S.Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford's Mystery Revealed

strongandfit

That is the strangest news conference I've ever heard. Poor wife and kids. Over Father's Day weekend too. What a Dad! Loser!!

Phoenix_Rising

Truly bizarre.



http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090624/ap_on_re_us/us_sc_governor_where

Gov. Mark Sanford admitted Wednesday he's been having an affair with a woman he visited on a secret trip to Argentina and said he'll resign as head of the Republican Governors Association.

Sanford, a rumored 2012 presidential candidate, refused to say whether he'll leave office.

"I've let down a lot of people, that's the bottom line," Sanford said at a news conference. He said he's known the woman about eight years, but their relationship turned into something more a year ago while he was on an economic development trip to Argentina.

Sanford, a 49-year-old father of four, choked up during remarks to reporters. He said his wife has known about the affair for the last five months.

Sanford revealed Wednesday morning that he'd gone to Argentina for a seven-day trip. For two days after reporters starting asking questions, his office had said he had gone hiking on the Appalachian Trial.

Meanwhile, first lady Jenny Sanford had told The Associated Press she did not know where her husband went for the Father's Day weekend.

First elected governor in 2002, the former real estate developer has more than year remaining in his second term and is barred by state law from running again.

A former three-term congressman, Sanford most recently snared headlines for his unsuccessful fight to turn aside federal stimulus cash for his state's schools. His vocal battle against the Obama administration — and libertarian, small-government leanings — won praise from conservative pundits. Ultimately, a state court order required him to take the money.

Sanford's announcement came a day after another prominent Republican, Sen. John Ensign of Nevada, apologized to his GOP Senate colleagues after revealing last week that he had an affair with a campaign staffer and was resigning from the GOP leadership.

Sanford was born May 28, 1960, in Fort Lauderdale, Fla., the eldest of four siblings. He earned a bachelor's degree in business from Furman University in 1983 and a master's of business administration from the University of Virginia in 1988.

After working for a couple of years in the financial world in New York, he returned to South Carolina and said he was shaped by his summers working on the family plantation. He served in the U.S. House for three terms before honoring a term limits pledge and leaving office in 2001.

In 2002, he defeated incumbent Democrat Jim Hodges by 4 percentage points to become governor and won re-election in 2006, beating Democratic state Sen. Tommy Moore.

As governor, Sanford has had seemingly endless run-ins with the GOP-dominated Legislature, once bringing pigs to the House chamber to protest pork barrel spending. He also put a "spending clock" outside his office to show how quickly a proposed budget would spend state money.

willywonka

Very strange indeed, I live in SC and this is all over the news.
I also feel sorry for his family.

aymie24

Never mind...been in my office cave all day and hadn't read the rest of the news....


He'll be fine, his wife will get some nice big job or something out of it....look at Bill Clinton and Kwame Kilpactrick, he went to JAIL and it all worked out for him in the end....

Seriously, WHY would anyone put themselves in this kind of position knowing they are always being watched? Stupid people, no wonder our country is such a friggin mess. Everyone in charge is so busy getting busy nothing is really being done!

strongandfit

And on Father's Day weekend he had to do this to his 4 sons. The poor wife. What was sick was at the news conference he freely divulged into too much information on and on and on how he met this woman 8 yrs ago and exchanged email addresses kept repeating the phrase very innocently ,how he initially was trying to get her to reconcile her marriage to keep her family together, how they were just emailing their daily problems together, how he felt safe to seek her council outside the political bubble, and that 1 yr ago, it became more than that. How it sparked into something else,how he met her 3 x and on and on and on and on.

Good grief. Can you shut up already? The reporter didn't even ask the question and he gave full disclosure of every sordid detail. He kept saying how it started innocently as if it could happen to anyone. No it happens to weak men who refuse to learn how to be a husband in a marriage. Duh!!

Such hypocrisy. To hold high office yet not hold oneself to high standard. Blah!! Leaves a sick taste in my mouth. His family knew about his affair for 5 months and he still couldn't help himself with this sordid Argentina disappearance. :embarassed:

Poor wife and kids. She should have kicked him to the curb 5 months ago when she first learned of the affair.

aymie24

I have to say, I've quit reading about it and I did not read the email exchanges. As someone who's been through this, and was totally blindsided by it, I would NOT want the world to know what my husband said to his mistress. I didn't want to know myself, I just can't even imagine having it played out in front of the world.

I do think these things can "just happen". In my situation, it was hubby's then best friend's estranged wife who had called him to talk to him about her hubby leaving her. She and I had never met, she's a stripper, I'm a PTA mom...we just didn't have a lot in common. In very short time it turned into something else. I am not defending the govenor, or my dear (sometimes dumb) hubby but we've been married 15 years, since high school, I've had four kids, I can honestly say I understand why having this hot bodied little tart all over him was appealing. It cost him dearly, as I am sure it will the Gov, but it happens in lots of lives. The little head has no brain cells!

strongandfit

Just because it is tempting does not make it right. A lot of lives are being destroyed by his actions. I can't imagine those 4 boys spending Father's Day not knowing where he went. What a moron!!

That is sick for all the emails to come out like that in public. Emails/Internet is a Padora's Box. Has potential for massive good as well as bad. And now, we're seeing the other side.

ivykivy

I hope they will stop talking about it soon for his wife's and kids' sake

On the political side good thing SC doesn't have a "top secret"s or the people of Argentina would know them all.

My mom and dad mentioned this bible verse last night

For by means of a whorish woman a man is brought to a piece of bread: Prov 6:26