Those who could afford it had their shiny hair long, their fancy necklaces, their expensive bell-bottom trousers in "psychedelic" colors and leather moccasins. The Bethesda-Chevy Chase crowd paraded around DC on weekends to show us hicks from the "wrong" side of the Potomac (Virginia) what was really cool, and it sure wasn't us. We couldn't afford to wear that expensive gear even if we wanted to. THEY knew what was cool and what wasn't, even if most of them had never even set foot in Virginia.
The Gridiron Club has been around since 1885. They have their traditions, and their motto is "Ladies are always present, reporters are never present, and the Gridiron singes, but it never burns." In other words they go so far, and then that's it. There are never more than sixty members. They have their traditions, and they are as long-standing as pumpkins on Halloween. The March events are incredible off-the-record mixers where probably more useful inter-party and intra-party deals and conversations are held than anywhere else. Congresscritters, POTUS (usually), the VP (usually), Supreme Court Justices, ambassadors, Cabinet members, and past luminaries are always there, even some useless nerds like me have known to be invited now and then (everybody makes mistakes). Everyone making a speech makes fun of themselves and their own parties, which is a pretty good indication of why Trump never comes. The Gridiron members put on a show which usually has everyone in hysterics. The members usually write it themselves, although on rare occasions others have contributed (including yours truly, which is how I know) when asked.
My dad joined the Washington DC print press as a wet-behind-the-ears reporter who was sent down there at age 28 as an experimental one-man DC correspondent's bureau for his one horse town's newspaper in upstate New York. He had heard of the Gridiron Club, of course. That's like saying every little league baseball player in Chicago has heard of the Cubs. He had three things most of his colleagues didn't have, however--at least not all three. He had a great sense of humor, a tireless work ethic, and a total lack of ego. That earned him the attention and friendship of DC journalists with similar qualities such as fellow future Gridiron Club president Helen Thomas. He finally got in to the Gridiron Club in 1977, and had me and the family along for his first March Gridiron event. Mondale gave his speech noting about he was the REAL power in DC, as could be figured from the fact that after the inauguration, he rode back to the White House in a heated, chauffeur-driven limousine, while Jimmy Carter "was forced to walk." Carter then got up and thanked the "acting Vice-President" for his remarks. Years later, Bill Clinton had the room eating out of his hand. Arch-rival Gingrich leaned over to my mom, who had been seated next to him, and told her "anybody who thinks this guy will be a pushover to defeat for re-election is deluding themselves."
This is from Gridiron events 30 years and longer ago, so if I'm stretching the "off-the-record" rule, I probably have some unofficial statute of limitations protecting me. But the white tie thing and the civility tradition go WAY back--as in before most of our grandparents were born. The traditions are respected because they are what makes Gridiron what it is. To even depart with the toast tradition is, yes, really, a BIG deal in DC press circles. So no one pulled out an assault rifle and started shooting Republicans. Guess what? Gridiron is probably an event where they wouldn't do it, either. I'll bet Gridiron was the only place where Democrats like us could hear Gingrich admit verbally (in 1995) that he and the Republicans and their Contract With America "probably bit off more than we could chew."
It's just an old DC tradition with its own rules, and if they don't do what we tell them to do, well cry me a river. That just seems like some good old-fashioned tie-dyed bell-bottomed reverse elitism like I used to get tossed at me by the Bethesda Cadillac crowd in the 1960s. It's not for us to tell the Gridiron Club members how to act any more than it's for Republicans to tell us what celestial entities we are forced to believe in. I can tell you that the couple of those events that I HAVE been to, kicked more Republican ass in a night than MSNBC kicks in a month. They knocked us, too, but never overly meanly. Everybody gets to laugh, because, as their motto says, the Gridiron singes but it never burns. I think they're entitled to keep their traditions without our little blog telling them they need to change their 140 year old ways, and conform to standards we set for them.
Oh, and some day, remind me to repeat Carl Rowan's best story about himself (he was sort of a precursor to Roland Martin, but 30-40 years ago, and on a different plane) mowing his lawn. That's a Washington classic that I first heard at Gridiron, and Carl ALWAYS had the last word. Although younger than my dad, Carl was Gridiron president years before my dad was. if you never heard the name Carl Rowan, check it out. You can do PLENTY inside and outside of Gridiron, and so do the people who have led it over the years.
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