John Avlon: “From the start of this unlikely campaign, Sanford has been easy to underestimate. His well-chronicled scandal, which brought ‘hiking the Appalachian Trail‘ into the lexicon, obscured his ability to connect with low-country voters. There’s a reason Sanford has never lost an election, and during the crowded GOP primaries I was struck by the way local voters called him ‘Mark’ rather than ‘Governor’ — and his evident mastery of policy details helped him stand out from the pack. For all the easy accusations of hypocrisy, Sanford had never been a social conservative Bible-thumper as much as strident fiscal conservative who was railing against the deficit and debt while arguing for entitlement reform back in the 1990s.”

The Week: “South Carolina voters, it seems, are almost French in their willingness to forgive an extramarital affair.”

Jon Stewart mocked the media for suggesting New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie (R) underwent stomach surgery to lose weight because he wants to run for president in 2016.

[Read more…]

A new Franklin & Marshall Poll in finds just 25% of Pennsylvania voters believe Gov. Tom Corbett (R) has performed well enough in office to deserve reelection.

Perhaps even more striking is that just 48% of Corbett’s fellow Republicans believe he deserves reelection.

Jill Lawrence
says Terry McAuliffe (D) has a potential problem with women voters even though he’s running against anti-abortion candidate Ken Cuccinelli (R) for Virginia governor.

Passages in McAuliffe’s book include him “ditching his wife Dorothy
while she was in labor” but the “more problematic anecdote to me is one that
involves the birth of another baby, in this case a newborn son whom
McAuliffe left in the car with Dorothy on the way home from the hospital
while he spent 15 minutes at a fundraiser. She was in tears, he writes.
How the heck did he think women would react to that?”

BuzzFeed looks at nine passages from McAuliffe’s book that might make voters cringe.

A new NBC News/Marist poll in Virginia finds Ken Cuccinelli (R) leading Terry McAuliffe (D) in the race for governor among likely voters, 45% to 42%.

Among all voters, McAuliffe holds a small lead, 43% to 41%.

First Read: “The good news for McAuliffe is that he has plenty of room to grow (44%
of voters say they’re unsure/never heard of him, compared with 32% who
say that about Cuccinelli). And the Republican Party is a potential drag
for Cuccinelli: The GOP has a 37%-53% fav/unfav rating in the state,
versus the Democratic Party’s 44%-46% score. Yet so far, before any
negative advertising begins, the poll doesn’t show the party dragging
Cuccinelli down — his fav/unfav is 42%-27%.”

A new NBC News/Marist poll in New Jersey finds Gov. Chris Christie (R) running away in his re-election bid with a 32 point lead over challenger Barbara Buono, 60% to 28%.

First Read: “The poll also explains why Christie is disagreeing with his national
party some of the time. The GOP’s fav/unfav in the survey is 34%-59%,
versus the Democratic Party’s 50%- 43% score.”

“I want to acknowledge a God not just of second chances. But a God of third, fourth, fifth, sixth, seventh, eighth, ninth chances because that is the reality of our shared humanity.”

— Rep.-elect Mark Sanford (R-SC), quoted by The State, in his special election victory speech last night.

The Boston Globe notes the insider account of Mitt Romney’s presidential campaign by Gabriel Shoenfeld — to be published next week — is an attempt  to persuade the Republican Party to jettison “the ­mechanical poll- and focus-group-driven ­approach embraced by the Romney campaign.”

“Romney’s campaign was marked by its discipline and the tightknit nature of top advisers. They have remained relatively loyal even in the aftermath of a stinging defeat, so a tell-all book from a former adviser could provide a provocative ­account of what went on ­behind the scenes.”

Bill Clinton insisted that his wife, Hillary Clinton, “hasn’t mentioned” to him whether she’ll run for president because she’s enjoying being a private citizen, ABC News reports.

Said Clinton: “I don’t know what’s going to happen, but I know this: that is the worst expenditure of our time.”

He added that it is “frustrating” that the conversation has gone back to politics so soon after the 2012 elections.

Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-MN) “is engaged in settlement negotiations in a lawsuit alleging that senior members of her presidential campaign stole a proprietary e-mail list of home-school families from the computer of an Iowa campaign staffer,” the Minneapolis Star Tribune reports.

Former South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford (R), looking for redemption after his political career was sidelined by scandal, easily won the special election for the congressional seat he once held for three terms, the AP reports.