The royal wedding is on, and for those of us watching, it was a relief to see that tradition abounded.  Meghan Markle looked splendid in her beautiful simple white wedding gown, with an exquisite lace-trimmed veil.  Harry looked so handsome in his black military uniform, alongside his identically dressed brother, faintly redolent of the Edwardian era; the last tsar; or, better yet, the Titanic thing.  The bride's mother in her mint green mother-of-the-bride dress was sweetly weeping, the way mothers of brides do.  The queen looked dignified and rather natty in a grandmotherly chartreuse and purple matched outfit and performed with her specialty: sitting still, just as we expect.  The daughters of Andrew and Fergie finally got their outfits right.  Even the celebs at the event, such as the Clooneys, and the Beckhams, and Oprah, looked very wedding guest-like.  Beautiful majestic traditional church hymns were sung, and the archbishop of Canterbury repeatedly appealed to God.  They did it right.

Source: Twitter.

This makes much of the speculation about the wedding, from left-wing media such as Teen Vogue, out to lunch. No, Meghan didn't make "a feminist statement," as the left-wing Pop-Tarts threw out there.  Look at this idiocy.

The British royal family knows the secret to survival, and its survival involves legitimacy, and legitimacy involves tradition.  So the royals went for it.  They especially went for it due to the bride's unconventional background – American, part black, native of South Central – famous for its riots, Hollywood career, one divorce...  She was lovely and went all out for fitting in with the royal ethos.  She will fit in.  And we know that the royals wanted Harry married off and happy, so it was possible to see that they were willing to bend the traditions a bit to allow the entry of Meghan into the family.  In any case, the queen was obviously pleased with her – she gave her the fancy title of duchess of Sussex upon her marriage, something she didn't give to her own daughter-in-law, Countess Sophie, who has been married to Prince Edward for years.

The other thing worth noting is that the royals kept the pols out: no politician, sitting or previous, got an invitation or was allowed in.  That goes back to British tradition, too – Prince Albert, Queen Victoria's royal consort, first urged and instituted the custom of keeping royals out of politics.  The official reason was that the wedding was "a private ceremony," unlike the earlier wedding of Prince William.  Whatevs.  The Prince Albert precedent was what it was about.

President Trump took that graciously and, despite not being invited, sent gifts – the traditional official bowl, of course, and also donations to Harry's and Meghan's favorite charities, likely out of his own pocket.  And with additional class, he sent gracious warm wishes.

The press grudgingly reported that.

But after all the wall-to-wall speculation about whether he or President Obama would get an invitation, and quite a few in the press thought President Obama would, the press was curiously silent about whether President Obama was just as magnanimous as President Trump.  I Googled and Googled, and nada, zip, nothing.  If he sent a present, the press is weirdly derelict of duty, because we know that the journalists would have told us about it.  The Obamas made much of their supposed friendship with the royals during the Invictus Games in Canada not too long ago.  Well, with all that friendship, pretty strange we aren't hearing about them sending a wedding gift.  Given the press's suckuppery to the Obama clan, doesn't it seem likely that if they gave a gift, the press would report it?

Nope, the evidence for now is that the Obamas sent nothing.  This would be about par for them.  They never gave their kids Christmas gifts, for one.  And the previous gifts they gave to the royal family have been utterly tacky – tapes of Obama's speeches on iPods and other junk nobody in his right mind would keep.  They aren't good at this.

You'd think they'd be bigger about it anyway.

Thus far, nothing from the press.  Maybe we will hear about a gift sent late, after people start to notice.  For now, what a cheapskate.