And I know way more about it than I want to, or need to:
CHARLESTON, S.C. — Jenny Sanford is asking that U.S. Rep. Mark Sanford undergo a psychiatric evaluation and take anger management and parenting courses in the latest filing in the couple’s contentious divorce.
She also wants the court to appoint an impartial guardian to look after the interests of the youngest of their four sons….
If you’re Jon Stewart, you love this stuff. You get rich off it. But when you think about the real, human pain behind it — pain involving kids — that just seems unconscionable.
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It’s sad, and no comedian should be using this story for comedy bits. It’s unfortunate that the Sanfords cannot reasonably get along, and Ms. Sanford feels she has no other alternative but to turn to the Courts for relief. However, that’s what the Court is there for.
Having said that, it may not be as bad as the legal pleadings make it out to me. There’s always two sides to every case. Also, I have to agree that the relief requested looks pretty standard. A Guardian is essentially required in any disputed custody/visitation case. I wouldn’t read too much into that at all.
I did think it was odd that the pleading contemplated that it would be amended. I’ve never filed a pleading with an intention to amend it later. I’ve certainly amended, but I’ve never filed something that I knew I would amend later. Not sure what the deal is with that.
We all agree the human side of this story is sad. And it’s common.
But lets set that aside for the moment. The voters of Sanford’s district had 2 chances to keep this scoundrel out of serving in the United States Congress. Given the conservative leanings of the district it would have been perfectly reasonable to pick another conservative during the primary. But noooooo. They picked this guy. Then the fine folks of the Charleston area could have picked the Democrat. But again, noooooo. They picked Mark Sanford with all his baggage. That was the election that caused me to throw my hands up and surrender to the complete illogic of our electoral process. There really is no hope when people just won’t vote rationally.
Bryan, what about the “no paramours” bit. My GAL spidey sense says that’s what’s up…
Me too. Though I would think that kind of request wouldn’t be unusual. I certainly understand not wanting your ex’s lover in the house overnight when your child is staying there. But if they’re living together, what can you do?
The courts don’t respect shacking up. No overnights while the kids are there with persons of the opposite sex unrelated by blood or marriage is standard. The paramour needs to stay elsewhere, or the kids don’t stay overnight.
Once someone is divorced, and engaged to their lover, doesn’t that person cease to be a “paramour” and become a “fiancee”? I think the term “paramour” is typically only used when discussing someone’s partner in an extramarital affair….
There are permanent “fiancés/fiancées” ….old Mainers call them sposes, cause they’re sposed to get married. In many communities, the term fiancé just means significant other.
Why doesn’t Mark go ahead and marry her already, and remove the primary cause of action? Curious….
I define a “paramour” as anyone you’re romantically involved with but not married to. Sometimes it’s helpful to have clear boundaries, so as not confuse younger children. However, in this case the children aren’t that young, it’s going to become moot whenever Mark and Maria get married. Also, for the Court to really put that in place you need to show some kind of specific detrimental effect on the children. I don’t know if that’s occurring or not.
My eyebrow raised at her request to have him take anger management classes. That’s not something I typically see.
Perhaps Jenny is the one who needs a good dose of “anger management”…
Um, yeah. This reads like a scorned woman’s play. Maybe there is cause, but….
I am surprised Jenny didn’t get a no paramours clause from the start.
Yes, it becomes moot when/if they marry, but studies show “paramours” are major culprits in sexual abuse cases, but usually that is men. The influence of shifting girlfriends is also real, but Mark does seem to be sticking with the original Other Woman.
So I sense this is bitterness from Jenny.
I was about to write that “Paramour Maria can sexually abuse my adult self any time she wants.” but maybe I should just keep quiet…
Yep, “Silence” is golden……
I have seen the anger management request maybe twice. Things get nasty when the divorced parties cannot work things out on their own. An exchange gets heated and the calmer spouse calls for anger management….while continuing to needle the angry party.
The psych eval suggests she thinks he might have a personality disorder, which from my vantage looks credible.
I would quibble with the general idea that a “calmer” party would be the one calling for the other to enter into an anger management program – or would make antagonistic, disparaging and inflammatory court filings over such private matters.
Certainly it appears in this case that one party is a needler. The “calmer” response would be that either both or neither one ought to submit to a psych. evaluation.
Anyway, while we all know being a sitting US Congressman in no way inculcates anyone from being an awful person, would it not practically guarantee that one is not going be be judged unfit by a court? So I’m sort of stuck with this as yet another example of how much harm bitterness can cause. It’s like a grenade detonating within a family – of any sort of composition.
Okay, putatively calmer party….
I guess my question was answered; they both may need to be evaluated.
Why would Mark Sanford call Jenny “crazy” in his press release? We were all sort of onboard with that developing reality – but there was no need for him to say it like that. Doing so certainly diminished has own standing. Every time he gets up he knocks himself down again…
Yeah, there seem to be issues on both sides. She seems bitter and vindictive and he seems like he thinks the rules don’t apply to him, with some cause. He should have at least staked out the high road.
I’m just glad I speak a language that still makes a place for wonderfully quaint words like “paramour.”
While it is a great word, the problem is that it makes dirty what is otherwise normal. Divorced people have relationships – just like single people do. Using a word like Paramour is to wield language in such a way as to specifically attempt to make such relationships illicit – as with marital adultery – instead of simply recognizing it for what it is – a relationship between people who are entirely permitted to have such relationships.
If divorce is legally permissible, then continuing to make use of words such as Paramour to define any sort of relationship one wishes to taint ought not to be; especially when the word is meant to perpetuate disagreements regarding children and maintain a state of post-divorce legal discord.
It might sound quaint, but it packs an odious wallop.
Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned… especially when she is replaced by a younger, hotter woman and her ex-husband get elected to Congress.
Move on, Jenny.
I am not sure Maria is hotter, but she seems a lot warmer in personality. Not hard to be, granted.
“I am not sure Maria is hotter”
I’d bet the male perspective would run at least 90-10 in favor of Maria. At least!
Having reviewed the tape, the ruling on the field stands.
And the reviewer up in the booth agrees with the ruling on the field as well. Although 90-10 might be upgraded to 95-5 without much disagreement.
And if she wants to keep everything out of the public eye, why take it to court? Mark seems like a hardheaded scofflaw, sure, but how damaging are his alleged actions to a sophomore in high school?
I hope they get a good Guardian ad Litem. One with a good BS meter!
I hope they get a good Guardian ad Litem. One with a good BS meter!
If I were her lawyer, I’d try to find a GAL that was politically liberal. Someone like bud.
🙂
Just go to the Triangle in North Carolina, pick any Guardian ad Litem off the list and you immediately have a liberal equivalent to bud. A friend just went through the process in the Raleigh-Durham area and the Guardian ad Litem and her hand picked psychologists labeled him as a prime example of a serial abuser and a list of disorders I have never heard about before. Heck, after reading the reports, if I didn’t know him as well as I do, I would have wanted to send him to jail on general principle.
Oh, no. Here we go, now…
Sanford has responded to his ex-wife’s filing, calling it “preposterous, crazy and wrong.” Here’s the story…
Sanford has responded to his ex-wife’s filing, calling it “preposterous, crazy and wrong.”
~~~
…”nothing I can do is […] enough, appropriate or adequate.”
This may be a simple case of Idiot’s Savants. Listen to the cadence of his words.
Mark Sanford MUST BE speaking for himself, as no seasoned veteran of the law and press would want his [or her] thoughts broadcast in that tempo: three adjectives/three adjectives.
For song lyrics, this is usually a hit; for personal vomit which readers are forced to ingest — nauseating. Perhaps even infuriating.
you immediately have a liberal equivalent to bud.
-Bart
You mean I’m a conservative version of a guardian ad-litem? In the words of Garfield, I resemble that remark.
In the words of the immortal Garfield: “I don’t do Monday’s”
also: “Lasagna!”
Sorry if the comment didn’t come out right. I should have said that you “immediately have someone who is as liberal as bud.”