After South Carolina Gov Mark Sanford admitted to an affair on Wednesday, I decided to look into his views on marriage. Since Sanford is a republican, I hoped wondered whether he had said anything about the "sanctity of marriage". While Sanford is opposed to gay marriage, he hasn't said anything too crazy about the sanctity of holy matrimony and all that BS...
But what he has talked about is infidelity.... Specifically, other peoples' infidelity.
Here are some quotes from Sanford from 1998 and early 1999, during the Clinton impeachment drama:
1/28/98
Charleston Congressman Mark Sanford, R-S.C., said the scandal will not be simply dismissed. "If he was having an affair in the family home with a 21-year-old while he's chief executive, the people I'm hearing from at home will not stand for that," Sanford said.
1/19/99
As to whether it would be weird to work with the President post-scandal, "Absolutely, people are going to be struggling with their respect for the office and whatever personal thoughts they have for this particular president," Sanford said.
Around that same time, after Larry Flynt offered a $1 million reward for information about extramarital affairs by members of Congress , it came out that Republican Louisiana congressman Bob Livingston had an affair with several women. This is what Mark Sanford had to say about it:
12/18/98
"The bottom line is Livingston lied," Sanford said. "He lied to his wife." He added that "it makes for a horribly confused grand jury setting. . . . It does cloud the issue, no doubt about it."
12/17/98
"I am sure there will be a lot of legalistic explanations pointing out that the president lied under oath. His situation was not under oath. The bottom line, though, is he [Livingston] still lied. He lied under a different oath, and that is the oath to his wife. So it's got to be taken very, very seriously. I am going to struggle through this"
12/19/98
Rep. Mark Sanford, R-S.C., said he would be "struggling" during Christmas over whether to support Livingston, even though the speaker-designate had not broken the law. "We as a party want to hold ourselves to high standards, period," Sanford said in an interview.
He's been much quieter on the subject of infidelity in the last ten years. Probably because he spent eight of those years exchanging naughty emails with his Argentinean pen pal...
