Caffeinated Politics

Long-term readers know I am a fan of the White House Correspondents’ Dinner for the work journalists do to cover how our government works and then report to the citizens. I also consider this annual event a time when some fun and hilarity can balance all the forces in Washington who are often in a more combative role. Last night the dinner was held, due to violence that played out earlier at the regularly scheduled event. The outcome was just as ridiculous as Donald Trump tried to do with his tongue what a madman tried to do with a gun months ago.

The saddest part of the insult‑soaked performance from Trump that lasted nearly an hour wasn’t the fat jokes, the crude asides, or the sundowner meandering through whatever white male grievances happened to be rattling around in his damaged brain. Instead, it was the spectacle of the presidency–you know that institution once treated and revered both in our nation and with our allies and friends around the world as the moral North Star–reduced to a late‑night Dean Martin roast of decades past. BUT without the courtesy of a punchline. Last night Trump diminished the office once again, and left a dirty smear on our nation.

That office means a lot to millions untold, and this morning, sadly, there is a stench coming from this president in the White House. It is not trite at all to recall that office was used by Lincoln through a civil war, and it steadied Roosevelt through a depression. Now that same institution finds itself dragged into the mud by a man who proved dignity is optional and decorum is for suckers.

After what I witnessed last night, it seems nearly impossible to add in the same breath that there was a time when the dinner offered levity. Respect, even when tensions were high over policy and politics. Trump tossed that into the toilet, and what resulted was a rambling, angry, and clearly delusional imbecile behind a podium. It was like that dim-witted fourth grader (we all know the one) that had hit his peak in life at age 10 and never advanced beyond offering a torrent of schoolyard taunts. The silence in the room wasn’t confusion about what they heard. I suggest it was mourning. I sensed a collective realization that the presidency (the institution) had been cheapened by the low‑brow theatrics usually reserved for closing time at a blue-collar bar.

And that’s the pity of it. Not the insults themselves, but the shrinking of the office into something small enough to be overshadowed by them.