The GOP's One Unforgivable Sin

Sen. John Ensign's confession that he had an extramarital affair with a member of his campaign staff is a good news/bad news story. It's good news for Romney, Gingrich, Palin and other Republicans hoping to unseat Obama, but it's bad news for a party that continues to lose voters.

This is their problem, according to The Las Vegas Sun.

The Republican Party didn’t make a deal with the devil.

It made a deal with God, or at least people who said they were God’s representatives — a certain class of very political and ideological preachers.

The deal, engineered by Republican operatives such as Lee Atwater and Karl Rove, went like this: Be against gays and abortion and for prayer in the schools, and in return, those preachers would proclaim the GOP the party of God and deliver millions of suburban and rural voters — enough to win elections for three decades.

But the deal carried a risk: Any behavior by Republican officeholders or public figures that seemed at odds with a certain kind of Old Testament morality — a tryst in an airport bathroom, a painkiller addiction, a sexual harassment lawsuit — and voters might feel betrayed and manipulated.

And the deal would collapse.

The last couple of elections show that the deal has been collapsing for sometime, and it's not just among Bible believing Republicans. As the LVS points out, voters are leaving the party because of their one unforgivable sin: Hypocrisy.

People are disgusted with Republicans. Instead of attacking other people's patriotism, morals, marriages, work ethics, etc., the GOP needs to get their own house in order. Calling for Ensign to resign is a good first step. After all, it was Ensign who called for Bill Clinton to resign, and it would certainly go a long way toward fulfilling the Senator's vision of "people who are in office who will hold themselves to a little higher standard."

Or do higher standards only apply to other people?