It’s ironic, really, that as the cloud darkens around South Carolina governor Mark Sanford, the biggest concerns are about his affair, who his lover has been and what a series of e-mails between the two said.

Unfortunately it is a testimony of what is important in our world today, much like all the hoopla surrounding John and Kate, frivolous news that seems to take precedence over North Korea’s threats to nuke the United States.

Yet here we are, amidst the tragic deaths of two of entertainment’s biggest icons — Farrah Fawcett and Michael Jackson — pondering the wrong questions about Sanford.

His marital woes, his morals and his affair are matters that are – and should remain — between he and his wife and he and God.

What should be of concern to the people of South Carolina, and to lawmakers in that state, is Sanford’s irresponsibility to the job he was elected to perform.

The governor disappeared nearly a week ago, telling no one, including his Secret Service detail, of his whereabouts, and scarier still, without transferring executive power to the lieutenant governor.

Sanford left his staff with the impression he was heading off for some solo hiking on the Appalachian Trail, an out-and-out lie that was relayed to reporters trying to dig up details of his whereabouts.

It is Sanford’s total disregard for the elected office he holds that concerns us, and should concern citizens in South Carolina. After all, what would the outcome have been if tragedy had befallen the state, with no one in charge to rectify the problem?

Sanford apparently didn’t care.

That, too, should be of great concern.

How can a man, afforded the opportunity to run an entire state, shirk the responsibilities citizens awarded him anything short of a major emergency, let alone a tryst halfway around the globe.

Instead of being concerned about the governor’s affair, voters and legislators should be weighing his effectiveness as a leader and whether, by virtue of his ignorant secretive flight from office, he violated the constitution he swore to uphold.

Those are the questions that should be answered as state leaders begin to call for Sanford’s resignation.

And, unless we miss our guess, the answers won’t dismiss the irresponsibility of a man who chose frivolous behavior over leading a state.