South Carolina Governor’s Mystery Vacation: Is He a Tango Addict?*

Travel Blog  •  Jim Benning  •  06.24.09 | 1:07 PM ET

Photo by Ana_Cotta via Flickr, (Creative Commons)

Nobody seemed to know where South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford was for days. His wife said she didn’t know but wasn’t worried. His staff said he was hiking the Appalachian Trail. The police got involved.

Well, today the governor emerged at the Atlanta airport saying work had been stressful and he had gone to Buenos Aires because he needed a vacation and “wanted to do something exotic.” He said he spent the week driving the Argentine coastline.

Some don’t buy his story. Speculation about what he was really doing is rampant. Talking Points Memo has put together a handy timeline of events surrounding the mystery trip.

Anyone have any good theories?

Call me crazy, but I’m going to suggest the governor did indeed go to Argentina—because he has a tango addiction. I have no evidence for this. I just like the idea of it and think it would make for a good HBO movie.

Come clean, governor. Is it tango? If it is, it’s OK with us.

*Update 11:37 a.m. PT: Well, I was close. The governor gave a press conference clearing up the mystery. It was a tango of a different sort.

*Update 4:34 p.m. PT: Gawker commenter flossy has the line of the day on the mixed messages earlier about the governor’s whereabouts: “In all fairness to his aides, “I’m getting some Argentinian tail” sounds a lot like “I’m hiking the Appalachian trail” when you’re on a fuzzy satelite phone connection. Who hasn’t had that kind of innocent misunderstanding?”