Journalism

What a Day!

Last Updated on March 8, 2015

It was quite the news day, as many of you already know.

For a few days now, we’ve been left to speculate about what was going on with South Carolina’s governor, Mark Sanford.&nbsp  The goofiness began when it was reported that he “disappeared” the Thursday before Father’s Day, itself an odd development for a politician who placed importance on family values.

It was reported that he was on a little vacation, which wasn’t in itself unreasonable.&nbsp  But then the curious little things started coming to light:&nbsp  his staff remained strangely silent about his wherabouts, choosing to wait until a nationwide rumor mill had begun churning at full speed before explaining that he had gone to the Appalachain Trail for a hiking trip.&nbsp  Then lawmakers began complaining that no one had heard from him in days.&nbsp  His security detail, apparently, wasn’t on the trip with him.&nbsp  No one had a way to reach him by cell phone.&nbsp  The Lieutenant Governor, Andre Bauer, who might be expected to be temporarily in charge of things, wasn’t being told where he was, either.

Then there were reports that Sanford’s last cell phone call was traced to Atlanta.&nbsp  I’ll come back to this little tidbit in a minute.

His wife reportedly told a member of the press that she had no idea where he was, but wasn’t particularly concerned by this fact, which is not the sort of thing you’d necessarily expect the wife of a public official to tell a reporter, unless she hoped to get the rumor mill going a little faster herself.

Then his car, a black SUV, was found at Columbia’s airport, suggesting that he’d flown to Atlanta, then…where?

Now back to the cell phone thing:&nbsp  how does that work, exactly?&nbsp  If I wanted to know where either of my two closest friends might be, I’d have no idea who to call to start a trace on their cell phone signal.&nbsp  I seriously doubt if there’s a listing for “cell phone triangulation” in the Yellow Pages, for those of us who stubbornly still use a phone book once in a while.&nbsp  In fact, as far as I know, you pretty much have to be in law enforcement or have a court order to start such a trace.&nbsp  So how did that come about?

The goofiness continued when it was reported by Sanford’s staff that he was somewhat taken aback by the buzz about his disappearance, as if it were perfectly normal for a sitting governor to vanish, making no public announcement that he was taking a short vacation, and leaving state officials with no way to get in touch with him.&nbsp  I mean, really: a quick statement from the Governor’s Office, indicating that he was taking a short vacation to recharge after the stimulus battle he lost, if released before his “getaway” would have been all that would have been necessary to make this story never raise an eyebrow from the very beginning.

Sanford announced through his staff that he would return to the office Wednesday.&nbsp  It was then announced that he’d hold a media availability — something that used to be called a press conference, although I see no need for a change of title — at 2:00pm.&nbsp  He was, presumably, going to answer questions about the oddity of his vacation.&nbsp  He might even address some rumors that were, by now, running rampant.

At 2:00pm, most local stations — probably all of them, but I wasn’t watching all monitors in the newsroom at the time — went on the air with special reports, anchors ready to pitch to a pool camera from ETV (which is, for non-SC residents, the state’s PBS network stations), at the state capitol building.&nbsp  But what those of us in the control room saw at 2:00pm wasn’t a lecturn with a collection of microphones:&nbsp  we saw, instead, an electronic slate indicating the press conference would start at 2:00pm.

By 2:05pm, anchors were still talking, still summing up what had happened, showing file video, and, likely, wishing that somebody would do something to get the press conference started.&nbsp  It was still going to be another few minutes before stations would get word that the 2:00pm press conference was now going to be a 2:30pm press conference.

Nothing like notice.

Sanford appeared, finally, about 22 minutes later, as a large crowd of reporters, photographers, spectators and staff members surrounded him.&nbsp  Here’s where the goofiness came to an abrupt end.&nbsp  The mood was suddenly dark and gloomy.

Sanford wasn’t indignant, as anyone who’d just wanted to take a few innocent days off and was annoyed by the presumption of something “darker” might have been.&nbsp  He seemed melancholy.&nbsp  Something bad was about to come.

He then explained that he was a “bottom line” kind of guy, which was a nice way to begin.&nbsp  That told us that we were going to get an answer pretty quickly.&nbsp  Several minutes later, after apologizing to a list of people that would rival a “thank you” list at the Oscars, he finally got to that bottom line:&nbsp  he had been unfaithful to his wife with a woman nearly 5,000 miles away in Argentina.

There comes a moment, for people who work in the news business, when the story flips some magic switch that can make you forget, temporarily, about the human equation.&nbsp  It’s the same way a bad accident gets EMS workers’ blood flowing or flames shooting from a home’s roof gets firefighters’ adrenaline coursing in all directions.&nbsp  The firefighters focus on the flames, not granny’s irreplacable photo burning in the hall.&nbsp  The EMS workers focus on getting the heart restarted, not the nice man who never had a mean thing to say about anyone who’s now moments from death.&nbsp  And reporters focus on the questions: the who, what, when, where, why, how, before the people immediately affected by those answers.

None of them are bad people for thinking that way:&nbsp  it’s precisely how each group is trained.

But now that the heat of the moment of a breaking story has passed, it’s time to think about the tragedy of a family that has been so needlessly and unnecessarily wounded.&nbsp  Many people have said it’s the Sanford kids who’ll suffer the most and they’re certainly right.

I suspect that they’ve already suffered a great deal.

I’m not sure I understand why it is that people cheat on their spouses.&nbsp  How often do they ever get away with it without it being discovered…sooner or later?&nbsp  And when you’re in such a high-profile position, how can you honestly expect that no one will ever find out?

One of the things Sanford said during his statement today was that sometimes we need protection from ourselves.

Some of us need a lot more than we realize.

the authorPatrick
Patrick is a Christian with more than 30 years experience in professional writing, producing and marketing. His professional background also includes social media, reporting for broadcast television and the web, directing, videography and photography. He enjoys getting to know people over coffee and spending time with his dog.