"En la casa del jabonero, todos resbalan, unos caen."Loosely translated, "In the soapmaker's house everybody slips, some fall."
I spent a lot of time down there, and I have my own sayings. Here's my favorite:
Latin America, where single men come back married and married men come back single.Now, thanks to Mark Sanford, we've got to put up with smirking liberals blabbing on about hypocritical conservatives
I don't understand the pleasure people take in the private travails of others. I don't know much about the John Edwards sex scandal, and I don't care to. I can't stand the guy, but I pray for him and his family. I would not wish family problems on anyone
The comments concerning hypocrisy are the stupidest of all. We're all human. Can't we aspire to higher ideals? What if the founding fathers had just said to hell with it and wrote a direct right to own slaves into the constitution? What if they had written all men (white men only, no women) are created equal? That would exonerate them from the hypocrisy charge but leave us a much poorer nation.
The ancient Greeks developed the philosophy of virtues. These were ideals to aspire to, not something they thought they possessed and therefore made them feel superior. Any good Christian will tell you he is a sinner who needs God's grace. The alternative is to abandon yourself to your basest instincts and say "hey, at least I'm honest!"
The news about Mark Sanford disheartens me. I hoped he would be our next president. It saddens me to see the man publicly disembowel himself and put his family through such anguish.
Liberalism's Three Amigos: Card Check, Cap and Trade, Socialized Medicine
Worst of all, while everyone salivates over the details, Congress will pass Card Check and Crap and Trade, causing the price of everything to go up and killing any chance of another Reagan or Clinton economy.
Iranians are dying for freedom and the O'President is focused on ramming a gigantic socialized medicine suppository up our posteriors
Iran tears me in two. I sympathize with the people in the streets but I oppose any US military intervention. If the CIA is not providing clandestine support we are criminally negligent.
I don't know what else to say about Iran that hasn't already been said. Anyway, seeing the rioting gives me flashbacks. We don't realize how good we've got it here. If Obama and Congress have their way, well be longing for the good old days...
God bless you and your family, Governor Sanford. God bless those Iranians manning the barricades, and God, please bless the USA...
5 comments:
Totally agree about all the smirkiness, Silverfiddle.
It's so wierd for me. Having compassion for him is the first and only real substantial feeling I had when hearing of Governor Sanfords situation. I happened to like him, too, which might have had something to do with that, I suppose. But, really, I just think he's a decent guy who happened to screw up in a really human way. It's just not in me to be smirky the way folks have been in the last day or so. It's just not in my make-up.
And the bigger issue, I think, for me, Silverfiddle, is that I'm completely clear, at this point, that his family is way more important than political fallout. Who cares about the political fallout, I would say, if I were a part of his family. We have more important issues to attend to.
And I happen to trust that guy that he will attend to them honestly. He just seems like a really good guy. And that press conference was the first time I'd ever seen him speak publicly. He just seems really sincere. And to hell with how everyone is mucking their way through this difficult time for him and his family.
It's not just that we're all hypocrits, Silverfiddle. It's that this was exactly what Jesus told us was the problem 2000 years ago. Everyone focussed on the splinters in someone else's eyes and not on the beams in their own.
It's so ironic to watch people grandstand around their moral/political/whatever righteousness and then watch people behave the way they have in the wake of this situation.
It's kind of disgusting, really. People can be real asses, much of the time. Especially when someone screws up.
How we look at our children and tell them to follow our example with a straight faces is a mystery to me, sometimes.
And I'll take a genuinely repentant sinner over a snarky self-righteous gossip any day of the week.
I hope he still does run for President. I'd still be willing to vote for him, depending on whether his opponents have a better option or not.
Like Dolly Parton in Steel Magnolias, I think people are more interesting when they got a past. More to the point, I think their more human. And more compassionate and decent with others when they screw up. And that's the kind of person I want to be in office, personally. Who needs horses' asses' walking around pretending like their hind ends don't stink and that only they and their maker don't sin? Not me, I say. Give me a repentant sinner with honest, decent, and more thoughtful policies any day of the week.
Fact is, I'm more likely to vote for Mark Sanford today than I was yesterday. Not because he cheated on his wife (obviously). But because I watched that press conference and he looked more genuinely sorry than most people who have screwed up and have a chance to own up for it (in public, in front of nationally syndicated cameras, no less).
That's the kind of President I want. Not some Mahmoud Ahmadinejad theocratic wannabe.
Perfection is overrated. Not the mention bullshit.
I'll take a sinner with good ideas any day.
Democrats and snarky gossips be damned.
Ben,
I like your point about people "with a past." Fact is, we all have a past, we've all screwed up, some just more publicly or spectacularly than others.
The comments here are what sparked me. I wrote this article three months ago praising Governor Sanford, and two smartasses made comments on it last night:
http://warskill.blogspot.com/2009/03/mark-sanford-politician-i-actually-like.html
You know, I sometimes wonder why collectively we are so preoccupied with other peoples personal lives, it really is quite sick that we support an industry of paparazzi that follow people around trying to get the dirt on them and pictures to boot. I personally could care less.
Your philosophy and policies are relevant, who you are boinking, when, and where is not. That applies equally to folks ranging from Sanford to Clinton. Had Clinton said "sure I was boinking her...what business is it of yours?" I would have had great respect for him... instead, he perjured himself.
As far as whether or not it disqualifies him or not, I would especially like to point out to all our gleeful liberal friends a NY Times article in defense of Clinton:
http://www.nytimes.com/1998/01/25/us/president-under-fire-history-14-presidents-have-been-talk-pillow.html
And ask, were the following people unqualified to be President?
Washington, Jefferson, Lincoln, Cleveland, Wilson, Harding, Eisenhower, Kennedy, Johnson, Bush, and Clinton?
Oh, and don't forget Carter, who may not have had an affair, but had to deal with the fall out of self-admitted feelings of lust (oooh!)
Our problem is we are not concerned with substance, only flash.
Finntann
Read the comments. So lame, Silverfiddle. It is so nuts, to me, how everyone loses track, completely, of everything that really does matter, in such situations, to attend to their political point-scoring.
The question that a lot of folks need to be asking themselves, right now, as with Clinton, is, "If you really cared about this family, would you really be behaving this way?"
No, is the answer most of the time on that question, I think, Silverfiddle.
I was guilty of this when I was a Democrat and all those rumors flew about around Strom Thurmond's love child. Like what I cared about really was that child and his family. Kind of foolish and snarky, in retrospect. And exactly the kind of petty behavior that so dominates and thus so undermines more honest, reasonable discussion and governing.
I'm quite tired of it, personally.
Makes us all look foolish. Which is appropriate since that's what we're being when we do it.
Makes me admire the wisdom of folks like Twain and Mencken and definitely my man from Nazareth for calling it for what it is.
Hope he and his family get things on the right track.
Excellent point, Finntann. Most folks of all political stripes are such blatant and unrepentant hypocrits on these matters. You're right. Voyeurism, through and through.
Makes it difficult for kids to look at such discussions and know who is really there to do any real good.
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