now, here's how to handle your husband's adultery

The Washington Post's Ruth Marcus in the C-J with an interesting article on Jenny Sanford-- and how she stacks up (amazingly well) against the spouses of other philandering husbands...

Jenny Sanford presents a new and improved version of the betrayed political spouse — neither enabler nor victim.

We're all too familiar with the usual drill, in all its excruciating permutations. In one, the wronged wife stands, looking stricken, by the side of cheating pol as cameras whir....In another, the wife is not on display but issues supportive, if unnervingly euphemistic, press release....

I have to confess to, and apologize for, having preconceived notions about Jenny Sanford that turn out to have nothing to do with who she actually is. I heard "wife of conservative Christian governor," saw the picture of her with those four well-groomed boys and figured her for someone who wouldn't have the spine to stick up for herself.

Boy was I wrong. She is as smart as Elizabeth [Edwards] or Hillary, except trade the law degree for an investment banking vice presidency (Lazard Freres) — and...tougher, too, at least when it comes to husbands.

What I admire most about Sanford's response is that she has apparently concluded — correctly so — that the person who is humiliated by her husband's affair is, in fact, her husband, not her....

He rambled on in a news conference; she crafted an elegant and thoughtful statement.

I admire her mature view of adultery as not a one strike (or even three trips to Argentina) and you're out transgression, but also her refusal to tolerate its continuation. "We reached a point where I felt it was important to look my sons in the eyes and maintain my dignity, self-respect and my basic sense of right and wrong," Sanford said in her statement. "I therefore asked my husband to leave two weeks ago."

I admire, too, her practical vision of real love and what it takes to make a marriage work....Now, she still has her feet on the ground even as her husband is head over heels — with another woman. "I believe enduring love is primarily a commitment and an act of will, and for a marriage to be successful, that commitment must be reciprocal," Jenny Sanford said in her statement.

And I admire her investment banker steel. "He was told in no uncertain terms not to see her," she said in an interview with The Associated Press last week about her husband's pleas for permission to visit his mistress. And, on his decision to defy her, "You would think that a father who didn't have contact with his children, if he wanted those children, he would toe the line a little bit."

Wow. Maybe this is a new role model for all wronged spouses, not just political ones.