Slusher: Will Sanguinetti really talk to media 'very soon'?

There was something in the last line of Erin Hegarty's Daily Herald story Tuesday on the swearing-in of Lt. Gov. Evelyn Sanguinetti that perhaps would furrow the brow only of news people.

At an inauguration event at the Old State Capitol Monday, Sanguinetti said she is not yet answering reporters' questions but will "very soon."

As a Wheaton resident, Sanguinetti holds special interest for us at the Daily Herald. She's a local product, now a heartbeat - or, perhaps taking the less-often-considered Pat Quinn route, one felony conviction away - from becoming the chief executive of the state. We've wanted to ask her a few questions since she and her boss Bruce Rauner won the election last November but we've been repeatedly left to place our hope in that phrase "very soon."

We can live with that. She is the lieutenant governor, after all, and the Pat Quinn experience notwithstanding, the likelihood is not strong that she will soon become a household name outside of the West and Northwest suburbs. We're confident that soon enough she'll sit down with reporters from her hometown newspaper to discuss what it's like to make the transition from local city councilwoman to the center of political power in the state and perhaps provide some insights into how she'll shape an office that has few official duties.

But her reticence, and that of the Rauner folks we've asked repeatedly for an opportunity to talk with her, suggests a quality of the new administration that many of us in the news business find worrisome and more than a little puzzling. We do not doubt that Gov. Rauner, not unlike myriad more-traditional politicians before him, can find reporters and editors a distracting annoyance, their questions alternatingly piercing and sophomoric, their stories often veering along their own lines of thought rather than the message he would like to convey. And truthfully, we don't fault him, or any of his colleagues, for that.

The relationship between politician and journalist is a peculiarly uneasy one, demanding trust from parties who have an innate distrust of each other, parties whose objectives and livelihoods require each other. It's natural for them to engage in a kind of constant arm-wrestling match for control of the message.

So far, during the campaign and in the weeks since it ended, the Rauner reputation has become one of fierce control, though it's important to point out that the governor and his staff are still at the very early stages of a long transition and have made some obvious attempts to cooperate with us pesky journalists.

But is so much control a good strategy? Time will tell. Pundits are quick to point out that too much of it can lead people to wonder what a politician really has to offer - or what he or she may be hiding. Perhaps sometime "very soon," we'll see more detail inside a camp that so far has been very cloistered and realize our worries and speculations were unfounded. For now, we'll count on that.

Jim Slusher, jslusher@dailyherald.com, is an assistant managing editor at the Daily Herald. Follow him on Facebook at facebook.com/jim.slusher1 and on Twitter at @JimSlusher.