Does Anyone Care? December 17, 2007
Posted by Reginald Johnson in Celebrity, Culture, Humor, Life, Odd News.add a comment
A couple of weeks ago I attended the Time magazine’s Person of the Year Breakfast at very posh The Source by Wolfgang Puck, located next door to the beloved Canadian Embassy. The restaurant is housed in the same building as the Newseum [on Pennslyvania Ave, NW].
Time magazine hosts an event such as this annually in New York City (I am not sure if the same can be said of the Washington event).
Time invites a panel to put forward nominations for their “Person of the Year” issue. Apparently, it’s bigger in New York City than DC. A reporter for the New York Post was there and told me the NYC audience was much bigger than the crowd here….by a hundred or so. I told the guy that NYC also has about 7.3 million more people too – and this was a breakfast, whereas the NYC thing is a luncheon. Even a free breakfast cannot get many Washingtonians up…especially at 8 am.
The panel consisted of Senator Sam Brownback; California Congresswoman Ellen Tauscher; Karen Tumulty, Time National Political Correspondent; and another person with Time whom I cannot remember. The event was moderated by Jay Carey (Times’ Washington Bureau Chief). I was busy sitting in back sipping tea and thinking, “…wow, this is a really nice place….” So busy infact that that I missed the introductory stuff.
For those of you who really are interested, the New York City event had NBC News’ Brian Williams, comedian/actress/The View co-host Whoopi Goldberg, former Senator George Allen, MySpace co-founder Chris DeWolfe and rockstar activist Ayaan Hirsi Ali as panelist.
The magazine gives grub to a few media people and hear their thoughts on who the person/thing/idea of the year should be. At least they give the media people that impression. Oh..and they also pretend to let them participate in the decision—they also hand out gift bags, which was a good enough reason to go in itself.
Sen. Brownback nominated ‘the immigrant’ as a possibility. Congresswoman Tauscher nominated the ‘iPhone’. Karen Tumulty nominated ‘the Secretary of Defense’. And the guy I cannot remember, well…he nominated ‘Gen. Petraeus’.
Out of all that was mentioned during the Q&A segment, I gotta say that I was no clearer as to who the person of the year will be – but after last year’s cop-out, I am not sure if anyone really cares.
