Oh, Is There A Wedding Tonight?

A FrontBurnervian is aghast at the News’, er, coverage:

Maybe it’s just me, but it’s kind of incredible that the daughter of the President of the United States, a former Texas governor, is getting married today just down the road from Dallas (where the bride was born and lived until she was 13) — and it was not on the front page of the DMN today. Not only was it not on the front page, I couldn’t find much of anything about it in the paper. I went to the website, and found an AP story, and a wedding-oriented blog written by Michael Granberry and Alan Peppard. Who the hell wants to have to search a blog for information about this wedding? Little old ladies love these kinds of stories. Does Belo expect them to navigate to a blog for their Jenna wedding updates? It’s nuts.

I know the newsroom has got to be pressed for resources, but it’s embarrassing not to have something written locally about the Jenna Bush wedding. How hard would it have been to have tracked down people in Dallas who knew her when she went to Preston Hollow and Hockaday? Nobody expects Woodward and Bernstein, for cripes sake, but isn’t it a no-brainer that you do a colorful, light-as-cotton-candy wedding feature on the day the president’s DALLAS-BORN daughter gets married WITHIN YOUR CIRCULATION AREA?! Don’t you think that there might be a few people who read the DALLAS Morning News who are interested in this story? I’m not a reporter, and I don’t really care about Jenna Bush or her wedding, but it’s a slow Saturday, and I was interested in what unique take the local press would have on a north Texas social event the likes of which we haven’t seen … ever. Are they that hard-pressed for warm bodies down there at the Belo cave, or do you think they just aren’t going to lift a finger to give press to the daughter of a Republican president? I await your analysis.

Me, I have no analysis. I just continue to shake my head. Did any FrontBurnervians see how the S-T covered it in its print edition this morning?

26 Comments to “Oh, Is There A Wedding Tonight?”
  • Dave Thomas

    I’ve had the exact opposite take on this story. I am surprised at HOW MUCH the media has made out of this wedding. I guess I don’t look to the Morning News or Startlegram for news coverage anymore though. I have just seen a lot about this wedding on TV and on the internet.

  • Buck

    S-T had a photo spread of past Presidential family weddings — cute but nothing about Hockaday.

    The S-T also had more details this week about the wedding and the Eddie Deen catered lunch.

  • Texas Flood

    Already blown all the buy-out money?

  • thomas

    Little Bobby Dechard doesn’t want his east coast liberal media friends kidding him about covering the wedding so it’s no big surprise that the wedding is being ignored. Can you imagine Little Bobby having to explain his decision to cover the wedding to those people from whom he so desperately seeks their approval????????????????

  • houston

    DMN was too busy snitching on Amazon.com to get more Texas Taxes. . .

  • Typical White Person

    No one really cares when a mass murderer’s daughter gets married. They deserve no more respect than the children of Jim Jones.

    The Bush’s are a cancer on our society. I hope they end up living in Gatesville or The Haque.

  • Brad Thedinger

    Maybe it’s not there because nobody cares about it and the DMN knows it.

  • AJ

    There are a lot of things to vent about with the DMN/ST, but the Bush wedding ain’t one of them. If you want news on it so bad, hit up Google and set a news alert to flood your inbox with constant updates of it.

  • Bill

    It’s so funny watching gay people get upset.

  • J.Paul

    From what I understand, this hasn’t been the most “media-friendly” wedding event and that’s how the Bush’s want it. Maybe Jenna can get legally sloshed at the reception in peace. It’s in a no-fly zone people, get over it.

  • HCL

    Newsflash: Nobody gives a flying eff about the wedding of someone they don’t know.

    And weddings, unless the bride/groom is the head-of-state herself/himself, should never be on the front page of major newspaper.

  • publicnewsense

    HCL, there’s your key phrase “major newspaper.” DMN’s Moroney publicly abdicated that goal on behalf of all the stockholders and all the focus groups — you may remember the assorted mandatory employee pep rallies.
    You are watching a newspaper carve off pieces of public responsibility and drop them into the toilet. Heck, yes, this is a big story: How much did the wedding cost taxpayers? Was Cindy Sheehan throwing rice at the front gate? What heads of state were eased into the event? What deals are being cut under cover of scrub-brush nuptials? This is an actual news event — not just a wedding.
    Plus, it is an event of public curiousity — like a UFO over Phoenix, a sinkhole in Daisetta or a melt down of the home loan system in high-dollar Dallas.
    There’s no telling who made the decision to low-ball coverage, but if they did it after being asked by the White House, that’s a story, too….Just too many actual news questions to let this event go unnoticed.
    Sorry, my apologies for being indignant. I used to be an editor when newspapers were newsy — an era when the dominate tendency in a newsroom was “nose around” not “brownnose.”

  • Bethany

    A. It happens today - so perhaps Sunday would be the appropriate day to look for deets on a Saturday wedding.

    B. There’s only so many ways to say, “They’re not letting in any press, so we’ve been forced to wander around Crawford and ask the residents what they think of it, and regurgitate the few facts the President and Mrs. Bush ponied up in random interviews and speeches.”

  • Bethany

    C. and what publicnewssense said. They sent two reporters that likely will not write about how much it will cost to secure Crawford for a wedding like this, or if the protesters increased their efforts during this time. Heck, there’s not even an actual invite list, either - the only thing we know is that some of Jenna’s rowdier friends weren’t invited.

  • MushMouth

    Sure am glad he/she didn’t really care about the wedding, can you imagine the outrage if they did?

    It’s a private event for family (and a few big donors I’m sure) and they wanted privacy so they’re getting it. I know what the response of the writer would have been if the press did the opposite - they would have been outraged about the invasion of privacy.

  • HCL

    “HCL, there’s your key phrase ‘major newspaper.’ DMN’s Moroney publicly abdicated that goal on behalf of all the stockholders and all the focus groups — you may remember the assorted mandatory employee pep rallies.”

    Well yes, I unfortunately agree with that. However, I’d prefer that they occasionally pretend to do some real work - as in, less calls to Linda Ronstadt and less screwing around with my Amazon purchases. With the exception of how much the wedding cost the taxpayers (I agree, we deserve to know this), those other things fall into the “I couldn’t care less” category. Besides, any deals being cut there, we’d never know about anyway regardless of the paper. The Bush administration has never been particularly welcoming of the press.

    The FB-writer said:
    “Who the hell wants to have to search a blog for information about this wedding? … Does Belo expect them to navigate to a blog for their Jenna wedding updates? It’s nuts.”

    Who the hell IS searching blogs about this wedding? What kind of “Jenna wedding updates” could one possibly care about? Do you “need” to know what the centerpieces look like or whether they lit a unity candle or what processional music they chose? Good grief.

  • Gwyon

    Yeah. What the nation’s newspapers need is more “celebrity” news on their front pages. Because that stuff is important.

  • DavidWasHere

    well, I did not receive an invitation OR a rebate check…

  • Moses

    it was lovely

  • allison

    If this person actually read the paper they would know that it was covered a couple of days prior.

  • Oh My Eyes

    I am grateful to have this event over.

    I now live on the direct flight path to Crawford, and the helicoptors, planes, and jets that flew over for weeks were BEYOND annoying!

    When the house shakes, and the dogs howl, it reminds me of my life in the Lower Greenville neighborhood I lived in for 11 years…although then it was because of the endless Police chases.

    I may be one of the few that regret her not planning a Washington Wedding…not because I want to have seen the pomp and celebration a White House event offers….but because I want a return to the Peace and quiet country living is supposed to provide.

  • Daniel

    The DMN doesn’t have room for the Jenna Bush wedding and Blow & Ragland Talkin’ ‘Bout Race (TM).

  • East Dallas Eccentric

    Nobody from Dallas works at the Dallas Morning News, save award-winning reporter Doug Swanson (wWw ‘71).

    Maybe someday we shall have some reporters and columnists who are keyed in, know neighborhoods and have some frame of reference beyond Flower Mound.

  • publicnewsense

    East Dallas Eccentric, you deserve a hug. Of course, Robert and Jimmy are from Dallas…but they’re not covering news, they’re covering their…uh, well, you know what I mean…

  • reader

    Are you people kidding? The Belo/DMN Over the Top blog has at least 29 posts on the wedding over the last couple of days:

    http://overthetopblog.dallasnews.com/

  • LoC

    reader, I smell a sock puppet.

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