Who Can Blame Him?

So Mark Sanford, South Carolina's Republican governor, fell in love with Buenos Aires and an Argentine woman living there. It's hard not to, considering Buenos Aires is the world's coolest city and its women are attractive. I was fortunate enough to spend a week there five years ago, walking the side streets of Recoleta and Palermo, eating excellent grass-fed beef, drinking cheap red wine and watching the Copa America.

Oh, wait, Sanford is a father of four who's based part of his political career on moral rectitude and the invioable bonds of the heterosexual family, and when he most recently traipsed down to Buenos Aires (apparently to end the affair), he didn't tell anyone, including his semi-estranged wife, staff and lieutenant governor, where he was going, nearly creating a constitutional crisis in South Carolina, and when he finally told his press people where he was, three days into the trip, he lied by saying he was hiking on the Appalachian Trail to clear his mind after a particularly difficult legislative session? Oh, um. This is comically remarkable. Everyone should blame him.

If one were to totally remove the context from the e-mails Sanford sent to his mistress -- which I realize is impossible -- they're actually romantic and touching. To wit: "I have been specializing in staying focused on decisions and actions of the head for a long time now — and you have my heart. You have oh so many attributes that pulls it in this direction. Do you really comprehend how beautiful your smile is? Have you been told lately how warm your eyes are and how they softly glow with the special nature of your soul." This is a man genuinely in love -- just not with his wife and also genuinely conflicted and terribly incapable of being a governor or generally respected.

The amazing thing about politicians enmeshing themselves in scandal -- of the bed, the bank account or otherwise -- is they always seem to believe things will either go undiscovered or resolve themselves neatly. One thing I've learned as a reporter is the story always comes out. It might not reveal itself the first time you take a run at it or it might not reveal itself in full at first. But, eventually, the story is always there in all of its sad glory, for everyone to see.

I wonder if this hurts or boosts the Appalachian Trail's business this summer.