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The senior Republican senator from South Carolina -- who serves in the U.S. Air Force Reserves and opposes taking sexual assault cases out of the military chain of command -- says that women in the armed services "put up with way too much crap."

In a Memorial Day interview, Fox News host Chris Wallace pointed out to Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) that the Department of Defense had estimated that there were 26,000 members of the armed forces sexually assaulted last year.

"I want to salute the women who serve and are putting up with way too much crap," Graham replied. "This needs to end. When a victim comes forward, they should have an advocate to walk them through the military justice system. And commanders who allow this to continue to flourish, quite frankly, should be fired."

"It is a disgrace to the United States military. And the women in the military are needed now more than ever, and they're putting up with way too much and it needs to end."

Earlier this month, Graham said that he opposed a bill sponsored by Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY) that would strip military commanders of the decision of prosecute sexual assault cases.

The South Carolina Republican insisted that the decision should remain within the chain of command.

"I think it will do a lot of damage," Graham said. "For 200 years, military commanders have been the court martial authority."

"And sexual assaults are not on the rise because the military justice system lets people go. It’s on the rise because of the culture that’s created in the military."

In February, Air Force commander Lt. Gen. Craig Franklin enraged members of Congress by overturning a jury's guilty verdict in a sexual assault case.

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Yeah, he went there if you can believe it. Fox News Sunday's Chris Wallace actually asked disgraced former South Carolina governor and now newly elected Congressman Mark Sanford if he plans on running for president, Does anyone think he'd ever ask, say Anthony Weiner, if he throws his hat into the ring for the New York mayoral race, that same question? I didn't think so.

WALLACE: Back in 2009, before all this personal stuff, you were exploring a possibility of running for president in 2012, even exploring the idea of setting up a nationwide organization. So the question is, does your political comeback now end as a Congressman from the 1st congressional district of South Carolina, or is there the possibility of higher office?

SANFORD: What I say is, one, people will begin to look at that fully. There's a big gulf between them looking at it fully and saying you ought to do this, that you ought to look at this, and me doing it. So I haven't pulled any tripwire on that front, but you're exactly right, a number of people were suggesting those kind of things. My focus... my focus is to be the absolutely best congressman that I can be for the 1st congressional district of South Carolina.

Wallace followed up by asking him what the Republican party needs to do to start winning national elections again, as though this wingnut is going to have anything to recommend other than his party moving even further to the right where he and his ilk have taken them. If Republicans are going to get any help with their so-called "rebranding effort" it's not going to come from the likes of Mark Sanford.

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Mark Sanford, the South Carolina congressman-elect who notoriously lied and said he was hiking the Appalachian Trail when he was actually in Argentina having an affair, on Sunday compared Fox News to The National Enquirer after a host asked him if he had set a date to marry his mistress.

During a Mother's Day interview following Sanford's win in South Carolina's 1st Congressional District, Fox News host Chris Wallace asked the former governor what he had learned from the scandal.

"You learn a lot!" Sanford asserted from his shotgun-adorned home on Seabrook Island. "You probably learn more in the valleys of life than you do in the mountain tops with regards to God's grace, with regard to the reflective grace through the people that you walk with on a daily basis. I have to say that I learned a lot about judgment, I learned a lot about forgiveness."

"You are now engaged to the women with whom you had the affair, Maria Belen Chapur," Wallace noted. "What did your four boys think of that and have they accepted her?"

"I'm not going to go into inter-family conversations," Sanford insisted. "But I would just say it is what it is."

"Do you have a date for your wedding and will your fiance come to Washington to live with you?" the Fox News host pressed, adding, "I feel like I'm The National Enquirer here."

"Exactly!" the South Carolina Republican laughed. "What is this Fox News or National Enquirer? So, I'm not going to make news on that front tonight -- or this morning."

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Stephen Colbert expressed his dismay after his sister, Elizabeth Colbert Busch lost in a special election to former governor and "Appalachian Trail" hiker, Mark Sanford for South Carolina's 1st Congressional district.

Colbert turns his back on South Carolina over Sanford win: ‘I feel so betrayed’:

On Wednesday night’s edition of “The Colbert Report,” Stephen Colbert lashed out at his home state of South Carolina for failing to elect his sister Elizabeth Colbert Busch to Congress, and re-electing former Gov. Mark Sanford (R) to the congressional seat he held before running for governor.

“Folks, tonight I am angry,” he said to the roaring crowd that greeting him at the show’s opening. “And for once, that doesn’t make me happy.”

Rolling video clips of South Carolina’s election results, he said, “And I think you know why.”

“My sister lost!” he said, although he got his hopes up briefly when CNN said she’d lost, which, according to their recent track record, clearly meant she had won.

“Mark Sanford beat my sister,” said Colbert, “and I believe that means that Mark Sanford is now my sister. And on behalf of my entire family, I want to say we’re deeply sorry about him.”

After saying he was then going to turn his back on South Carolina, Colbert went on to make it obvious that was going to be a lot easier said than done, since he didn't seem to thrilled with the idea of becoming a Tar Heel and wasn't wild about North Carolina's barbeque either.

Maybe Stephen can have Brad Friedman on some time in the near future to discuss whether his sister actually lost in a landslide or not and their one hundred percent unverifiable touch-screen voting machines, the use of which have guaranteed that we will never know for sure what the results of that election were.

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Heritage Foundation President Jim DeMint on Monday said that he opposed a bipartisan plan for comprehensive immigration reform because "unlawful immigrants" could live "another 50 years" and take advantage of government benefits that they earned by paying taxes.

At a press conference on Monday, the Heritage Foundation released a report that claimed the immigration reform bill offered by the "Gang of Eight" senators would cost Americans $6.3 trillion.

"The number over the 50-year lifespan of an amnesty for unlawful immigrants, it's $6.3 trillion to the American taxpayer," DeMint told Fox News host Martha MacCallum prior to the press conference. "And we know over time that this is going to increase more debt, increase taxes. That has a depressing effect on our economy. And we know that unlawful immigrants -- once that they have amnesty -- are going to replace the jobs of many Americans and depress their salaries."

"So there is no way you can look at this and conclude that it's good for the American taxpayer, and that includes immigrants who are here lawfully."

MacCallum noted that most benefits would not be available to immigrants for 13 years under the proposed plan.

"I'll believe that when I see it," the former South Carolina senator quipped. "Even if they follow through, unlawful immigrants are already receiving many benefits. A lot of their children are legal American citizens, whether its public education or Medicaid. But if you just look at a 13-year window when the life expectancy of unlawful immigrants goes another 50 years and once they get on Social Security and Medicare -- I mean, the average cost of an unlawful immigrant is hundreds of thousands of dollars."

DeMint added that he was all for immigration reform as long as "lower-skilled, less-educated" immigrants were excluded from the plan.

"In 1960, the average immigrant had about the same education and skill level of an American citizen. Today, immigrants have -- they're four times less likely to even have a high school diploma. And now with all of our welfare benefits, the arithmetic for immigration is totally different."

(h/t: Twitter/@igorvolsky)

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Democratic strategist James Carville on Sunday praised tea party-backed Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) as "the most talented and fearless Republican politician" in the last 30 years.

In a panel discussion on Sunday, ABC News host George Stephanopoulos noted that recent news reports indicated that Cruz had been examining a possible run for president in 2016.

"The people love Ted Cruz because he's taking on his own party, his own leadership, he's taking on the other party," former Sen. Jim DeMint (R-SC) opined. "He's trying to rock the boat to get us to stop moving towards this cliff that we're headed for as a country. So I've been in about 25 cities in the last few months, all you have to do is mention Ted Cruz and people get on their feet."

"I think he is the most talented and fearless Republican politician I've seen the last 30 years," Carville agreed. "I further think that he's going to run for president and he's going to create something. I'm not sitting here saying that he's going to win. And I think Sen. DeMint is right. I've listened to excerpts of his speech in South Carolina, he touches every button, and this guy has no fear. He just keeps ploughing ahead, and he is going to be something to watch."

"And a lot of Republicans feel this way," he continued. "You hear this a lot, 'If we only got someone who is articulate and was for what we were for, we would win elections. And we get these John McCains and these Mitt Romneys these squishy guys that can't do anything.' Well, there's one thing this guy is not: He ain't squishy, not in the least."

"We're anti-squishy men," Republican strategist Mary Matalin, who is married to Carville, volunteered. "We like really hard men."

(h/t: Mediaite)

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I'm not sure just how "humble" former South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford has been when he's done things like ask his ex to manage his campaign, introduced his mistress to his children for the first time onstage after he found out he won his primary race, trespassed on his ex-wife's property and then took out a full page ad explaining it, or having a mock debate with a photo of Nancy Pelosi -- but that's what he claimed during his debate this Monday evening with his Democratic opponent for the U.S. House seat vacated by now Sen. Tim Scott, Elizabeth Colbert Busch

SANFORD: Yeah, I was just going to say, the second part of what I think I would bring to bear is, you don't go through the experience I has back in 2009 without a greater level of humility. And what I would say, what I would say is that willingness to sit down with a Republican or a Democrat alike and say, you know, I know what I believe, I believe what I believe. I believe the facts support what I'm suggesting, but let me just sit down with you and let me just a little bit better understand where you're coming from.

Wow. So it made him more willing to reach across the aisle as well. Who'd have thought getting caught with your mistress "hiking the Appalachian Trail" would do all that for you? Sanford may be a lot of things, but "humble" or "bipartisan" sure as hell aren't the first two things I think of when I hear his name.

Colbert Busch was tough. She did a really good job during the debate, but it's a blood red district, so we'll see how things turn out on election day. Here's more with a recap on the debate for anyone that missed it: Sanford, Colbert Busch square off in SC debate:

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In this brief but telling exchange last night South Carolinian voters saw just about everything they needed to see from the two: Colbert Busch was combative and easily won the debate, and former Governor Sanford was as slimy and as evasive as ever.

via Politico

That was a reference to Sanford’s use of state funds to fly to Argentina to visit his mistress and now fiancé, an affair that derailed his political career four years ago.

“She went there, Governor Sanford,” one of the debate’s moderators responded.

With much of the crowd hooting and hollering, Sanford seemed shaken.

“I couldn’t hear what she said… repeat it, I didn’t hear,” he said.

“Answer the question,” Colbert Busch interjected.

“What was the question?” Sanford said, appearing stunned.“Ok, but anyway, ah ah, on the sequester, I’ll go back to the sequester…”

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Bill Maher answered his own question while discussing the political prospects for Anthony Weiner and whether he is able to make a comeback in New York, compared to Mr. Appalachian trail, Mark Sanford, who has already been forgiven and won his party's primary for the upcoming House race in South Carolina.

As Maher explained during his New Rules segment this Friday, the Republicans are the Christian party and "there's nothing Evangelicals eat up like a redemption story," but when it comes to the Jewish guy from New York, "no Jesus mulligan for him."

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Republican South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham on Sunday praised President Barack Obama's budget that reportedly cuts future increases to earned benefits programs like Social Security and Medicare.

Several media outlets reported last week that the White House would adopt chained CPI, a less generous way of calculating Social Security cost-of-living increases that assumes seniors will change their buying habits as certain items become more expensive.

Compared with the current model, advocacy group Social Security Works has said that a person who began drawing Social Security at the age of 62 would be receiving 7.32 percent less in benefits per year by the age of 88 under chained CPI.

"I'm looking at the biggest spending cut in American history by reforming entitlements, saving those entitlements," Graham told NBC's David Gregory on Sunday. "And the president's showing a little bit of leg here. This is somewhat encouraging."

"His overall budget is not going to make it, but he has made a step forward in the entitlement reform process that would allow a guy like me to begin to talk about flattening the tax code and generating more revenue."

The senior Republican senator from South Carolina asserted that the key to a grand bargain on the budget was immigration.

"And as to Republicans, the politics of self-deportation are behind us," he warned. "Mitt Romney is a good man. He ran -- in many ways -- a good campaign, but it was an impractical solution. Quite frankly, it was offensive. Every corner of the Republican Party, from libertarians to the RNC, House Republicans and the rank-and-file Republican Party member is now understanding there has to be an earned pathway to citizenship."

Graham added that Obama "showed some leadership" with proposals to cut Social Security and Medicare "and that puts the burden on us to do the same thing."