Posted By: Michael Sweeney June 25, 2009 As Tyler and I discussed on this week’s episode of The Stonecipher Report radio show – and we even sort of dismissed it a bit with some punchlines – respected national political writer Roger Simon had a piece out last week on the 7 things he thought Sarah Palin should do to win the 2012 Republican Presidential nomination. (To which I add, OK – and then likely losing to President Obama by a Mondale- or Goldwater-dwarfing landslide…) The 7 examples he gave mostly consisted of events in two areas – shoring up her at-times ramshackle media and policy dealings AND in being identified as the "true" preferred candidate of the conservative base (albeit a somewhat-steadily shrinking base these days).
Getting Palin more fully studied up on non-Putin-sighting foreign policy and being prepared to list ANY actual news publications she may read or Supreme Court decisions she may agree with is up to her now-and-future staff (and "Good luck!" with that, say both I AND almost all of the McCain ’08 people who had to deal much with her). However, she seems to be getting all the help she can possibly get from the ongoing drop-outs and screw-ups among the moderate, white-man semi-minority in the Republican Party lately…
First – as I covered out here a few weeks back (available via this link) – following longtime GOPer Sen. Arlen Specter’s fleeing to the Democratic side of the aisle, FL’s Repub Gov. Charlie Crist opted to move to a (perhaps less pre-Presidential prominent) Senate run…AND UT’s Repub Gov. Jon Huntsman took the job of Ambassador to China for the Obama Administration. Admittedly, both of these popular moderates would have been relative dark horses against the expected Romney-Huckabee-Palin forces in the 2012 GOP primaries, but…it seemed that they (and / or their key people) had perhaps taken the current temperature of the still-wobbling, all-anti-Obama-all-the-time GOP and decided that, uh, you know what? That 2012 nomination is probably the potentially sourest of grapes available, so…let’s take a pass on that, OK?
Now, just a month later, two more popular, semi-handsome (well, in that greyish-old-man-Republican way, anyway), moderate Grand Old Party leaders are finding themselves potentially on the outs with their current local voters, MUCH LESS with the future national ones who will decide who tops the party’s ticket in ‘12. First, usually-smooth and resourceful NV Sen. John Ensign comes out – presumably to help control the about-to-leak (or perhaps even threatened black-mailed) news AND maybe even to try and get enough distance from it to still give him a chance in 3 years – and admits to an extra-marital affair with a staffer. Oops – it happens, I guess. (At least, as opposed to Republican Senators Larry Craig and David Vitter, the Ensign affairee was not A) Male or B) A prostitute…)
THEN, of course – and, no doubt, MUCH to the relieved thrill of Sen. Ensign (whose bad news all but suddenly disappears into also-ran 8th and 9th paragraphs of news stories now) – comes the idiot moves, excuses, and admissions of the latest moderate Republican poster boy for setting himself (AND his career) on fire – SC Gov. Mark Sanford.
Uh, first he’s apparently missing,..no, wait – he’s just out of touch…uh, and he spent Father’s Day away from his wife and kids to go hiking on the Appalachian Trail – by himself! Wait – check that…his car was found at the airport…and then he just flew back into Atlanta from South America (and, boy, are his arms tired?) – yep, just a solo trip to Argentina where he spent time by himself and claimed he drove along Buenos Aires’ beautiful (yet actually non-existent?) coastline – or so sayeth the Guv in his original "I don’t know why this is such a story" lying excuse.
…NOW, however, the truth has dribbled out…and Sanford stands ashamed, having admitted to an affair with an Argentine woman that has been apparently going on for months (AND had already caused disruption and separation between Sanford and his wife). Initial reports include the resulting fact that Sanford has now resigned his leadership position in the Republican Governors Association…AND speculation about whether or not this event (both the affair AND the unusual sneaky behavior and lying surrounding it) will effect either his current job as SC Governor (where he is scheduled to serve until 2012) or his potential to run for President in the immediate or further future.
(BTW – a quick aside: Well done, FOX News! During most of the day Wednesday when this news broke, the unofficial official faux-"news" voice of the Republican Party kept identifying Sanford onscreen as a "D" – or, of course, as a Democrat. Hey, YOU try to find the words "Truth" or "Facts" in the phrase "Fair and Balanced"…)
Now, I don’t know enough about local SC politics to be able to say whether or not Sanford faces potential Blagojevich-level problems down there in trying to keep his executive seat (although both his own GOP Lt. Governor and state Senate leader have already spoken fairly ill of the Governor and his actions)…but, as for the 2012 (or 2016, etc.) GOP Presidential slot? Well, at this point, I’d have to say that I think that ‘70s sitcom junk-yard-runners Fred and Lamont Sanford would have about the same shot at getting the nomination that Mark Sanford has now…
Meanwhile, somewhere up in Alaska, a young-end-of-middle-aged former beauty queen keeps hitting "Refresh" on the headlines page of her browser, excited to find out whatever latest career-ending news might be coming out about those ever-lessening ranks of guys expected to run against her for President in 2012. Whoever first said that it can be better to be lucky than to be good ought to send her office an invoice…
Look for my regular political posts here on The Stonecipher Report. (And, for a free subscription to my twice-weekly e-mail column on politics and pop-culture, "And, in the News…" send a note to: m_l_sweeney@hotmail.com)
