3. He knows how to fool all of the press some of the time and some of the press all of the time. On June 24, the morning that Sanford held a news conference to announce he was having an affair, The Washington Post ran an article that stated: “The governor, it should be noted, is quite happily married.”

Whoops. Rewind. But that can happen. We journalists are limited in our abilities to know what is going on behind closed doors. What is most interesting, however — and most encouraging for Sanford’s future political career — is that some journalists don’t care about his lies and betrayal of public trust even after they learn of them.

A recent article in The New Republic addressed those who find fault with Sanford by saying: “Give it a rest. The man didn’t commit murder here. He’s in love.” (How the writer knows that Sanford is in love and not in lust — a condition far more common in middle-aged men bored with their marriages — she does not say.)