Mark Sanford's win is GOP's loss

Despite the optimistic polling, it's not that shocking South Carolina's own Appalachian Trail hiker won the special election yesterday. What's more surprising is how close the votes were. Sure 54% to 45% ordinarily sounds like a big win but if you look at the actual totals Sanford only won by 12,838 votes. Granted a special election draws a lot fewer voters but compared to the guy he's replacing, who won by 62% to 35% just last year, it doesn't look as impressive.

As satisfying as watching the cons deal with an upset would have been been, on a practical level, this was the best outcome for Democrats. There were already signs that Colbert Busch was going to piss off liberals and progs with her "moderate centrism." Indeed she would have little choice but to Blue Dog it to satisfy her constituents. Meanwhile, all indications point to Sanford's gain becoming Boehner's bane.

This quote from Congressman elect Sanford's good buddy in the state Senate portends trouble in Capitol City:

“Sorry, NRCC. We won anyway,” he tweeted shortly after the election was called.

This outcome is essentially a draw. While it's a horrible outcome for good governance, all we did was trade one GOP clown for another. But Sanford is a much bigger showboating, bumbling, hapless sad sack. Willing to predict he's going to become the gift that keeps on giving for lefty bloggers, liberal pundits and the perpetually bored insider media.