The Patrick’s Place Poll asking whether Governor Mark Sanford should stay in office or resign ended with a 67/33% split favoring resignation.

For the third of respondents who think Sanford shouldn’t have to step down, I have to wonder why they feel that way. I sure hope it’s not the tired old, “Clinton did the same thing and stayed in office” argument; Clinton never left the country without telling his office where he could be reached in an emergency, leaving the government (through a constitutional technicality) with no one in charge.

In any case, a new article in the Washington Post reveals that during that 2008 trip to Argentina Sanford reimbursed the state for, he actually tried to arrange for light days so he could tour Buenos Aires and, presumably, visit his mistress.

It’s a good thing he’s already paid the state back for that trip. But it definitely calls into question his leadership ability, and certainly his priorities, to know that he was trying to lighten the load of official business for an Argentine rendezvous.

Meanwhile, state GOP leaders recently voted to censure Sanford for “demonstrating repeated failures to act in accordance with … core [Republican] principles and beliefs,” but stopped short of asking him to resign. Of the 41 members who voted, a quarter felt censuring wasn’t enough and wanted him to resign.

Inexplicably, another 25% felt no action should be taken against him at all. I wonder how many of Sanford’s supporters would have been so quick to forget if a Democrat had committed this kind of failure.

Yeah, I think we all know the answer to that one.