Agreed. Watching events like these sober and from a hearty distance makes me remember why I started to drink my way through them in the first place.
Meanwhile, my colleague Jon Swaine did some great, important reporting from the protests in Baltimore. If you took the time to read this, spend the time to read that. It’s more important, anyway.
Two thoughts:
1. Clinton’s been the best overall presidential speaker in my lifetime (although Obama’s Selma speech was incredibly emotional and verbally masterful), but Obama’s had the best timing by far. Even though some of his material was really lightweight tonight, he’s always been quick to read the room or his antagonist and weighed beats really well and sold the gag, whatever it was. And he sold Cecily Strong’s really well. He was engaged with her, and even if some of those smiles and nods and theatrical mutterings were insincere and just playing off the material, he did it right, and it was a pleasure to watch. Even if I strongly disapprove of things he’s done or failed to do, even if he’s been disappointing, it is really reassuring to see a mentally agile and attentive person on the other end of American power structure, with the wit to pay attention and the humility to laugh even at his own expense. There’s a human being at the controls, more so than “some guy I can drink a beer with” or some other campaign artifice. That’s fun. Obama, and especially the Luther routine, were the best part of the night.
2. We came six hours for all this: agonizing delayed prep, staged photographs, a bunch of rich assholes being fawned over and lavishly served as they delighted in themselves and the mutual act of recognition and applause … ultimately so they no-sell something as tame as a semi-sharp joke about racism and the objectification and control of women. Meanwhile, a short drive down the road, a major American city threatened to erupt in outrage at oppression. If that doesn’t get you ready for the endless hellride of 2016, nothing will. Let’s get out of here.
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The second reference to police brutality of the act! But at least this one got a laugh.
To Obama: “Your hair is so white now it can talk back to the police.” Goddamn.
YES. That was excellent.
“Now Rand Paul is a Libertarian. A Libertarian is just a Republican you have to block on Twitter.” Jesus, that’s eerily accurate.
As Cecily said, it DOES seem like a lot of work to run for president to get a Fox News contract, Carly Fiorina.
Cecily Strong acknowledging that “Jeb” is an acronym for “John Ellis Bush” means that now I – a True Jeb – will love her forever.
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That pledge will be broken faster and with more enthusiasm than when my parents asked me to promise to stay a virgin until marriage.
Also making the audience to put up their hands and say, “I solemnly swear to not talk about Hillary’s appearance, because that is not journalism” was very welcome. Visibly not taking the pledge: Wolf Blitzer.
The mental image of Hillary Clinton deadlifting 200 pounds and saying “IT’S YOUR TIME” was pretty good.
Agreed. That said, the format for all roasts is basically “burns by taking roll call”, but Cecily Strong is delivering this like a frantic death race. It’s stepping on even the half-hearted laughter.
At least she got a good shot in on Don Lemon.
I don’t expect everyone to come out and Stephen Colbert this sort of thing, but they could! As Ben Schwartz pointed out in The Baffler, that kind of satire really isn’t that dangerous. Colbert made those shots a decade ago and changed… nothing! They just seem dangerous because these audiences are so accustomed to formal events where critics preemptively apologize for the slightest shots, like, aw shucks, we didn’t mean it. (I mean, CNN winced at a tepid slight from Obama.) So why all the softballs? I mean, not to co-opt Washington language for an Arab wedding or an Arab birthday party, but THIS IS A TARGET-RICH ENVIRONMENT.
To recap Strong’s act so far: C-SPAN jokes kill in a Washington crowd, but jokes about white cops shooting black people and politicians trying to pass laws to limit women’s bodily autonomy are a step too far.
Cecily Strong leads off with a Hillary Clinton shout-out “Feels good to have a woman follow President Obama, doesn’t it?”
Saturday Night Live cast member Cecily Strong performs
And for the final event of the evening...
A genuinely touching toast to journalists as essential to liberty at the end from Obama. That said, if the emotion he showed was genuine, the natural response is: TALK TO THE PRESS MORE AND STOP FIGHTING A WAR ON WHISTLEBLOWERS.
Also, every shot of Wolf Blitzer through Obama’s jokes was of him stonefacing through this. Now, I’m not gonna say this entire routine was great, but it should have engendered some smirks. Basically this confirms my years-long supposition that Wolf Blitzer has no sense of humor because otherwise every mirror in his house would be broken in horror.
Important update from our 37th president:
Receiving an award at the White House Correspondents' Dinner is like a trophy for being too weak and asthmatic to play football.
— Richard M. Nixon (@dick_nixon) April 26, 2015
Absolutely. And Luther having to rein him back in after the climate change bit was great. I could watch this until January 2017, quite frankly.
Have you met Luther, President Obama's anger translator? #WHCD http://t.co/5ShwiopHcq
— The White House (@WhiteHouse) April 26, 2015
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Is it too much to wish that this had been the WHOLE speech? It’s funny on Key & Peele, and more hilarious when it’s actually Luther and President Obama.
Okay, the fact that “Luther the Anger Translator” from Key & Peele just showed up is legitimately badass.
President Obama's "anger translator" #WHCD pic.twitter.com/fHrsck2X8z
— Huffington Post (@HuffingtonPost) April 26, 2015
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When your best joke is a joke about nobody knowing Martin O’Malley, you’re not working with your A material.
A couple of these jokes have been pretty good, but for every decent one, there’s another with an “A, on the one hand,” followed by “B, on the other hand…” where you can see part B flying at you from a thousand miles away.
OBAMA: “Usually the only people impersonating journalists on CNN are journalists on CNN.”
CROWD: “Ooooohhhhhh.”
Seriously, you people are adults. This is a softball at best to the thigh meat. Just take your fucking base.
“[Joe Biden] and I have gotten so close that some places in Indiana they won’t even serve us pizza anymore” actually caused me to facepalm.
“A foolproof way to keep people off my lawn” followed by a Photoshop of an angry McCain wearing a cardigan and holding a broom is also another good one.
The new way to get people off the White House lawn, according to President Obama #WHCD pic.twitter.com/UdWB879Uws
— Huffington Post (@HuffingtonPost) April 26, 2015
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I think this routine is only really funny if you’ve been drinking overpriced-but-crappy wine.
On the Presidency aging him: “I look so old, John Boehner’s already invited Netanyahu to speak at my funeral.” Okay, Obama writers, this was a good one.
You can tell that DC is fun when “‘bucket’ rhymes with ‘fuck it’” counts as a joke.
Hey, Obama’s finally speaking. Here’s hoping he repeats his joke about killing the Jonas Brothers with a drone for the benefit of Warren Weinstein’s grieving family.
Obama's speech begins
Only 4.5 hours in.
Somehow I’ve missed a complete playoff hockey and complete playoff basketball game during this, and as far as I can tell in that span the following has happened:
- arrival
- eating
- awards.
Now it’s time to laugh at how the President doesn’t give interviews! And toast his unwillingness to speak to the media!
Or, in other words, they are handing out a bunch of awards to other journalists for things you haven’t heard about.
CHRISTI PARSONS: And now I’m proud to present the White House Correspondents Dinner Talent Show Winners. For being able to make Mike Allen talk even while drinking a glass of water … Chevron. For playing “Für Elise” on champagne saucers … The Guardian’s Nicky Woolf.
Barack and Michelle Obama shaking hands with these journalism scholarship winners and speaking briefly with them, like, “And YOU have been co-opted, and YOU have been co-opted, and YOU have been co-opted…”
They are now handing out scholarships to a bunch of would-be journalists (which, you’ll recall, all amount to less than they pay the executive director).
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The Clinton crackle/drawl impression at the “you wanna hold it, it’s reeaally soft” was the highlight.
I personally just want to see more of that video of Bill Clinton with the baby koala. But pictures will do.
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The applause seemed kind of sparse for an event that is inherently self-congratulatory. But some of these videos are nice. For every person who’s describing being PRESENT at CHANGING THE FACE OF THE PLANET, there are a couple fun stories about being overwhelmed at the scope of the work and the potential for embarrassment and screwing up. Which is nice. Being a screwup is pretty universal.
Now that everyone has stood to be applauded, we get to watch a video of some White House correspondents who retired this year.
Christi Parsons calling for “openness, transparency and press freedom” in this room is like calling for a bloodless week in an abattoir. I mean, look to the dude to your right, Ms. Parsons. (Hey, it’s the president!) Hell, just look out at the sea of anonymous-source-fueled Beltway gaze-merchants in front of you.
Oh, never mind, her speech is singling out press restrictions abroad, where the bad governments are.
I honestly can’t wait until it ends and I can get in on that.
The bystanders in my house forced to watch this because I have to are all getting drunk.
The speeches are about to begin.
THANK GOD it’s about to start, if the guests ever sit down.
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“‘Garçon’ means boy.”
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Earlier you posted that link to Karl Rove murdering the entire genre of rap, which reminded me of former NBC White House Correspondent David Gregory dancing during it. It also reminded me of my favorite David Gregory quote:
The right questions were asked. I think there’s a lot of critics – and I guess we can count Scott McClellan as one – who thinks that, if we did not debate the president, debate the policy in our role as journalists, if we did not stand up and say, this is bogus, and you’re a liar, and why are you doing this, that we didn’t do our job. And I respectfully disagree. It’s not our role.
Garçon, more wine!
I’ve seen Touré twice now as the camera’s panned by. Remember back in 2013 when he defended Obama’s extrajudicial assassination of the al-Awlaki’s with, “He’s the Commander in Chief” and some op-ed commentary on MSNBC reeeeeaaaaal close to “if the president does it, it’s not illegal”? That’s aged really well, I think.
Patrick made some other great points in his piece today for us as well:
Patrick Gavin, director of Nerd Prom: Inside Washington’s Wildest Week on C-SPAN pointing out that “the [White House Correspondents] Association’s Executive Director gets paid more than they give out in scholarships every year” and “the gap is getting worse, not better.”
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“The prettiest sight in this fine pretty world is the privileged class enjoying its privileges.”
C-SPAN going into the hours of preparation involved in making this dinner, as well as the days and months of sourcing locally produced food. Not going into: the wages of any of the people who did that.
While we watch Washington’s elite eat, trapped in a ballroom that, for security reasons, the Secret Service won’t let them leave, enjoy a picture of Michelle Obama thinking about how comedian Cecily Strong is about to mock her husband.
I assume somewhere, under the table, a thrill is going up Matthews’ leg.
Chris Matthews was just shown sitting next to chef Tom Colicchio, who fans of bald men might remember is apparently quite a cunning linguist (according to his wife).
No one would ever say a word...
My goal when chewing is to sound as much as possible like running your garbage disposal without knowing that a plastic bottle cap accidentally went down the drain. Also, corollary: I feel bad for anyone at this thing who chose not to get a foley-effects app for “gastric distress” and sit in a bathroom stall, playing effect after effect while piteously moaning, just to see what would happen.
Once upon a time, when I worked and lived in Washington, an employer made me take an etiquette class, so now I am also always self-conscious when I chew at one of these things.
This is the most concentrated self-conscious chewing you will ever see in one room.
At least, unlike Karl Rove, it won’t be an entire musical genre.
Oooh, speaking of which, I wonder who Obama will be executing during this speech.
Don’t forget that, in 2011, preparations were underway to kill Osama bin Laden while the WHCD was going on, and not a single Administration official leaked. The closest anyone got to getting a big reveal was Seth Meyers.
So, it could happen.
Just for the sake of ruining the evening of everyone at CNN’s table, I hope right now is the moment they FIND THE DANGED PLANE.
I’m glad that a bunch of people can watch what is ostensibly a celebration of the First Amendment and instantly leap all over some poor woman who failed to publicly express fealty to a nation.
I suppose we should mention that Twitter is all over a young woman who the cameras caught typing on her phone during the National Anthem. I’m surprised she had any service? But I’m more surprised at how little folks seem to be paying attention to the cameras.
It’s like a macro version of some dude performatively slut-shaming in public @ mentions and then DMing you his best half-off boxers “I just got back from doing crunches at the gym” shot.
I have been watching the hashtag on Twitter all night, and in the last 10 minutes, a pornbot started spamming it, so it’s like all the snark is interspersed with penis pictures. I guess this is what online dating is like?
I thought I just saw the bald head and preternaturally long thin neck of Florida Governor Rick Scott, but I can’t be sure it was him because I didn’t see him sucking the breath out of a child at the time.
People call Rick Scott "Voldemort." It's wrong. He's one of The Gentlemen from Buffy's "Hush." http://t.co/Z3HL9KSwmO pic.twitter.com/EG5fPmYRJ3
— Big Sexy Jeb Lund (@Mobute) September 30, 2014
Um, so C-SPAN just showed a gentleman picking his nose on camera. I can’t believe people are that hungry already.
I can’t believe it took me this long to realize Josh Earnest is just Politics Mike Florio.
“If.”
The colors are being presented as Obama stands before a red-uniformed and brass-buttoned band. If I were on acid, this would be the scariest, most dickhead version of the Nutcracker I’d ever seen.
The Obamas have arrived.
Well, he’s an Englishman. What does he know about what’s best for America? If he did, he’d be having (per C-SPAN and everything sic’d for my head-cold deafness) “a tureen of jumbo lump crab meat, baby oat salad with house-made buttermilk green goddess dressing, paprika-rubbed filet with wild mushrooms and gala apple demi, along with Alaskan halibut, cheese stone grits, jumbo peeled asparagus.”
PS: I got my head cold by eating at Chipotle with Everyday American Hillary Clinton.
As the VIPS are entering the ballroom, 40 miles away, Guardian senior reporter Jon Swaine is covering the Baltimore protests over the death of Freddie Gray.
Dozens of riot cops still in line yet dwindling protest at Orioles stadium. 2-deep on right hand side #freddiegray pic.twitter.com/lqul6HnvFa
— Jon Swaine (@jonswaine) April 26, 2015
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So, Nerd Model UN, Nerd Homecoming, Nerd Baseball, Nerd Hockey, Nerd Pickup. All of that’s just straight-up nerd, actually. When does the rest of America get to shove these people into a locker while their crushes are watching?
Well, there’s already a Congressional Correspondents’ Dinner and the Gridiron Dinner, the annual baseball game, the Congressional hockey challenge and the lobbyist-versus-Congress members basketball game, so...
A member of the White House Correspondents Association just did a voiceover on CSPAN explaining how important the White House Correspondents Dinner is for the Association’s efforts to demonstrate the importance of the press to the White House. So, apparently this administration’s “most restrictive” and “most dangerous” treatment of the press in history, including its unprecedented war on whistleblowers and its use of the Espionage Act (more than all previous administrations combined) to silence them could be a lot worse without this shindig. All things considered, we should really have two of these dinners per year. And a sock hop, a box social, and a three-legged race. Plus a regatta competition with that really snotty rich-kid summer camp.
C-SPAN just showed John Brennan in the crowd. He’s not checking his phone, but I’m pretty sure he can read this later: Get bent, you jackal.
Apparently, it only took Don Lemon one try....
Whew.. Tied the bow tie in one try.. #WHCD pic.twitter.com/u949eTkA2n
— Don Lemon (@donlemon) April 25, 2015
Nah. It takes about 20 minutes to learn how to do it, and you can just watch a YouTube video.
I must admit that I have no idea how to tie a bow tie. During my cater-waiter years, I always wore a clip-on. Is it difficult?
CSPAN just explained that the White House Correspondents’ Dinner has a bunch of staffers whose job is just to re-tie the bowties of attendees. To put this in perspective, Clouseau could tie his own bowtie.
As a Constitutional Originalist, Scalia will be served a special dietetic meal of a hard biscuit riddled with weevils, boiled salted beef hunks, root vegetables grown in manure, rum in a leaden mug and a flagon of river water filled a hundred yards downstream from sewage runoff. He is 100% okay with the overwhelmingly black service staff.
Katie Couric is now sitting with Antonin Scalia, who is quite clearly having a martini – though not a dirty one.
Seen on C-SPAN at #WHCD: @katiecouric and Associate Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia. pic.twitter.com/w92DzA2UUH
— CSPAN (@cspan) April 25, 2015
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Ohhhh, how awkward. Donald Trump just showed up wearing the same meringue on his head that the dessert pie will be wearing.
.@realDonaldTrump tells @krystalball he'll make a decision about 2016 by "June or July" http://t.co/twgwsen48c #WHCD pic.twitter.com/Ceskfp5UE8
— msnbc (@msnbc) April 25, 2015
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America 2015: Of all the people in this room, Martha Stewart is the one who actually saw jail time.
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The thing about DC is that so many jobs drug test that most folks couldn’t even pretend to find that funny.
The White House Correspondents Dinner needs to be way more like the 1970s Academy Awards with gimmick and protest guests. Like, you attend with a yellowed calcified brain in a jar and say, “I’m drunk on Coors, the Banquet Beer; I came here in a Chevy Silverado; I’m wearing a suit by Pfizer, and my plus one is a Hall of Fame NFL offensive lineman.” Or just roll in with a Scotts Turf-Builder lawn spreader full of dripping defrosted ground beef and say, “My guest is someone who was on a Yemeni street and ten yards away from the drone strike that killed the 17th al-Qaida #2.”
And Huma Abedin just arrived (looking gorgeous) with a tall, attractive gentleman who is not Anthony Weiner.
Sorry, didn’t mean to repeat myself there at the end.
Huma Abedin and yours truly about to hit the red carpet #WHCD pic.twitter.com/Nd7o9AJKa3
— Jim Acosta (@Acosta) April 25, 2015
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Tamron Hall and Al Roker just took a selfie.
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"Police-inspired riot in Baltimore simultaneous to Correspondents Dinner" is way over the top as a metaphor of Roman-esque imperial decline
— The Neon Dipshit (@Bro_Pair) April 25, 2015
Well, for one, it’s really hard to steal anything out of a teeny-tiny clutch. For two, there’s a TON of security around, both by the hotel and the Secret Service and the stars’ people. So you’d have to really want it ... and I suspect, if the autograph guys caught you, they’d deliver a real beat-down. They don’t want security to get stepped up too much, or else it would affect their livelihoods.
Genuinely curious how much casual theft – boosting, pickpocketing – not only occurs but is budgeted for and tolerated at this event.
Best photobombs, or best photo bombs?
Keep an eye out for a picture of her and Kissinger breaking bread and posing with Tea Leoni.
Good to see Madeline Albright letting her hair down after a lot of hard work accelerating the Rwandan Genocide and blockading Iraq.
Clicked briefly over to Bloomberg and saw Halperin and Arianna laughing tinny laughs over a product and immediately had a feeling of knowing what it would be like to watch someone bulldoze two tons of uncooked rice into a furnace in open sight of a thousand caged refugees.
Jane Fonda just arrived looking for all the world like she might be planning on killing someone tonight, and I am so here for it.
She’s talking to Wolf Blitzer, so...
Spotted on C-SPAN on #WHCD Red Carpet: @Janefonda and @wolfblitzer pic.twitter.com/dRx4J3nrsh
— CSPAN (@cspan) April 25, 2015
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Connie Britton is here. I would give anything for her to stand up and give a Tami Taylor monologue about how everyone here needs to cut the shit, remember who they are and remember what matters. REMEMBER ME AS A TIME OF DAY.
Spotted on C-SPAN on #WHCD Red Carpet: @conniebritton pic.twitter.com/6uJgIj4cmq
— CSPAN (@cspan) April 25, 2015
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He is, and he’s way better at it than Mark Halperin.
Wait, is Walt Frazier doing commentary on Bloomberg???
.@WaltFrazier's #WHCD fashion statement. (via @jheil) pic.twitter.com/Z6nkwnCIOc
— Heather Zeller (@HeatherZeller) April 25, 2015
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Laverne Cox. Just: Laverne Cox.
The best part of the C-SPAN feed is that it’s giving a sweeping look at the room, but every now and again it cuts to a camera close to another network’s interview where a celebrity with a pronounced vocal fry is trying to explain, like, why they’re here and, um, who they want to see and, uh, what they’re getting out of this?
Appropriate answers: something different to do on a Saturday; the POTUS; and spicing up the Instagram.
Also, this now exists in the world.
.@Madeldine & @timmydaly partying with @Twitter at @WashingtonPost #WHCD reception https://t.co/2rjPDPqWiZ
— Post Style (@PostStyle) April 25, 2015
Gabourey Sidibe is here with a girl friend, and they totally just hammed it up on the red carpet.
(I stopped watching Bloomberg after he asked Martin O’Malley’s wife if she would enjoy living in the White House. My masochism is vast but it turns out that I have limits.)
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Newt and Callista Gingrich made it this evening. Newt is wearing pork, Callista with hair by Magneto. Give it half an hour before both are ejected for trying to sell $15 DVDs about America’s promise shot in 4 : 3 aspect ratio and hosted by either the Fake Bo or the Fake Luke from when “Dukes of Hazzard” went into contract dispute.
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It looks like Russell Wilson brought his grandmother, after Golden Tate intercepted his original plus one.
Spotted on C-SPAN on #WHCD Red Carpet: @dangerusswilson and his grandmother Carolyn. pic.twitter.com/0rdCWgq1lz
— CSPAN (@cspan) April 25, 2015
Tony Romo managed to make it, though.
Speaking of Patriots, Aaron Hernandez was invited to the White House Correspondents Dinner but unfortunately could NOT make it tonight.
Holy crap, Mark Halperin is playing Seacrest on Bloomberg. He just asked Katie Couric to twirl and called her husband “cute”.
They just gushed over how nice Tom Vilsack is. And, back in studio, is former NYPD commissioner Ray Kelly, the defender of stop-and-frisk.
There is almost no better signifier of this even than this picture:
LOOK: @FaceTheNation host @bobschieffer is dressed and ready for tonight's #WHCD. pic.twitter.com/6gbiVUsx4W
— CBSN (@CBSNLive) April 25, 2015
Bill Belichick is on the red carpet. You couldn’t pick someone other than Gregg Popovich who has a more profound career-long intolerance for cant and match them with a worse occasion. President Bill Belichick would use these people as cannon fodder.
Spotted on C-SPAN on #WHCD Red Carpet: New England @Patriots head coach Bill Belichick. pic.twitter.com/X4UrlWBVQV
— CSPAN (@cspan) April 25, 2015
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I can only pick out Congress members at these events.
Actually, the best party game at these this is to play “Journalist, staffer, lobbyist, wife”. Congress members are identifiable by their pins, so they’re too easy.
My God, is that Seattle Seahawks’ quarterback Russell Wilson? I have trouble recognizing him without the dog-whistling preface of every NFL announcer who introduces him: “THIS REMARKABLE YOUNG MAN RUSSELL WILSON, WHO WHEN WE CAUGHT UP WITH HIM THIS WEEK WAS STUDYING, JEEM.”
Though our C-SPAN narrator just explained that tickets are $300, the dirty secret is that those are the single ticket prices, and most organizations buy tables for much, much more than that.
[Full disclosure: The Guardian is hosting a table tonight.]
My big hope for this event is that, while everyone’s enjoying their $300 seats, a little retail drone flies over their heads, bearing a half-gallon of Nickelodeon green slime. Hey, you’ve got nothing to be afraid of. You’ve done nothing wrong. It’s not going to hit you by accident. Bzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz.
Yes, obviously. Leave Gillian alone.
Well, except for Gillian Jacobs, right?
.@GillianJacobs is looking beautiful at the #WHCD http://t.co/p6OlN8QoFG pic.twitter.com/bEfJYGLOva
— Spylight (@Spylight) April 25, 2015
Everything that is wrong with the White House Correspondents Dinner could be fixed by glass shattering and Stone Cold Steve Austin driving a zamboni onto this red carpet, sending people scattering and forcing them to gaze on him in awe as he pours cracked-open Steveweisers into his face before delivering stunner after stunner to people like, say, Arianna Huffington, who just arrived.
For the record, this is what’s wrong with almost everything else, so I realize what I’m saying is less shocking and more an expression of a ubiquitous malaise.
Pete Wentz is in the house. But I won’t do that to you.
Let me assist: this is Tracee Ellis Ross, Diana Ross’s daughter and the star of Black-ish (IMBD tells me).
This has been your moment of Tracee Ellis Ross appreciation.
I’m just realizing that my recurring sensation of “I have no clue who this person is” is because this event is like a Venn Diagram of “my not reading Politico for the pictures” and “my not watching CBS”.
For those of you without access to C-SPAN, you can view a cacophonous live-stream of the red carpet arrivals here. There is no Seacrest. I repeat: there is no Seacrest.
I should, at this juncture, admit that I covered the red carpet in 2008 for Glamour, where I was quickly disillusioned about the glamour or exclusivity by a professional autograph seeker who hired out cute kids to beg celebrities for autographs about 10 feet from the red carpet you see on television. He is probably pigeon-holing Gillian Jacobs right now.
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It’s nice to see Gillian Jacobs hesitantly walking across the red carpet, as if she considers it weird that she’d be the focus at a thing like this. Also because she’s walking into a room full of people who on a daily basis Britta an entire nation.
Hell yeah, it’s time for the White House Correspondents’ Dinner. Time for everyone around the Beltway take one night off from logrolling, rewriting press releases, planting stories, revolving door careers and taking selfies with each other to celebrate the adversarial system that keeps everything honest for the American people. Pro-Tip: try to spot an ink-stained wretch who makes a quarter million dollars per year deliver a steely gaze to one of 535 civil servants whose median income is over $1m per year.
It’s gonna be great, folks. Let’s all plunge ourselves face first into the toilet and put our hands together for “Jacob Riis, Lincoln Steffens and Ida Tarbell Present: John Pierpont Morgan’s Nite of Laffs 2015.”
I’m wearing Jeb Lund by Craig and Aven Lund. That’s right, I’m naked for this entire thing. I was brought into this world naked, and that’s how I’m going to exit it. By the end of this broadcast, I plan to be dead.
Good evening, and welcome to your live coverage of the White House Correspondents’ Dinner, brought to you from our respective sofas. As befitting the importance of this occasion, I’m wearing yoga pants by Target, a tank top by Old Navy and slippers by Clarks of Boston. My jewelry isn’t on loan from Harry Winston: it’s straight from Claire’s Boutique.
Just kidding: only the celebrities get their dresses from designers. Everyone in DC shops at Macy’s.
