The Gov: Stylin’ and high flyin’

We initially first published the fact Gov. Mark Sanford eschewed his supposed tight ways and instead was spending liberally on his out-of-country flights. On June 26, we wrote:

Gov. Mark Sanford has made folk stories of himself as a guy that pinches pennies, making absurd requests of staff to make the most use out of everything and telling anecdotes about how, when he was a child, the house only had one air conditioned room.

Turns out, he’s not averse to the finer things when flying to see his Argentinean mistress. Last June, his “trade mission” to Buenos Aires involved having one of the Commerce Department’s employees tagging along. According to the passenger tickets, the employee, Ford Graham, flew coach (KL), with a travel cost of $1,536.80. Sanford, however, went “restricted business class,” (DX) and, in the South American airlines, business class (JB, JV), racking up $8,644.03 in charges.

So, not only did he arrange state business to work his affair around, Sanford couldn’t be bothered with toughing it out with the grunts in steerage.

The AP not only looked at this information, but went well beyond, showing an extensive record of stylin’ and high flyin’ by the Governor. In 2007 on a trip to China, Sanford racked up a bill of $12,172 for good food, drinks and a better chair. The report states that Rep. Nikki Haley, who was also on the flight, had a flight cost of $6,842. And that is even more than actual state employees whose bills ran between about $1,905 and $3,963.

But, it doesn’t end there. The trip to Poland was done in style in April, as were flights to Germany in 2007 and the UK in 2006.

It would be one thing if he just played it straight by saying that this is par-for-the-course procedure of executives. However, his song and dance about the way he spends money is shown to be just another breach of trust.