Another week, another sex scandal: Word broke late yesterday that former GOP Rep. Chip Pickering is the latest politico in trouble for allegedly cheating on his wife. Pickering’s now-estranged wife, Leisha, has filed suit against his alleged mistress, whom she says busted up their marriage and ruined her husband’s political career. The alleged other woman, Elizabeth Creekmore Byrd, was Pickering’s college sweetheart. The suit claims Pickering, who left Congress in January, began having an affair with Creekmore Byrd when he was still in the House and that their relationship ended both of their marriages. What’s so juicy about this latest dust-up? Well, while he was in Congress, Pickering just so happened to bunk at the increasingly infamous rowhouse at 133 C Street SE here in Washington, a “Christian fellowship home” where he was roomies with John Ensign and where Mark Sanford used to hang out. Ensign and Sanford, as the world well knows, have been caught up in their own sex scandals in recent weeks. C Street is even mentioned in Leisha Pickering’s lawsuit: She says her husband and Creekmore Byrd snuck around there. Scandal!

So what exactly is going on at this house on C Street? The Washington Post had a good profile a few weeks ago about the increasingly curious rowhouse, which is owned by a secretive religious group that encourages lawmakers to promote Christian ideals in public policy. At least five GOP members of Congress currently rent rooms there, including Ensign.

You can read the whole interview here. But a couple excerpts:

NEWSWEEK: In devising a new strategy for the party, where do you go from here?
SANFORD: There is an eternal tug of war within the party on where we go from here and how we find a way out. One camp says the key is to appeal to Hispanics and women and use technology more. The way out of the wilderness is to grow the tent. The other camp—and the one I fall in—says that you can build a big tent, but you have to make sure the poles can hold it up and that you're working from a good foundation. In many ways, a political party is nothing more than a brand. The great brands of time have succeeded in as much is that they've done what they say they're going to do. People buy a John Deere tractor because it does what it says they're going to do.

Who's responsible for crafting that image of what the party is supposed to do and turning around and selling it to people?
From a tactical standpoint, it's got to be Republican governors. The minority in Congress can try to impede policy, but that's very difficult. In these economic times, people want changes that will make a difference in their lives. I think that the way out of the wilderness will be getting back to the core and getting policies implemented that will be instrumental in people's lives. And I think for that, Republican governors will be particularly important.

Toward the end of the interview, I asked Sanford about the "rising star" label -- how it felt to know his party expected big things of him. "That's very flattering and kind," he said, awkwardly unsure of what else he could say. "But I can't be focused on that." Apparently, we now know, he wasn't.

Your Gaggler wondered yesterday if Mark Sanford would have to own up to using any state funds to either facilitate or cover up his infidelity. Now comes word via his press office that the South Carolina governor will reimburse the state for a junket to Argentina he took a year ago, which is when the affair apparently started. Here’s Sanford's statement:

As noted by the Department of Commerce, I attended a trade mission with the Department of Commerce last June. As the agenda notes, the mission was spent meeting with government and private business officials in both Brazil and Argentina. This trip was handled very professionally by the Department of Commerce, and I'm proud of their work there. However, while the purpose of this trip was an entirely professional and appropriate business development trip, I made a mistake while I was there in meeting with the woman who I was unfaithful to my wife with. That has raised some very legitimate concerns and questions, and as such I am going to reimburse the state for the full cost of the Argentina leg of this trip.

Mark Sanford's unexpected and emotional revelation of an affair yesterday has caused much hand-wringing about the future of a seemingly scandal-plagued GOP. Critics are quick to point out that the party espousing "family" values seems to be having some difficulty getting it's representatives to live accordingly. But here at the Gaggle, our memories are a little longer. We recall the days, not so long ago, when it seemed as though Democrats were the ones having trouble keeping their pants on. So we tasked our wonderful intern Aku Ammah-Tagoe to tally up who's been doing what to whom since the Wayne Hays scandal of 1976. My penchant for powerpoint graphs once again proved irresistable, so I turned the results into graphic form. (Please note, this is not an entirely scientific analysis. Politicians are grouped by year, according to when the affair/scandal was exposed.)

The first thing to note is that, according to our research, Democrats and Republicans are pretty even in terms of sex scandals since 1976. Democrats have edged ahead in recent years, but not by much (16-14 since 2000). Republicans led the way in the '80s and '90s. The other striking feature of this graph is the jump in the number of scandals this decade. We only found nine notable scandals in the '80s, compared with 30 since the turn of the century. Interestingly, the majority of these political affairs happened during the reign of arguably the most socially conservative president during the period we examined.

It's impossible to say whether affairs are more common now, or the media has gotten better at reporting on them, or the news cycle and new mediums allow for less privacy. There are potentially other factors at play too, like the fact that few Congressmen bring their families to live with them in DC these days as was common in the past. Now the pressures of fundraising drive members back to their districts whenever Congress is not in session. Perhaps these split-city lives place more strain on relationships than before. Or perhaps, as conservatives and even some feminists would argue, the overt sexualization of popular culture has altered our societal expectations of sex, its availability, and when and where it is appropriate. But I don't think there is an academically sound way to prove any of these hypotheses. Pick the one you like, and argue amongst yourselves.

One last thing to note is that just one female politician made the list: Helen Chenoweth, who admitted in 1998 to having an eight-year affair with a rancher in her home state of Idaho during the 1980s. Ironically (or maybe hypocritcally), Chenoweth was a vocal critic of President Bill Clinton during the Lewinsky scandal. So that is one out of 53, or 1.9%. Yes there are fewer women in politics overall, but this figure is a significantly smaller proportion than that. Maybe the solution to the political distraction and damage of sex scandals is simply to elect more women.

Aku's full list is after the jump. If we've missed anyone, please let us know in the comments and we'll update the graph.

The State newspaper publishes more of those Mark Sanford emails today, and now we’re getting more of the back story on how those messages were obtained and why the paper chose to not print them until now. As your Gaggler mentioned yesterday, the State reports that it had the Sanford emails since December. According to the New York Times, which has a nice write-up on the press’s handling of the affair, someone forwarded the emails to the paper anonymously. A State reporter then contacted “Maria” via her e-mail address in an attempt to confirm their authenticity, but never heard back. They apparently did not approach Sanford’s office. “What it was, was a puzzle piece that was hardly discernible,” the paper’s political editor tells the Times. But the paper didn’t really pursue it further, in part because reporters were so skeptical that Sanford might be a cheater. By their own account, Sanford was a weirdo, but an adulterer? No way. The paper still doesn’t know who sent the emails—a mystery that is indeed pretty interesting. Here’s your Gaggler’s question: Did Maria tell Sanford that reporters had contacted her? That was in December, and by Sanford’s own admission, his wife found out about the affair five months ago, in February.

BTW, today’s round of electronic pillow talk includes a mention of John McCain (Sanford talks about how he had been invited to spend some time in Aspen with the 2008 nom and how it had stirred up VP talk again); talk of their apparent first liaison at an open air dance in Uruguay (They’ll always have Punta del Este); and book recommendations (Maria gives a thumbs up to “The Age of Turbulence” by Alan Greenspan). Oh, and there’s Sanford’s odd movie recommendation: “The Holiday,” that Cameron Diaz/Jude Law/Kate Winslet chick flick about couples who fall in love on a holiday but live thousands of miles apart. “It’s music was pleasant and made me think of you—its mood and the notion of a holiday (wrapped up in our case over two days) certainly fit as well,” Sanford writes.

Speaking of other shoes to drop, the State newspaper down in South Carolina has published a series of emails between Gov. Mark Sanford and the woman in Argentina with whom he had an affair. The woman, identified only as “Maria,” refused to talk one of the paper’s reporters today when approached at her home in Buenos Aires, but the governor’s office doesn’t dispute the content of the emails, which date back to roughly one year ago. In the story, the State discloses that it's been in posession of the emails since December. (Oh really? What's the backstory there?) Warning: These emails are super cheesy, even for your Gaggler who will own up to watching the occasional episode of Days of Our Lives. (The guy who played Chris Kositchek now playing Roman? What is that about?) Here’s an excerpt of one Sanford love email to his beloved. Don’t say we didn’t warn you:

Two, mutual feelings .... You have a particular grace and calm that I adore. You have a level of sophistication that so fitting with your beauty. I could digress and say that you have the ability to give magnificent gentle kisses, or that I love your tan lines or that I love the curve of your hips, the erotic beauty of you holding yourself (or two magnificent parts of yourself) in the faded glow of the night’s light - but hey, that would be going into sexual details...

Three and finally, while all the things above are all too true - at the same time we are in a hopelessly - or as you put it impossible - or how about combine and simply say hopelessly impossible situation of love. How in the world this lightening strike snuck up on us I am still not quite sure. As I have said to you before I certainly had a special feeling about you from the first time we met, but these feelings were contained and I genuinely enjoyed our special friendship and the comparing of all too many personal notes...

Lastly I also suspect I feel a little vulnerable because this is ground I have never certainly never covered before - so if you have pearls of wisdom on how we figure all this out please let me know... In the meantime please sleep soundly knowing that despite the best efforts of my head my heart cries out for you, your voice, your body, the touch of your lips, the touch of your finger tips and an even deeper connection to your soul.

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In an emotional press conference this afternoon, South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford admitted that he had been cheating on his wife with a woman in Argentina, where he had been secretly vacationing the past six days. Sanford, who announced he was resigning his post as chairman of the Republican Governors Association, repeatedly apologized to his wife and kids and to his staff, whom he admitted misleading about his whereabouts. The governor’s aides told reporters yesterday that Sanford was hiking the Appalachian Trail, when in fact he was in Buenos Aires. “I’ve been unfaithful to my wife, and I developed a relationship with what started as a dear dear friend from Argentina,” Sanford said, tearfully.

Sanford insisted the affair began “innocently” with casual emails and phone calls—the woman had apparently sought Sanford’s advice on her own marital troubles. But their relationship developed into something more about a year ago, the governor said. He said he had seen the woman three times since then and that he had spent the last five days in Argentina “crying.” The governor told reporters that his wife and family had been aware of his affair for about five months and that he had spoken to his father-in-law about it before he left for Buenos Aires last week. Asked if he and his wife are separated, Sanford seemed to struggle for an answer. “I guess in the formal sense we’re not,” he finally said. Sanford, who had been repeatedly mentioned as a 2012 GOP presidential contender, was asked if he would resign from the governor’s office. He didn’t answer. “I’ve let down a lot of people,” he said. “And that’s the bottom line.”