Democrats As Morality Police

You may recall that columnist Kathleen Parker recently did for Journalism what Arlen Spectre did for politics, which is to say that she sensed the shifting winds of political fortune and - like a leaf - was lofted from the Conservative camp into the Democrat's back yard. So it was as predictable as the sun rising that Parker has embraced the "hypocritical Republican" argument so crucial to Democrats in the National Debate, and most recently inspired her article about S. Carolina Governor Mark Sanford's admission to an affair this past year ("Sanford and sin: He could have spared us the ick").

Parker took it a step further, though, also embracing the "misuse of government funds" and "dereliction of duty" themes that are currently ricocheting through the Liberal Commentariat; the whole point being, of course, to exploit and further perpetuate the double-standard by which Conservative politicians are judged compared to Democrats.

It goes something like this: If Republican politicians express belief in any mainstream values and are then found guilty of not living up to those values, they are guilty of hypocrisy and malfeasance, and must be driven not only from polite society but from office as well. If a Democrat is guilty of not living up to mainstream values, they get a hall pass because they express belief in no values and thus, are guilty of no hypocrisy and by extension, no malfeasance.

For the Mainstream Media and Democrats, it's a three-fer: 1) Commentators get a constant flow of Republican Controversy to write about, 2) Democrat politicians get an unending stream of "issues" they can regularly use to flog Republicans, and 3) through their collaboration, both Commentators and Democrats are immunized from being held to any comparable standards. The political landscape is littered with such Republican casualties; Democrats, not so much.

The "misuse of government funds" charge is hilarious, given that the Democrats just stole $1 Trillion plus of our dollars to give to their friends and patrons in the so-called "stimulus". Sanford's alleged offense involves things like driving his State provided car to the airport, and adding Argentina to a trade mission junket to South America. I would see their Sanford and raise them one Nancy Pelosi. Pelosi is of course the multi-millionaire whose abuse of aircraft privileges - insisting that a fleet of government-provided planes be available to her and her minions for any and every trip - is legendary.

The "dereliction of duty" angle is also a bit of a stretch. According to Parker, the fact that Sanford took off without telling his staff where he was going makes him a bad governor because "he failed to make arrangements for his state's uninterrupted governance". The mind boggles at the implications of South Carolina going for even one minute without governance. Apparently governors - like presidents - have to be ready to take that telephone call at 3:00 a.m. It also raises several questions as to exactly what governance Parker thought was unattended in his absence:

- Was it South Carolina's nuclear football? Exactly what was the likelihood of war with Georgia in their border dispute over water rights, and who these days can rely on The Peach State not to strike without warning?

- Was Tiny Tim deprived of the emergency funds needed to get that lifesaving operation, funding that could only be approved by the governor of South Carolina?

- Stimulus funding to the States not only has caveats, it has deadlines, and such was the case for the $4.5 million allocated for the Daughters Of The Old South adopt-a-highway beautification plan. Did the Stimulus funds for this program expire in Sanford's absence?

- There were rumors of Pirates off the coast of Myrtle Beach. If true, were Special Forces deployed, and was Governor Sanford unavailable to give them the kill order?

To proponents of "uninterrupted governance" like Parker, these are no doubt important questions that for the sake of the Republic need to be answered. For the rest of us, it's the opportunity to milk a little much-needed humor out of the dreary regularity with which Democrats - and their Media Pets - exploit Morality as a political weapon, even as they exempt themselves from its strictures.