Leave it to a New York Times writer to say something truly inane about the Mark Sanford scandal. In a column yesterday, Gail Collins gave us The Times’ definition of morality: Adultery? No big deal. Refusing federal funding? Scandalous!
The day before, the South Carolina Governor admitted that when he disappeared for five days, he wasn’t hiking the Appalachian Trail (as previously announced) but in Argentina, breaking up with his mistress.
Collins makes it clear she considered this an amusing peccadillo. “I think I speak for us all when I say that if a governor wants to fly off for a rendezvous with his mistress, the first rule should be: leave a phone number.”
The “first rule” should be for an elected official not to betray his spouse. If he can’t set a moral high-tone for the public, at least he should avoid becoming a public disgrace. That The Times, which has spent decades chipping away at our nation’s moral foundation, finds sexual sin amusing, is hardly surprising.
What does give one pause is Collins’ definition of sin. The Times columnist is outraged that Sanford refused $700 million in federal stimulus spending, which — she claims – would have been used to stop “massive layoffs of public school teachers.” I’m only surprised she didn’t add police and firemen.
The very idea that a governor would want his state to stand on its own two feet, instead of looting the taxpayers and burdening posterity, The Times considers repugnant.
Collins closed with a call for Republicans to “apologize for putting us through the Clinton impeachment,” which she termed “sexual stone-throwing.”
It doesn’t mater how often or how patiently it’s explained, The Times continues to distort history. Clinton wasn’t impeached for committing adultery with an intern in the Oval Office, but for lying under oath — for perjury — which is a felony.
Well, at least, as Arkansas Governor, Bill Clinton never turned down a federal buck, which makes him an OK-guy in Collins’ book, even if he did violate his oath of office by committing a felony – and his marriage vows repeatedly, over the course of decades..
@nytimes.com
