Scenes from the Red Carpet

Unhooked from the grid and took a day trip to the mountains yesterday to visit the Biltmore Estate. Gorgeous day. The grounds were magnificient. The views were stunning and uplifting. As for the house itself, the simplest way I can describe it is -- oppressive opulence. Which strikes me as a pretty good description of the current incarnation of the White House Correspondents Dinner and its attendant peripheral parties.

However nothing is all bad. I missed the live action, but The Caucus sums up the resounding thumping of Donald Trump at the event:

But in the end, it was Mr. Trump who served as the punching bag for the evening. As it turned out, Mr. Obama’s swipes were just the warm-up act for Seth Meyers, the headliner for the evening, who spent most of his routine going after Mr. Trump, who sat at the Washington Post table, grimacing.

Painful.

Wasn't all that impressed with Meyers myself. Came across as a bit too heavy on mean-spirited cheap shots to me, but our President was brilliant. Video is well worth watching in full.



Kind of makes it all worthwhile. Which is not to say the whole affair hasn't become an obscene exercise in celebrity worship. As Mark Knoller noted on Twitter: "There’s actually a red carpet for celebrity arrivals. When did the Correspondent’s dinner become the Golden Globes?"

And I hear Politico did live blogging all day, literally under the banner "Scenes from the Red Carpet" from whence I stole the title for this post. In any event, I'm done bitching about it for this year. Besides, Thers has the ultimate takedown, so there's really no point in saying anything else.