David Gregory sure learned his Villager lessons well. Want a big Scoop? Just sell out the integrity of your platform (In this case Meet the Press) that the American people depend on for access.

BarbinMD at KOS explains:

When the stories about South Carolina Governor Mark Sanford's love of hiking and the ensuing revelations about line crossing and soul mates were first revealed, I think it's safe to say that most people never saw it coming. But what hasn't been a surprise is the resulting confirmation of how many in the media are willing to sell their journalistic souls for political access.

And leading that list has to be David Gregory, who went out of his way to continue the proud tradition of Meet the Press kissing the ass of shamed elected officials.

From his emails to Sanford's office, where he begs for an interview:

Left you a message. Wanted you to hear directly from me that I want to have the Gov on Sunday on Meet The Press. I think it's exactly the right forum to answer the questions about his trip as well as giving him a platform to discuss the economy/stimulus and the future of the party. You know he will get a fair shake from me and coming on MTP puts all of this to rest.

... So coming on Meet The Press allows you to frame the conversation how you really want to...and then move on. You can see (sic) you have done your interview and then move on. Consider it.

In the middle of the breaking scandal, Gregory not only offered to let Sanford guide the story, he was willing to give him a platform to change the subject. And then Gregory would "move on."

Move along now little doggie. No story here, that's it..just a couple of kids in love...run along. Nothing here to see. I can only echo what Vernie Gay said about the new Meet The Press:

But he also seems more intent on covering the waterfront than digging for news, or in pushing the talking heads off their talking points. Recent interviews with Sens. Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) and Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) felt like a waterfront that went on for miles - an endless vista of chatter and spin.

BOTTOM LINE "Meet the Press" is now the de facto safe show on Sunday morning - "safe," that is, for those being interviewed.

Gregory has been handed perhaps the most important program in television journalism. It's time to start acting like the king who rules wisely yet ruthlessly. Otherwise, his legacy will match that of Garrick Utley or Bill Monroe - moderators who were highly respected but not highly feared. In this job, it's vital to be both.

These Mark Sanford emails proves Vernie's point perfectly.

South Carolina residents have been riveted by the unstable behavior of their Governor Mark Sanford, but they have other things to be very nervous about and they should be.

Terrified residents canceled Fourth of July plans and holed up in their homes Friday as investigators hunted a serial killer believed to have shot four people to death.

--

Plenty of evidence links the killings, though officials have not yet determined how the victims are connected or if they knew whoever shot them, said Cherokee County Sheriff Bill Blanton.

"Yes, we have a serial killer," he said at a news conference in this rural community 50 miles south of Charlotte, N.C.

So far, all investigators have to go on is a sketch of a suspect and a description of a possible getaway vehicle, though police would not say who provided that information.

The latest victims were found in their family's small furniture and appliance shop near downtown Gaffney around closing time Thursday. Stephen Tyler, 45, was killed, and his 15-year-old daughter was shot and seriously injured. Tyler's wife, his older daughter and an employee found them in Tyler Home Center, County Coroner Dennis Fowler said.

A day earlier and about seven miles away, family members found the bodies of 83-year-old Hazel Linder and her 50-year-old daughter, Gena Linder Parker, bound and shot in Linder's home. Blanton would not say if Tyler and his daughter were also bound. The killing spree began last Saturday about 10 miles from Tyler Home Center, where peach farmer Kline Cash, 63, was found shot in his living room. Blanton said the killer may have first spoken with Cash's wife about buying hay. She left and came home a few hours later to find her husband's body. Investigators said it appears he was robbed, but they have not determined if anything was taken in the other killings.

The John Douglas book called Mind Hunter, is a pretty fascinating look (it gets interesting about 80 pages in) at how the FBI developed the profiling methods we see used today. Robert Ressler coined the term "Serial Killer," and also wrote a book about his experiences: Whoever Fights Monsters: My Twenty Years Tracking Serial Killers for the FBI. He interviewed many of these killers in jail to better understand their behavior. He was interviewed by Thomas Harris, who then wrote two of the greatest novels on the subject, Red Dragon and Silence of the Lambs. Both were made into excellent movies, (Who can forget Hannibal Lecter in Manhunter or SOTL's?) but South Carolina hopes that's not the case here. Let's hope he's caught quickly.

The plot thickens...

RIO DE JANEIRO — A television anchor who's the only journalist known to have spoken with South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford's Argentine lover since news of their affair broke last week said the couple received an e-mail threat from the person who hacked into her Hotmail account.

Eduardo Feinmann, who worked with Maria Belen Chapur when she was a translator for Argentina's C5N news channel, said in a telephone interview from Buenos Aires that a member of Chapur's family told him of the threat on Saturday.He said the family member told him that the e-mail from the unidentified person warned both Sanford and Chapur that "you don't know who you are messing with." He said he didn't know how either of them responded.

Sanford's wife has said she's known about the affair for many months, so if true, this would certainly explain a lot:

Chapur said in an e-mail to Feinmann, which the anchorman read on the air Sunday night, that her Hotmail account was hacked into around Nov. 24. She became aware of the intrusion shortly thereafter and by Dec. 8 had succeeded in having the account closed. Read on...

Take a look at this hilarious bit of Republican erotica from Andy Cobb -- "Love Means Never Having to Say You're Resigning." Governor Mark Sanford truly is the gift that keeps on giving.

Open thread below....

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Lindsey Graham admitted that he was godfather to two children disgraced Gov. Mark Sanford in South Carolina. How does NBC expect Graham to be objective in any sense of the word? He should not be on TV talking about this situation.

Graham and Romney and the rest of the Republicans are hypocritical windbags for defending Sanford now when they all tried to get Bill Clinton impeached. Sanford left his state completely without leadership for almost a full week and if an emergency had occurred in South Carolina there was nobody with the authority to help his constituents. That is the firing offense for Sanford. He was derelict in his duty. All he had to do was give the word and the Lt. Governor could have taken over, but he was in love so it's just alright if you listen to the Peggy Noonans of the conservative movement.

MTP:

MR. GREGORY: ...of South Carolina. Governor Mark Sanford disappeared for five days then announced that, in fact, he'd had a mistress, he was visiting a mistress in Argentina. He misled his staff, he misled the voters. Should he resign?

SEN. GRAHAM: Well, the first thing, I'm the godfather of Mark and Jenny's youngest child, so I'm just going to put that on the table. My main focus right now is can this marriage be saved? Can these kids have a mom and dad to guide them through life? That is my main focus. I think if Mark can reconcile with Jenny, and that's not going to be easy, that he can finish his last 18 months. He's had a good reform agenda. And I do believe that if, if he can reconcile with his family and if he's willing to try, that the people of South Carolina would be willing to give him a second chance. But he's also got to reconcile the legislature. If he can get his family back together, I think he can continue out his term and maybe do some good things next year.

Suddenly the party of moral values is the party of sinners.

SEN. GRAHAM: Yeah. I think we're a party of sinners, just like every other group in America, but we're also a party that openly talks about good things. It is good for Mark and Jenny to get back together, if that's possible, because it's good for families to have a mom and dad. And it's OK to talk about those things. And part of life is failing. So from Mark's point of view, if he can get his family back together, people are pretty fair in this country. Bill Clinton had his problems. People looked at his job performance, they looked at his personal failings and they said, "You know what, we're going to put one over here and the other over there." That's no justification for what Mark did, but I think the people of South Carolina appreciate what Mark tried to do as governor to change their state.

Sanford's presser was crazy. The people of South Carolina should be asking, "Was Sanford in his right mind dealing with the stimulus package?" He was refusing the money to a state in deep unemployment and obviously battling being in love with another woman. Well we knew that, but if you think Americans will be easily duped by the claim Sanford was acting in their best interests, think again.

And Graham's remarks underscore the fact that the witch hunt that Republicans and the media perpetrated on Bill Clinton was disgusting and should never be forgiven. The same behavior now is OK in their books, of course, if it involves a Republican.

SEN. GRAHAM: And they're very disappointed in what he did as Mark the individual and his malfeasance at, at times, but they can reconcile the two only if, if Jenny and Mark can get back together. I think the people of South Carolina will give him a second chance.

MR. GREGORY: Do you think you had that kind of compassion during the impeachment proceedings against President Clinton?

SEN. GRAHAM: Well, I can tell you this. I'm the only Republican that voted against the article that dealt with lying about Monica Lewinsky, because I think lying about a consensual affair when you're blindsided is not a high crime or misdemeanor. The reason I vote for impeachment is because it was a lawsuit about nonconsensual behavior where President Clinton was accused of doing some very crude things; he manipulated witnesses, he undermined the integrity of the legal system like Richard Nixon undermined the integrity of the political system. That's what I focused on, not the fact that he lied about a consensual event.

Riiight, and Sanford didn't fly to Argentina on the state's dime and didn't lie about it and didn't leave his state without leadership and none of the charges he raised against Clinton were proved true.

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I think it's just automatic now. When a high-profile Republican gets into trouble, Fox News steps in to mislead their sheep viewers by labeling them as Democrats.

Here's a short list of Fox's chyron hackery:

John McCain - Democrat

Joe Lieberman - Democrat

Arlen Spector - Democrat (when he was still a Republican!)

Mark Foley - Democrat

Media Matters also caught Fox listing a Democratic strategist as Bush's head of FEMA -- because his name happened to be Michael Brown. Oh, and we can't forget the time they announced Rep. William Jefferson's indictment using footage of Congressman John Conyers. They apologized to their audience, but never to Conyers personally.

I'm sure it was just an oversight, just like all the rest...riiiight. Have I missed any?

Dave N:

It's almost a clockwork thing.

Whenever Fox News wants you to forget that someone is actually a Republican, they, ah, accidentally label them a Democrat on their chryon and let it go. So they did that today, as you can see, while Mark Sanford was explaining that he had been in Argentina to screw around on his wife. (They corrected it in later chryons.)

Hardly the first time this has happened.

There was the time they ID'ed Mark Foley, in the midst of another sex scandal, as a Democrat too.

At other times with sex scandals, as with Sen. Larry Craig, they simply have forgotten to identify them as Republicans.

They've also done it when someone's Republican status is inconvenient:

When Arlen Specter was attacking conservative shibboleths, he got labeled a D too.

And then there was the time John McCain was labeled a Democrat too. At the time that just seemed weird, but now, with Glenn Beck and Rush Limbaugh and a host of other conservatives promoting the notion that McCain was just a fake Republican anyway, it makes a certain kind of sense.

Fox sense, that is.