I attended a breakfast this morning with Gov. Mark Sanford (R-S.C.), hosted by The American Spectator and Americans for Tax Reform. It was a wonky and self-reflective affair — Sanford mused that he’d been “emasculated” once or twice by the South Carolina legislature — with one Mel Brooks moment. Responding to a question from Amanda Carpenter of The Washington Times on whether opposition to the economic stimulus package should be a defining issue for Republicans, Sanford paused and referred to the rule that the 40th president had for criticizing other members of his party.

“The whole Ronald Reagan ‘Thirteenth Commandment’ thing,” Sanford started to say. He corrected himself: “Errr — Eleventh Commandment. Whatever it was. Yeah, the Eleventh.”

As the conservatives around the table chuckled (with him, not at him), Sanford saved himself with a joke: “My wife gives me fifteen.”