Saturday night marked the event when the Washington, DC elites gathered to reassure themselves they are elite by virtue of the fact that they had, indeed, gathered.
The event is the White House Correspondents' Association Dinner.
I was not invited. I used to be invited but when I was, it was because I was a somebody.
No. That's not correct. It was because I worked for somebody who was a somebody: Newt, or Dan Quayle, or the Secretary of Defense.
But, that is not to diminish the importance of The Dinner for those who buy the tables and invited the guests.
We all need reinforcement that what we do is of value. And one of the ways we do that is to be around other people who want to believe that what they do is of value.
And, for the vast majority of reporters in the room - whether actual White House correspondents or just friends and family - what they do IS of value.
It is an unfortunate element of the WH Correspondents' Dinner that the "entertainment" has gone from amusing, or even funny commentary on the place, the people, and the times to, like Saturday night, brutal attacks on people who have no ability to fight back.
The entertainer last night was Michelle Wolf. Another example of why I am considered to be "What Was," is: I had never heard of her before.
In any event with Donald Trump thumbing the Presidential nose at the whole thing by holding a campaign rally in Michigan, Ms. Wolf turned her focus on press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders.
I am not much of a fan of Sanders. I think she gets away with a lot because she is Ms. Sanders and not Mr. Sanders, but from what I read today about Wolf's act was it was in many cases a cruel rehashing of Saturday Night Live bits about Sean Spicer that had been balled up and thrown into a trash can in the writers' room.
It was so awful that Maggie Habermann, the ace WH reporter for the NY Times (which the BBC informs us, stopped attending the event in 2008) and who, herself, is a regular target of Trump's Tweets, Tweeted:
That @PressSec [Sarah Huckabee Sanders] sat and absorbed intense criticism of her physical appearance, her job performance, and so forth, instead of walking out, on national television, was impressive.
The audience groaned, moaned, chuckled and in general did its best to protect the tribe's anti-Trump credentials even in the face of Wolf's performance.
The Washington Post's Paul Fahri wrote:
"The White House Correspondents' Association dinner attracted about 3,000 journalists, random plus-ones and curious hangers on, but the usual buzz around the event was reduced to something more like a snore."
Meanwhile …
Deep in fly-over country - Washington Township, Michigan - Donald Trump held a rally in front of a completely different tribe.
As an example: Rates at the Washington (DC) Hilton are about $350/night. Rates at the Hampton Inn (a Hilton property) closest to Washington (MI) are about $111/night.
Trump spoke for about 75 minutes and aimed at all the usual targets: The "dishonest" press corps about 500 miles away, the Democratic Leaders Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) and Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-NY); the Wall; the botched nomination of Adm. Ronny Jackson, MD; James Comey, and so on.
On the other hand, he took full credit for the meeting between the leaders of North and South Korea.
Trump, on Trump, via the NY Times:
"What do you think President Trump has to do with it? I'll tell you what: Everything."
I love it when Trump talks about himself in the third person like George Costanza.
To his credit, as the Detroit Free Press noted:
"Saturday's event in Macomb County was the 11th rally Trump has held in Michigan and the fifth rally in metro Detroit since first announcing his run for president in June 2015. He also appeared a huge rally at Macomb County Community College on the Friday before the 2016 election."
Compare and contrast with the Clinton Campaign which not only didn't send Hillary to Michigan, but according to Politico.com, refused to allow the Service Employees International Union to pull volunteers out of Iowa and send them to Michigan to try and eek out a victory there in the days before the 2016 election.
So, the DC Tribe was in black tie in Washington, DC while the Trump Tribe was in MAGA shirts and hats in Washington Twp, Michigan.
Next year the two should meet half way. Maybe we can stop this foolishness with a Unity Night in Pittsburgh.
On the Secret Decoder Ring page today: A link to a video of Michelle Wolf, and to the coverage of the Dinner by the Washington Post and the Trump Rally from the NY Times.
® 
