Overstimulated Statehouses

"People," Gail Collins asks in today's New York Times, "what is going on with governors in this country? Are we doomed to see them go bonkers one by one, state by state?"

As the President heads for Russia next week, he leaves behind troubled American statehouses, from Schwarzenegger's in California handing out IOUs like a busted riverboat gambler to those of Sanford and Palin, who resisted Washington's stimulus money and are now heading out of office, maundering about higher levels of arousal in Argentina and Alaska.

In New York, the legislature is being held hostage by Gov. David Paterson, who got the job after Eliot Spitzer resigned over professional stimulus, while former Gov. Rod Blagojevich of Illinois, awaiting federal trial for corruption, loses out to Palin for the Sitting Duck Award, granted annually to the most ridiculed newsmaker in the nation.

Affairs of the states have been roiled by collapsing economies and rising pressures on chief executives to manage their way through crises rather than primp for the TV cameras in search of higher office. For some, like Bobby Jindal after his disastrous rebuttal to Obama's address to Congress, that may be a blessing in thin disguise.

Meanwhile, the antics of Palin, Sanford et al are distracting millions of mourners who won't win the lottery for tickets to the Michael Jackson memorial next week. Compared to some governors, the Gloved One was a model of sanity and much more entertaining to boot.

Two Styles of Political Suicide

While Mark Sanford continues to go for his own jugular with new confessions that will force him out of office, there is news about his neighbor to the north, John Edwards, that should bury him politically once and for all.

The two offer a fascinating contrast in self-destructive styles.

Now that his erotic secrets are out, the South Carolina governor just can't stop blabbing that he has "crossed lines" with other women, each revelation costing him the loss of more political allies, to say nothing of possible reconciliation with his wife.

Edwards, on the other hand, has been a true trial-lawyer weasel, practicing Nixon's "modified limited hangout," admitting only misdeeds revealed by others and hoping to keep all the rest buried.

This week those hopes were dashed by news of a book proposal by former aide Andrew Young, who once tried to take the rap for Rielle Hunter's pregnancy, but is now disillusioned (and no doubt greedy) enough to tell all about the affair, including their making of sexual videotapes and plans to marry after the death of Elizabeth Edwards from the cancer she has been fighting.

In his quest for the presidency, John Edwards kept talking about two Americas. When it comes to ambitious politicians, he and Mark Sanford have living in two different universes. but the result will be the same for their careers and help make voters wary of politicians posing as Mr. Clean.

Update: In the second part of his confessional AP interview, Sanford burbles, "I will be able to die knowing that I had met my soul mate." This declaration has haunting echoes of King Edward VIII renouncing his throne in 1936 for "the woman I love." The former king and his soul mate went on to a long life of exile in what used to be known as Café Society, but the GOP right wing has no such counterpart these days for dethroned Southern governors.

Disparity in Marital Smarts

That new soap opera, "The Sanfords of South Carolina" revives interest in a subject that intrigued me over decades of editing women's magazines--the sexual politics of two-career marriages.

Working with ambitious women in their twenties and thirties, I was struck by how different their lives were from the Father-knows-best ethos of earlier generations. They weren't holding jobs, as most of their mothers did, only until they could start homemaking and procreating.

In those "dormitory marriages," there were fascinating variations of relationships between equals or, human nature being what it is, unequals on either side. In many cases, the wives were much smarter, sharper and more competent.

The Sanfords look like one of those couples. In a society that still gives power more easily to men (pace Todd Palin), however, a successful woman like Jenny Sanford has to morph from a New York investment banker to a helpmeet who "largely gave up her professional life and turned to helping her husband’s political career" even as she refused "to abandon her sense of identity, her direction, or her own opinions."

His wife successfully managed campaigns for Congress and the statehouse while rearing four sons, but for Mark Sanford, such a powerhouse performance may have been hard on the libido, leaving him vulnerable to "a dashing new version of himself," as Maureen Dowd puts it, in the eyes of an exotic stranger.

Sanford's downfall is a sad example of a society that is still struggling with the idea of powerful women (Hillary Clinton supporters had a lot to say about that last year and Sonia Sotomayor's confirmation hearings may revive the subject next month).

Without making a Joan or Arc out of Jenny Sanford (her outward perfection may have been daunting to live with), however, it seems safe to assume that her husband's disappearance from the political scene won't deprive the nation of a strong, gifted leader. If and when she dumps him, Mrs. Sanford might think about running for something herself. When it comes to brains these days, Y chromosomes don't count.

Stimulus Show-and-Tell Starts

State by state, the Recovery Scoreboard is lighting up with projects to be funded by some of the $787 billion Congress passed last month to get the economy moving again.

Just keeping track of the money, let alone spending it wisely, is going to be a monumental job as governors appoint overseeing groups and, in some cases, "czars" to make sure the money is not fraudulently or stupidly spent.

The Recovery.gov web site is getting almost 4,000 hits a second, according to the chairman of the federal Transparency and Accountability Board, but it's not clear how many of the viewers are concerned citizens or job seekers looking to get to the money tap.

Residents of every state can click on the interactive map and get, along with a self-puffing picture and message from their governor, a breakdown, with varying degrees of detail, on the projects about to get going in their area.

State officials are under pressure to move projects fast and efficiently. As Vice President Joe Biden warned them at a Washington meeting this week:

"Six months from now, if the verdict on this effort is that we've wasted the money, we built things that were unnecessary, or we've done things that are legal but make no sense, then, folks, don't look for any help from the federal government for a long while."

Politics, of course, is part of the picture, as 2012 presidential hopefuls like Govs. Mark Sanford of South Carolina and Alaska's Sarah Palin righteously turn down part (but far from all) of the federal funds.

Their conservative grandstanding may go down well in future primaries, but they may have to take some flak meanwhile from their own residents watching them throw the money back at Washington.

Uodate: The New York Times reports: "President Obama issued a directive on Friday requiring lobbyists to make their requests in writing about the projects they believe should be awarded from the $787 billion economic stimulus bill, saying the plan 'will not be an excuse for waste and abuse.'

"In a speech to state lawmakers here, Mr. Obama outlined what he called 'unprecedented restrictions' to increase the transparency on how the government spends money on projects to boost the economy and create jobs. The conversations between federal lobbyists and his administration, he said, would be disclosed on the Internet.

“'Whenever a project comes up for review, we’re going to ask a simple question,' Mr. Obama said. 'Does it advance the core mission of the Recovery Act? Does it jump-start job creation? Does it lay the foundation for lasting prosperity?'”