News or no news?

Politician has an extra-marital affair of which his wife is aware:
no (well, likely not much) news.

Politician mysteriously goes missing for days,
Wife says she doesn’t know where he is,
Staff say he’s taking a short vacation and decline to provide further details,
Staff later say he’s hiking on the Appalachian Trail,
Media find the vehicle he drives parked in airport parking lot,
Met by reporter as he arrives in Atlanta on flight from Buenos Aires,
Claims to have decided last-minute to go to Argentina because it’s “exotic”,
THEN holds news conference explaining trip with admission of extra-marital affair of which his wife is aware:
big news.

In PR, the cover-up often does more damage than the original offense.

Here’s the video of South Carolina Governor Sanford’s widely-covered news conference this afternoon.