Man-Whore Mark Sanford Takes Obama's Dirty Money, Like A Prostitute

March of 2009 was so very long ago that when you click this link you will be surprised that everyone in the story isn't wearing chain mail and calling each other "thee" and "thou," but back then South Carolina Governor Mark Sanford was a guy with a future in politics, and if there's one thing guys with futures in politics do, it's go in for dumb grandstanding stunts that score points with ideologues but do real, actual damage to the people who elected them. That's why 2012 sleeper political candidate Mark Sanford bravely told Chairman Obama that he didn't want to use the money allocated to his state by the stimulus package to "stimulate" the economy in the intended Keynesian (Kenyan?) fashion, but rather to pay off this guy he owed money to. What happened to that strong, principled conservative of yore, anyway?

Well, obviously he betrayed those principles, by having a consensual sex affair with an adult woman who doesn't even speak English natively. And that was the end of his political career, pretty much. But he still has to/gets to be governor of South Carolina for several more months! And now that he doesn't have to worry about what Iowa caucus-goers think about his conservative credentials, he's just up and taking that Obama money, stained red with blood and communism, and giving it in greasy handfuls to South Carolina's laziest unemployed.

Other governors who swore never to participate in the spending-orgy that is the stimulus but later quietly took the checks and made their states nicer with them include Sonny Perdue of Georgia and Phil Bredesen of Tennessee, neither of whom is running for president or even re-election. The lesson, apparently, is that the people who determine politicians' electoral prospects are not the people you want setting policy, which is troubling. Still, arrange for the seduction of your local leaders by sexy Latin gals or dudes (their choice!), just to be on the safe side. [ NYT ]