Do you remember when Governor Mark Sanford ran for Governor of South Carolina the first time around and he became famous for his frugality? He wore the same blue blazer at every function, then insisted on wearing the very same worn out jacket at his inauguration. He and his wife held a down-home, casual, out-door barbeque instead of a formal ball to celebrate his election and they played up his frugal ways whenever possible. Well his obsession with frugality apparently doesn’t extend to the salaries earned by his top aides.

In the March 13^th edition of The Beat it was reported that Governor Sanford’s newly appointed Department of Insurance Director and former top political aide, Scott Richardson will earn $137,126 per year. His predecessor Eleanor Kitzman earned $100,000 a year. The independent Salary Commission had recommended a salary of $112,407 for Richardson. The Beat reports that a salary comparison shows the Governors seven highest salaries currently go to all male cabinet members. No women are in the top half of the highest paid cabinet members. The top male salary in Sanford’s cabinet is $159,878, while the top female is $111,320, a difference of nearly $50,000.

This situation reminds me of the time that I accidentally on purpose discovered that my radio news co-host, who happened to be a male and who I also happened to supervise was earning more than $20,000 more than I was per year. When I confronted the owner of the radio station about this pay discrepancy and asked for an explanation, he said he didn’t want to insult the male co-host by offering him a lower salary than he had earned when he had worked as the News Director. So in other words it was perfectly acceptable to insult me by paying me less in a supervisory capacity than to insult a man by paying him less to be supervised by a woman. That’s truly twisted. I did by the way end up getting a pay hike but only through direct confrontation.

I find it perverse that Mark Sanford refuses to raise taxes on cigarettes to help pay for health coverage for our most vulnerable citizens without a tax reduction but goes out of his way to raise salaries for his closest male political cronies far above the recommended level of independent experts. I’m so tired of people telling me what a wonderful Christian and caring person Mark Sanford is. His actions speak volumes and his actions are sexist and self serving.