Governor Sanford's recent scandal impugns the authority of social conservatives to discuss how terrible infidelity, abortion, homosexuality and post-1960's sexual morality are. The usual suspects have already got in their obligatory sneers, but what's more surprising is how quick various members of this website have jumped on the bandwagon. No accounting for taste, but they're wrong.

As I never tire of reminding people, most of the conflicts on the Right today have happened before. The desire to rid our side of social conservatives is no exception. Frank Meyer actually wrote an essay entitled "A Rebel in Search of Tradition" in which he savaged Russell Kirk for being culturally authoritarian and thus socialist by proxy. Friedrich Hayek leveled the accusation that "conservatism has compromised with socialism and stolen its thunder" at traditionalists. In the end, Meyer's fusionism resolved the dispute, but the tensions remained, to the point that Murray Rothbard and Russell Kirk both tried to write each other out of the movment in the same issue of the same magazine. Kirk accused Rothbard's libertarians of being "chirping sectaries" who could never agree and were Satanic in their opposition to authority, whereas Rothbard wrote that fusionism was really a "libertarian manque" intended to keep those stupid traditionalists quiet. And even though any time social conservatism was dumped, it resulted in disastrous political alienation (see also the rise of the New Right in response to Gerald Ford), and anytime fiscal conservatism was dumped it resulted in political failure and division on the Right (George W. Bush), people still try and write both sides out.

But enough about history. Let's deal with the question at hand - why should the infidelity of Mark Sanford merit the expulsion of social conservatives? Perhaps I'm being willingly obtuse, but I can't remember a single time when any socially conservative Senator, Representative, Governor, President or dog-catcher has suggested that adultery be made illegal. I've also never heard a single Democratic Representative, Senator, Governor or President advocate adultery as a social good - in fact, unlike Sanford, some of them will even put themselves at the risk of impeachment to avoid admitting to it. Hypocrisy? You bet. But if we threw out every political idea that had a high profile hypocrite advocate it at some point, then we'd have nothing left to advocate at all.

The impulse to throw hypocrites out is a healthy one. The impules to throw out everyone but the hypocrites is not - it is a symptom of desperation. Suppose the Republican party followed the advice of all the people who said abandoning social conservatism because of the Mark Sanfords of the world was a good idea. Imagine the message that sends - "Alright, you've got us, husbands can't keep their pants up and we're not going to claim they should." Imagine the fun Robert Gibbs would have with that. Imagine how many voters, both socially conservative and otherwise, we'd never be able to get on our side again.

The mere fact that Sanford's so-called "hypocrisy" is getting so much airtime is the best argument for believing in a politics of morality one could ever want. As Rush Limbaugh pointed out yesterday, "Hypocrisy does two things, both at the same time: Hypocrisy shows -- and you're not going to want to hear this. You're not going to want to agree with me on this.  I know you're not.  But hypocrisy shows that there are moral values in a culture.  Without moral values in a culture, it would not be possible for anybody to be a hypocrite.  The fact that we are calling Sanford a hypocrite is the proof that there are still standards of dignity and morality that apply in our society." Or, to put it even more bluntly, hypocrisy is the one thing which liberals have not been able to turn into a lifestyle choice. 

It's true that social conservatism puts us in a difficult position. You never hear about the pro-choice Democratic "hypocrites" who forbid their daughters from getting abortions. You never hear about the college professors who are rich and still say property is theft. Even when you do, it doesn't do anything. You don't see the Democrats arguing that they should drop opposition to corporate corruption because Chris Dodd got caught. When Bill Clinton cheated on Hillary or when Elliot Spitzer paid to become "Love Client Number Nine", you may notice there was just as much outrage, if not more, than what has accrued in response to Governor Sanford. Whatever we may do on blogs, putting partisan spin on a personal tragedy alienates average people because it looks cynical, heartless and petty. Making partisan spin on a personal tragedy the basis for a massive philosophical shift is politically and philosophically counterproductive because it makes your party look like a collection of gutless wimps who allow the worst members of their party to dictate moral standards.

In his article, Max Borders argues that while cheating on one's wife is a morally disastrous act, "there are egregious moral acts the discovery of which no politician should survive...legal bedroom behavior between consenting adults ain’t one of them." It is lucky, therefore, that nobody on the Right, Left or anywhere in between is suggesting government rationing or regulation of sex. They simply suggest that sexual habits and character may be linked. It may be true that, as Mr. Borders says, Jerry Falwell's form of public moralizing has caused the GOP more harm than good. This is not an argument for abandoning one's argument. It is an argument for changing the rhetoric and presentation of it, because we no longer live in the age of moral panic that characterized the 80's. Pro-choice advocates do not abandon their argument because Margaret Sanger once took their side on the grounds that blacks should be exterminated. One can be right for the wrong reasons, and there are plentiful examples of more "libertarian" Republicans who are anti-abortion or even anti-gay marriage who are not cheating scum.

In short, it is political suicide to abandon social conservatism at a time when our most zealous supporters are socially conservative, and when a good majority of even the fiscal conservatives hold socially conservative views. It is also logically fallacious to suggest that because one person violates a set of standards, the standards are therefore invalid. Finally, it is philosophically disastrous to conflate a refusal to regulate certain things because they are not capable of being regulated with abandonment of the moral arguments against them as reflections of an individual's character.

I tend to agree with Patrick Ruffini that Gov. Sanford should not be obligated to resign for having an affair (as distinct from his disapperance and deception of his staff).  While I think that resignation is a perfectly legitimate, even appropriate, path to take after disgracing oneself, a personal disgrace should not necessarily require resignation from one's job, whether in politics or the private sector.

Indeed, as I pointed out in the comments there, I've been trying to think of a prominent politician who resigned from their elected political office because of an affair (note: McGreevey and Spitzer resigned because of the major ethics/legal violations involved, not the affair), and the only one I can come up with is Rep. Livingston, who resigned his Congressional seat in 1999 after admitting an affair.  I'm sure there are others - probably more at the State/local level - but I can't think of them offhand.

On the other hand, I have to disagree with part of what Max Borders wrote here.

The Right is now reaping what it sowed. By making social conservatism central to its platform, it left no room in the GOP for sinners.

I don't think the backlash against Gov. Sanford has a lot to do with social conservatism.  Social conservatives do not have a unique position on adultery.  Pretty much everybody considers it immoral.  And the social conservative position on gay marriage (which Sanford shared) is not predicated on heterosexual people being uniquely faithful, either.  The appropriate criticism is not so much hypocrisy as it is failure.

Ultimately, there are no political or ideological lessons to be drawn from Mark Sanford's affair.  There are only human lessons.

I also think Max is wrong on a practical and logical level to conclude from this story that "it is time to purge the Right’s politics of social conservatism".  As a libertarian, I certainly favor the harm principle over the offense principle - that is, I think politics should focus on addressing force and fraud instead of things which are merely unpleasant.

I believe that libertarianism is a very internally consistent way of marrying the personal and political spheres, but I actually don't think it works. Or rather, it's wonderful in theory, but human nature has not adopted that theory for any large, sustained social group in history.

For my part, I've come to believe that libertarianism is a personal moral philosophy, not a political philosophy. It describes how we ought to behave individually, but it does not give us practical advice for how we can resolve social disputes in a political system.

The political system requires accomodation.  Libertarians can either disengage or they can find a way to work within a coalition.  Unprincipled?  Maybe.  But so is everybody.  That's human nature.

But there is one final, very important point: Social conservatism is basically a personal moral philosophy (or tendency), as well.  As Hayek said of conservatism, "It is that by its very nature it cannot offer an alternative to the direction in which we are moving. It may succeed by its resistance to current tendencies in slowing down undesirable developments, but, since it does not indicate another direction, it cannot prevent their continuance. It has, for this reason, invariably been the fate of conservatism to be dragged along a path not of its own choosing. The tug of war between conservatives and progressives can only affect the speed, not the direction, of contemporary developments."

Social conservatives also need to accomodate libertarians.  That does not mean they must minimize their objections to immorality, but it does mean they are going to have to accept fewer litmus tests and, if trends hold, a somewhat less decisive role within the Right's coalition.

Social conservatives and libertarians do have some common interests.  The Right's coalition has worked best when they have focused on those common interests and left the rest to the social and personal spheres.

That title is provocative, and deliberately so. I'd like to play Devil's Advocate and argue that blindly going along with the Dump Sanford crowd could seriously damage Republican elected officials' ability to weather future, hopefully less serious storms.

At the core of the Sanford and Ensign episodes is the cloud of "hypocrisy" that hangs over any Republican who strays from the bonds of their marriage. (Quickly forgetting that all who commit adultery are hypocrites, having taken a solemn vow of marriage.) Because Democrats are perceived as more socially libertine, they get off easier.

This is a structural disadvantage that, on the margins, hurts Republican officeholders, forcing them into resignation or disgrace more easily than their equally adulterous Democratic counterparts.

Simply put, it is a strategic error to sanctify the idea that it's worse when Republicans cheat. The hypocrisy charge exacts a double penalty on Republicans where none exists for Democrats -- first, in the accusation of hypocrisy itself, and second, in the media whipping social conservatives into a frenzy in a bid to belatedly "enforce" their moral code -- exactly the thing the secular media believes you shouldn't do 364 days out of the year -- to hound a Republican out of office. 

The left-leaning Center for Budget and Policy Priorities released a report discussing tax increases. (H/T Derek Thompson at the Atlantic)  They found that 36 states either have or are considering tax increases. Here's the picture:

Several observations on the list.

California and Florida budget fights have gotten national attention. For California, it was a bunch of ballot initiatives failing. In Florida, Governor Charlie Crist broke tax pledge by signing a number of tax increases, and this has become a rallying cry in the Senate primary. 

Six states with Republican governors who are looking at their future are on the list of states that have done nothing. In Minnesota, Governor Tim Pawlenty is clearly looking at running for President. As are South Carolina's Mark Sanford and Alaska's Sarah Palin. Indiana's Mitch Daniels has been put out there and is being considered by some. And Louisiana's Bobby Jindal and Texas's Rick Perry (looking at a primary)

But what I want to know about is the state legislators that are fighting this stuff. Who are the articulate state legislators who are going on the radio and local TV, rallying against these tax increases. Those leaders are redefining the Republican party. They are rebranding the Republican Party by their actions. And they may be winning some of these fights.

Let's hear about them.

Despite the protestations of folks like Mike Huckabee, Republicans need to get back to basic message of small-government conservativism if they choose to win elections once again.  I've said this time and time and time and time and time again. Folks much brighter that me (i.e. Richard Viguerie, Ryan Sager, John Dean, Peggy Noonan, Ron Paul, Michael Tanner, Bob Barr) have been presenting the same message since before the 2006 elections.

One of the people I continue to cite as an example of good conservative messaging is SC Governor Mark Sanford.  Here's Frank Luntz analyzing the Republican and Democrat response to a recent Sanford ad:

"Governor Sanford is the most articulate Republican out there right now and the other Republicans ought to pay attention," said Luntz a couple of days ago on Fox. "Or if they don't, their numbers will continue to languish."

Republicans need libertarians more than libertarians need Republicans.  It's time for libertarians - fiscally conservative, socially tolerant people who advocate limited government and individual freedom - to start fighting back. - Jon Henke

There are all sorts of self-described libertarians out there: Ron Paul libertarians, Libertarian Party libertarians, Club for Growth libertarians, Cato libertarians, Reason libertarians, Next Right libertarians, Neal Boortz libertarians and Lew Rockwell libertarians.  There are also millions of people who don't even know they are libertarians.

During the Goldwater-Reagan years, Republicans knew they needed libertarian votes to win the White House.  After George H. W. Bush disregarded his "read my lips" pledge, libertarians felt pretty isolated until the Republican Revolution.  Once the Republican Party gained control of Congress, libertarians and the goals of the Republican Revolution were simultaneously flushed down the commode of win-at-all-costs politics.

Republican leaders were warned time and time and time and time again that they would pay a price for dismissing potential libertarian supporters. Republicans did pay a significant price in 2006, but continued on as if nothing had changed.  Immediately after it became apparent that John McCain was going to win the 2008 Republican nomination, the Libertarian Party sent a funeral wreath to the RNC.

There are a lot of senior Republicans who apparently wish for this downward spiral to continue, as they continue to bash libertarians to this very day. 

According to an American Spectator item this morning, the race for RNC Chair appears to be over. Or maybe it's not. But the game of who is in and who is out has some tongues wagging.

It seems the South Carolina GOP Chair Katon Dawson has been campaigning for the gig since last year sometime (Ok, not really. Just since the convention, according to the AS piece.)

Dawson, the owner of an auto-parts-supply company, has been calling GOP donors and fundraisers, among others, telling them he has lined up enough votes within the 168-member national committee to make him a prohibitive favorite for the job.

"He's made it clear he doesn't expect John McCain to win the presidency," says one RNC fundraiser who has received such a call. "Katon's an ambitious guy. He's made no bones about the fact that he wants the RNC job."

But no one takes seriously the notion that Dawson is anywhere close to having a large voting bloc of RNC votes. "There are too many others poised to get into the race," says one RNC member. "We're looking at between 10 to 15 potential candidates and maybe seven or eight of them already have constituencies on the committee. No one is in a position to call this thing over, particularly since our next president, John McCain, gets to pick the next chairman."

That point is something that Dawson has seemingly overlooked, and his aggressive campaigning at a time when most Republicans are fighting hard to get McCain elected President has angered a number of Republicans because they understand why Dawson, who has been a local GOP chair in South Carolina, and won the state party job in 2002, is running: in part, to help jumpstart a presidential bid for the governor of South Carolina, Mark Sanford...

Dawson was actually campaigning for the job during the Republican Convention, something that angered not only the McCain campaign, but other Republicans with longtime ties to the RNC.

Apparently, some people are upset because Katon Dawson is actively campaigning while they're trying to elect John McCain. On the heels of all the "reform the rightroots movement" posts, this may stirke some people as odd.

I'd like to throw this out for discussion. Given all the chatter about reforming the GOP, is it bad form to start a campaign for Chairman months before the election?

I suspect it will only be another 36 hours or so before we see a lot more people jockeying for the RNC gig. After all, it is one of the three most visible positions within the GOP if McCain should fail to hold the White House. However, how early is "too early"? Should the body be cold before campaigning begins? Does it even need to be dead?