The White House Correspondents' Dinner: When I Was 'Important'
And always valet your trashed pick-up truck for maximum impact
Substacker Chris Cillizza’s tongue-in-cheek call to abolish the White House Correspondents Dinner made me laugh — especially his recollection of pledging, in his mid-20s, that he’d one day be “successful enough” to make the guest list and bask among Washington’s important people.
As Chris put it:
"I still remember the moment distinctly. I was in my mid 20s — a fledgling reporter at Roll Call newspaper. I lived just a few blocks from the Hilton hotel on Connecticut Avenue where, every April, the glitterati of the political and media world flocked for the White House Correspondents Dinner."
"I went on a run the Saturday night of the dinner. I stopped to watch all the people I thought I wanted to become, filing into the hotel. I pledged to myself that one day I would be successful enough to make the guest list. And I did."
"I went to eight (or so) WHCD dinners over the next decade or so."
Eight WHCDs? Damn — sounds painful.
I only made it to two — but hey, I was important… once. CNN and NBC News invited me, and was psyched to check it out as a novelty.
Oh yeah, now I remember — it was the mid-'90s. I worked at the National Republican Senatorial Committee (NRSC). I did cable hits, wrote and parroted GOP talking points ad infinitum, and occasionally got quoted in The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal, and The New York Times. I’d walk into my Georgetown dry cleaner or Martin’s Tavern and someone would say, “Hey, saw you on TV! You were great!” — even if I’d bombed. I was never all that good on camera.
Ah, Washington. It’s a very important place.
I’d lived in D.C. for years — but despite that fun stint at the NRSC and a couple of WHCD’s, I was more of an “out of town” campaign consultant-type working gubernatorial and senate races. Leaving D.C. for 3 or 4 days to work out of an Anytown USA strip mall campaign headquarters with lousy coffee and powdered milk-product creamer was my muse.
Honestly? I loved it. And it was a helluva lot more lucrative and interesting than sitting around in town with what I like to call the “green-room campaign strategists” who’d never set foot outside the Beltway.
And back then, in my 30s, I drove a 740i Beemer. Why? Duh — I was important. For a while, it was cool to drive around. But all I really ended-up caring about was ding-avoidance. Driving a 740i with dings? You’re definitely not important.
Laughable when I look back on it.
These days? Now that I’m no longer important, I drive a beat-up Ford F-250 long- bed pickup that wears its dings and dents from beach-use like a coat of armor. I live outside the Beltway now — the exurban perimeter — just far enough from D.C. to avoid that self-important Beltway vibe.
On the rare occasion I head into town for a consulting dinner where a suit is required — usually at Capitol Grille, the pretentious Capitol Hill steakhouse packed with very important politicians, lobbyists, consultants and other luminaries — I love pulling the F-250 right up front to the valet.
I tell the kid to park it.
"Dude, you can’t be serious," he pleads — knowing full well it’ll never fit wherever it is they take guest vehicles.
"Yeah," I say. "Just leave it out front. I'll be back in a couple hours," leaving the eyesore there in the street. I’ll surely seem important to guests at the sidewalk tables as I depart my vehicle for the Cap Grille front door.
Inside, I drink some good wine, do my business, and return to find my ride waiting — the keys left in. It’d never be stolen.
Being important is just a D.C. state of mind.
As I wrote this quick piece, I poured a second glass of wine and flipped on C-SPAN to catch the WHCD’s “red carpet” pregame.
Nothing quite captures Washington’s enduring belief in its own relevance like the sight of important, formally-attired luminaries promenading before the cameras.
It gives me a nostalgic twinge for the glorious days of Beltway relevance at my two WHCD outings.
In all seriousness, there are plenty of solid folks associated with the WHCD — some of whom I still know. And who am I to rain on others' parade and fun?
Meanwhile, C-Span just interviewed ABC News' Ann Compton, perhaps one of the nicest big time D.C. TV journalists one will ever encounter — and a former president of the White House Correspondents' Association (WHCA).
Despite the absence of President Trump, leave it to Compton to stress the positive when most of the important dinner attendees would rather not think about him at all.
"Well," she said, pausing, "I give President Trump a lot of credit for providing access to journalists — he often makes himself available two or three times a day." Good point -- that's one way to look at it. But I digress.
After twenty minutes of C-SPAN red carpet gawking, I’m maxed out.
It was fun watching while it lasted. I have more important things to do because hey, it’s Saturday night out here in America. I’m cooking up a pot of Tex/Mex-style spaghetti sauce with jalapeños, cumin, and assorted chili staples.
Maybe I’ll check back later to see what WHCA president Eugene Daniels has to say. Nothing against Eugene — but unlikely.
One thing’s for sure: as you get older, things once important no longer are.
And that’s a very good thing.