Sanford Meltdown Mortifying—but Real

Commerce secretary didn't know where to reach guv

(NEWSER) - Mark Sanford’s recent Argentine excursion wasn’t the first time he had gone missing: His commerce secretary didn’t know where to reach him in June 2008, either, emails reveal. “Need contact number for (Sanford) ASAP,” the secretary wrote to a Sanford staffer on the 28th—a day the South Carolina governor saw his lover, he has since admitted. The email was part of 3,300 pages of communications released to the State. More»

(NEWSER) - The vise is tightening around Mark Sanford's political career. South Carolina officials, including fellow Republicans, are lining up to urge the governor to resign, reports the State. The pressure has ramped up considerably since Sanford's admission yesterday that he'd "crossed lines" with other women besides his Argentine mistress. The governor, however, is resisting, notes the Washington Post. "He is finished discussing this matter," said a spokesman. More»

(NEWSER) - Mark Sanford’s affair stemmed from his love of a woman—and his love of the “dashing new version of himself he saw in her molten eyes,” writes Maureen Dowd in the New York Times. Mark, the Sanford we knew, “was the self-righteous, Bible-thumping prig who pressed for Bill Clinton’s impeachment,” while “Marco, international man of mystery,” was “the un-self-conscious Lothario, canoodling with Maria.” More»

(NEWSER) - Mark Sanford acknowledged today that he met with his Argentine mistress while on a state-funded trip last year and promised to reimburse South Carolina's coffers, the State reports. The state paid $8,000 for the governor to travel on business to Brazil and Argentina last June, and he met with the woman during the trip. More»

(NEWSER) - Mark Sanford's hometown paper in South Carolina is revealing cringe-worthy emails between the governor and the woman identified only as Maria in Argentina. In one obtained by the State, Sanford writes in July 2008, "I could digress and say that you have the ability to give magnificent gentle kisses, or that I love your tan lines or that I love the curve of your hips, the erotic beauty of you holding yourself (or two magnificent parts of yourself) in the faded glow of the night’s light ..." More»