Posted: Saturday, July 11, 2009 12:00 am
MARY BILLITER
Perspective
So let me see if I've got this straight. Sen. John Ensign, R-Nev., and South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford can publicly lament, even cry on cue, confessing their extramarital affairs, but when President Barack Obama takes his wife, Michelle, to dinner in Greenwich Village and a play on Broadway, outcry ensues. And there you have America's moral standards.
To the critics who argue that the taxpayers should not foot the bill for the president's date nights with his wife, consider the vast amount of taxpayer dollars that went into the impeachment trial of former President Bill Clinton for his extramarital relations with a White House intern.
Not to mention the taxpayer dollars that will inevitably get sunk into sorting through Ensign's affair with campaign staffer Cynthia Hampton, due to recent allegations by watchdog group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW).
CREW alleges that the senator violated the Senate's ethics and campaign finance rules by failing to report a severance payment to Hampton as an in-kind contribution from his campaign or leadership political action committee. CREW has already filed a complaint with the Senate Select Committee on Ethics and a complaint with the Federal Election Commission against Ensign's campaign committee.
Then there's the taxpayer dollars that will be drained determining the taxpayer money that fronted Sanford's secret rendezvous with his Argentinian mistress on the leg of the economic development trip to South America last year.
When two right-wing Republicans fall from grace and want to return to the business of politics, it's easy to see why the president courting his wife must really tax Americans. The president didn't follow protocol. After all, when he had the audacity to take his wife to dinner and utilize the company plane, he didn't follow suit with Ensign and Sanford and offer up an empty apology for wasting tax payer money. Nor should he.
All the president's men could learn a lesson from their chief. The real measure of a man is not his ability to step out of his marriage and into an affair, but rather his ability to have his actions align with his morals.
Planning a date night with your wife and making your marriage a priority are actions that align with the high moral ground that the president is walking and Ensign and Sanford both forfeited.
And for those women that "hook up" with married men, your actions are equally reprehensible.
Cynthia Hampton and her husband Doug were both employed on Ensign's staff when Mrs. Hampton and the senator began their affair. Alleged threats of blackmail by the Hamptons have circulated as to the cause for the senator's sudden admission of his affair that spanned from December 2007 through August 2008.
Maria Belen Chapur, a divorced mother of two sons, acknowledged her affair with Sanford in a written statement to news network C5n of Buenos Aires, where she said she'd like to "put an end to a matter that, as you imagine, is very painful to me, my two children, my entire family and close friends."
It's interesting to me that Chapur is just now thinking of her two sons and family. But it aligns with Sanford, a father of four, who lied to his wife of 20 years and his staff to visit his mistress. And then on the heels of confessing his dirty little secret, Sanford dismissed any suggestion that he resign. Referencing the Bible and the story of King David, who continued to lead after sleeping with another man's wife, Bathsheba, having the husband slain, then marrying the widow, the governor rebuked the mere notion of resignation.
"What I find interesting is the story of David, and the way in which he fell mightily - fell in very, very significant ways, but then picked up the pieces and built from there," he told members of his cabinet.
What I find interesting is that Sanford would compare himself to King David. As a "man after God's own heart," David did have his falls and God held him accountable. What Sanford omits from this story comparison is that King David and his mistress bore a son whose life was taken as a result of David's sin. David's household was also cursed with calamity.
"You did it in secret, but I will do this thing in broad daylight before all Israel." (2 Samuel 12:12)
The sins of the father befall the son, the wife and the family. My only question to Sen. Ensign, Cynthia Hampton, Gov. Sanford and Maria Belen Chapur, who destroyed multiple lives through their selfish, self-centered pursuits: Was it worth it?
So the next time President Obama wants to court his wife and it happens to fall on the taxpayers' dime, it seems like money well spent.
Mary Billiter of Alpine is a weekly Star-Tribune columnist. Write to her at mbilliter@silverstar.com.