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Sunday, July 05, 2009
Governor: Just Let Us Know Where You Are
By Leslie Linthicum
Journal Staff Writer
See what can happen when your governor won't tell the news media where he's going and what he's doing in his spare time?
First, there's confusion, then worry, then an embarrassed return, a tearful news conference and — the cotton candy to the whole circus — a dump of e-mails about tan lines and curving hips and "magnificent gentle kisses."
If you haven't been following the surreal saga of South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford, you've missed some fantastic political theater and truly mortifying behavior by an elected head of state.
You can watch Sanford unraveling before your very eyes, but let me recap: He went AWOL — no word to anyone on his staff — and when he finally checked in five days later, he claimed he had wanted to clear his head and was hiking on the Appalachian Trail. But then a pesky reporter was at the Atlanta airport when he stepped off an international flight the next day and the jig was up: He'd actually been cheating on his wife with his Argentine lover (which he'd done before, by the way, while on a taxpayer-funded trade mission) and crying and (it gets confusing here) admiring her hips and comparing tan lines and disappointing his God.
Whew, thank goodness he's OK.
What does all this have to do with New Mexico, except to take some focus off our own rumored statehouse scandals that involve comparatively boring things like favors for money?
Nothing, except it brings a little more focus to an argument Gov. Bill Richardson and his staff have been having with the news media for more than six years now.
The disagreement boils down to this: We at the Journal believe the governor should let us know every time he is leaving the state and tell us when he is returning and where he's going. We would also like to know what he's doing when he's in New Mexico. Richardson and his staff believe that when he is not at a public event — here or elsewhere — he is entitled to keep his whereabouts private. And they refuse to make his daily calendar public.
This issue has been — what do they call it in couples counseling? — a stress in our relationship. I've watched it unfold mostly from afar, and I can tell you that both parties feel aggrieved, unheard and frustrated.
So what do we learn from South Carolina, which is now a talk-show punch line in political disarray?
The lesson isn't that politicians who won't tell you what they're doing in their spare time are necessarily doing creepy things they're ashamed of. And it isn't that elected officials should never have any time to themselves or have any fun.
But it does show us why holding elected officials to some basic level of public scrutiny is in all of our best interests. They work for us, after all, and it doesn't seem too much of an imposition for them to fill us in on their general movements around the world.
And it prompts the question: If you're only having some time to yourself and having some fun — and if you're going to bring with you State Police officers who are on the clock — what's the big deal about telling people where you're going and what you're going to do?
For most of us, this process — except for the bodyguard part — starts in our workplace about lunchtime on Friday.
Question: What are doing this weekend? Sample answer: I'm going to the lake/catching an Isotopes game/going out to dinner/thinking about seeing "The Hangover." For normal people, this is no big deal.
For the Governor's Office, this is the stuff of legendary fights.
Question: Where is the governor going this weekend? Sample answer: He has no public events scheduled./We can't tell you for security reasons./Why would you even ask that question?/What are you implying?
After the fact, we often find that the governor has been seen ringside at a fight in Las Vegas or gone to the Kentucky Derby or given a speech to some group in Philadelphia.
Sometimes, Richardson's staffers release a schedule of his public events (usually when they want publicity for some event), but most of the time they don't. That means we, and by extension you, often have no idea where the man who runs this state is at any given time.
Most recently, on a day when the governor chose to release his schedule and it said, "No public events scheduled," an astute journalist here was watching the Magic-Lakers playoff game and said, "Hey, that's the governor!" And that's when we all found out that he was not in Santa Fe but in Los Angeles.
A similar event happened last spring, when Lt. Gov. Diane Denish, who is supposed to be notified when the governor leaves the state because she takes over his duties, was relaxing at her country home on a Saturday when Richardson showed up at the Kentucky Derby.
Sanford said he flew the coop in South Carolina because he needed a break. "What I found in this job is that one desperately needs a break from the bubble," he said.
Richardson works hard, and he deserves his nights and weekends to himself if he wants them. And I don't guess anyone cares whether he spends them curled up under an afghan watching "Remington Steele" reruns or chillin' and grillin' or practicing the trapeze.
Just let us know where you are, governor.
A bright light in this dispute came last week as the governor released the news that he's going to be out of the state on an extended vacation over this Fourth of July weekend. According to his office, he and his wife, Barbara, left on Tuesday for Cape Cod — no specifics on exactly where on the 413-square-mile peninsula — and they'll return "late next week."
Hey, it's a start.
In South Carolina, a state senator described his dismay at the governor's absence. "The state was on autopilot without a pilot," he said.
Denish has phrased her personal need to know this way: "I do feel like I would not want to be caught off guard if something happened — or if something happened to the governor."
Is there any constitutional requirement that Richardson fill us in on his travel plans? No.
Does the newspaper have its famous "right to know" to that information? Maybe; maybe not.
Do you do the right thing only because you have to? I hope not.
If you've ever raised a teenager, you've already had this conversation. But let's have it again: Just tell us where you're going and which friends you'll be with. It's not that we don't trust you, but God forbid something should happen.
Humor us, governor. Because we worry.
UpFront is a daily front-page opinion column. You can reach Leslie at 823-3914 or llinthicum@abqjournal.com.
This is Gov. Bill Richardson's policy on revealing his whereabouts, according to his deputy chief of staff Gilbert Gallegos:
"The Governor's Office releases a public schedule that lists the governor's public events. That schedule includes the governor's travel plans when he is participating in events that are open to the public or the media. The governor is in constant contact with his staff when he is away from the office."
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