Taking the opportunity on Politico to say What the GOP Needs to Do, South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford offers his version of timeless Republican principles that must be returned to:

Some on the left will say our electoral losses are a repudiation of our principles of lower taxes, smaller government and individual liberty. But Election Day was not a rejection of those principles — in fact, cutting taxes and spending were important tenets of Barack Obama’s campaign.

Conspicuous by its absence here is any mention of social conservatism (or, for that matter, foreign policy conservatism). Sanford is an Episcopalian who went so far as to express opposition to South Carolina’s new “I Believe” license plate (though he couldn’t bring himself to veto the legislation authorizing it). As his citation of “individual liberty” indicates, he speaks for the Ron Paul corner of the party. It’s got its enthusiasts, of course, but in the large Republican scheme of things is not to be taken seriously.