May 03, 2005

The Runaway Story Of The Runaway Bride

It turns out I'm not the only one in the FOX News audience sick to
death of the runaway bride story.

Last night three out of about five callers during the first hour of
the Alan Colmes Show (a FOX News radio program) complained about the
exessive coverage in the media in general and, in one case, on FOX
News in particular.

Maybe the radio audience is getting smarter.

Colmes discussed the story in great detail and played clips from the
mayor of Duluth, GA, where Wilbanks ran away from, and from an
interview with her fiance who, as it happens, is a big Sean Hannity
fan.

Then it was time for phone calls.

The first caller was Brandon in Jackson, TN.

He got off on the right foot (in my book) by saying he couldn't blame
Wilbanks for running away from a fiance if he's a Hannity fan.

Then Brandon went on to complain about the national focus on this
case.

Colmes said that he thinks it's a human interest story, not that there
wasn't other important news, but that there's nothing big happening
right now and they can't talk about war all the time

(Comment: So how about Bush's latest scam to destroy Social Security?
Tom DeLay's latest ethics problems? Jeff Gannon going into the White
House when there weren't press conferences and not coming out? I feel
confident the Gannon story would trump Wilbanks any day if only it had
happened during a Democratic presidency.)

Brandon replied, "It's not headline news."

He mentioned his own "human interest" problems dealing with runaway
health insurance costs, reduced funding for his medical problems,
increased fuel costs, etc.

Colmes finally agreed the Wilbanks story was a diversion, that there
was too much focus on missing white people but he likened it to
reality television.

(Comment: But since when is a news network supposed to be like reality
television?)

Brandon responded, "It's a diversion on the national level away from
the issues that do matter to people."

Tom in Coleman, Alabama (one of my favorite callers) was not only
annoyed that the story is getting so much play, he singled out FOX
News as a major culprit.

"Where is the responsibility from FOX News?" Coleman asked.

Colmes answered that it's not just FOX News, that he thought Tom's
anger was misdirected.

Tom, however, held his ground and said that FOX News took the lead on
making the story what it turned into.

He talked about the pointlessness of the coverage.

"It does no good... They have to accept responsibility," he said.

Finally, there was Nathaniel in Harlem who complained, "There's other
things to talk about. I'm a Viet Nam vet still waiting for
disability."

Something tells me that the problems of health care costs for
civilians and veterans are not going to be a big topic on FOX News any
time soon.

In fact, Colmes announced that tomorrow night there will be more
discussion about the runaway bride.

And when he returned to the open phones during the third hour of the
show, almost everyone seemed interested in discussing it.

Maybe all the smart ones went to bed early.

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Nighty night.

Harry