† Let Them Eat Steak!: The Associated Press informs us that, “The White House is the place to be on Wednesdays”:

Since the presidency changed hands less than six weeks ago, a burst of entertaining has taken hold of the iconic, white-columned home of America's head of state. Much of it comes on Wednesdays.

The stately East Room, where portraits of George and Martha Washington adorn the walls, was transformed into a concert hall as President Barack Obama presented Stevie Wonder with the nation's highest award for pop music on Wednesday.

A week before that, the foot-stomping sounds of Sweet Honey in the Rock, a female a cappella group, filled the East Room for a Black History Month program first lady Michelle Obama held for nearly 200 sixth- and seventh-graders from around the city.

Cocktails were sipped during at least three such receptions to date, all held on Wednesdays.

Bookending the midweek activity were a Super Bowl party for select Democratic and Republican lawmakers and a dinner for governors, the new administration's first black-tie affair. It was capped with a performance by the 1970s pop group Earth, Wind and Fire. And a conga line.

New York Times columnists Gail Collins and David Brooks debate the message it sends to have the First Couple party hearty while less privileged Americans worry about making ends meet, and whether flaunting your status and wealth while so many of your fellow Americans are suffering is “so August”:

Collins:  “This morning somebody asked me if I thought the Obamas should have been spending taxpayer money on that Stevie Wonder bash. I am pretty positive Americans don’t want to read about how the president and his wife, dressed in their signature sackcloth and ashes, shared a pot of gruel with the president of Ukraine.”

Brooks: “[F]ar from being offended by the Stevie Wonder bashes at the White House, I’m thrilled by them. It gets the wonks moving. It brings a little sparkle into their lives. It gives Michelle another chance to show her biceps. (As far as I can tell, one of the main reasons Barack Obama ran for president was so Michelle would have a platform to show her biceps, Thunder and Lightning, to the world.)”

† Obama Is Just About Every U.S. President All Rolled Into One!: Writing in the New York Post, Dick Morris and Eileen McGann observe that “President Lyndon Johnson's administration was known for his War on Poverty. President Obama's will become notable for his War on Prosperity.”  

† Updates To Previous Posts (The Media Love Obama, But He Doesn’t Love Them Back): After personally going after CNBC’s Rick Santelli for criticizing President Barach Obama’s mortgage rescue plan, White House today, asked press secretary Robert Gibbs went after CNBC’s Jim Cramer, reports MediaBistro blog TVNewser for these remarks (video link; 3:06 to 3:20 into the clip) on the “Today” show:

Matt Laurer: Famously in October, Jim, you told people if you need this money in the next five years, get it out of the market. Then in November on the 24th, you said this to me on our show, you said 'Matt, but confidence can be restored. A lot of what's going on is gloom. Some of this is pessimism that's unwarranted. Fast action by Obama could take that off the table.' We had a stimulus package, we had a housing bailout, we've got efforts to save the banks. People would say that's fast action. Why hasn't it worked?

Jim Cramer: We have an agenda in this country now that I would regard as being a radical agenda. I think we had a budget that came out that basically put a level of fear in this country that I have not seen ever in my life, and I think that that changed everything.

ML: So, the policies are not shareholder-friendly?

JC: Shareholder-friendly? This is the greatest wealth destruction I've seen by a President ...

"I'm not entirely sure what he's pointing to make some of the statements. And you can go back and look at any number of statements he's made in the past about the economy and wonder where some of the back-up for those are too. … If you turn on a certain program it's geared to a very small audience. No offense to my good friends, or friend at CNBC. But the President has to look out for the broader economy and the broader population," said Gibbs.

Well that’s a fine howdy-do, considering that CNBC’s Keith Olbermann led the media pack in his ass-kissing coverage of Obama during the primary and general election campaigns.

† Updates To Previous Posts (third item, Depends Whose Ox Is Gored): A researcher paper published in the peer-reviewed journal, Nature, describes a new method to transform skin cells into stem cells that look and act like embryonic stem cells without using viruses to insert the necessary genes into the cells, which could cause the cells to proliferate like tumors. “The new method also allows for genes that are inserted to trigger cell reprogramming to be removed afterwards,” reports Reuters.

† Updates To Previous Posts (fifth item, Now Is Not The Time To Talk About Race): The Washington Post reports that now that the Obama administration has settled into the West Wing, “[t]op officials are engaging the subject of race more freely, with a boldness and confidence they once shunned,” but forcing a dialogue may not be helpful:

There is a risk in talking about it too much, said Thomas Mann, a political scientist at the Brookings Institution, in an e-mail. During his campaign, Obama made an explicit decision not to emphasize race and did so only when it threatened to damage his candidacy. Changing course now could make some feel uncomfortable. …

As it happens, DC Examiner columnist Gregory Kane, has a list of five uncomfortable things he wants Attorney General Eric Holder to talk about: the 70 percent of black children born out of wedlock; affirmative action; the racial disparity in felony murders (according to the FBI stats from 1976 through 2005 whites were 54.7 percent of felony murder victims while blacks were 59.3 percent of felony murder offenders); the racial disparity in interracial homicides (black-on-white slayings are nearly three times the white-on-black ones); and the Morelock-Woycio murders, in particular.

Rinku Sen, president of the Applied Research Center, a think tank on race in Oakland, CA, Chicago and New York, tells the WaPo that she worries whites are thinking, 'We've elected the black president, and now we're post-racial and everybody should just shut up.' She says “It's very dismissive. We did elect the first black president, but people seem to forget that it was a hard campaign."

Yes, but the campaign was won and white Americans are having trouble understanding why black Americans can’t live in the moment and enjoy their triumph. Yes, blacks were enslaved in this country, but in the course of human history just about every ethnic minority has been enslaved. And today few recall that the Irish were once routinely characterized as monkeys (fifth item) in cartoons and “scientific” studies, because they let their grievances and resentments go a long time ago and applied their energies to successfully integrating themselves into American society, commerce and politics despite rampant and virulent anti-Catholic bias that continued well into the 20^th century.

The alternative is to experience your collective history like Benjamin Button.

† Updates To Previous Posts: (last item, Living In These Mad, Mad, Madoff Times): A cost-savings measure at Chicago law firm McDermott Will & Emery has some of it’s attorneys feeling deprived – caffeine deprived, reports the Chicago Tribune:

Quentin "George" Heisler, head of McDermott's Chicago office, e-mailed colleagues … that the firm will no longer provide free coffee in its 45th-floor lobby. The firm also will suspend evening food services. Heisler said in the memo that the firm will keep single-serve coffee machines on each attorney floor and make beverages available for client meetings.

His memo was leaked to the legal blog, as was an e-mailed response from another partner that was inadvertently sent to everyone in the office.

"George, I know this will save some dollars, but they are small dollars. For the small savings, I think this is a mistake. To me it sends a message of desperation," the e-mailer said.

Big Law blog Above the Law found out that the other partner was John Hendrickson, chair of the firm's compensation committee and a member of its management committee.

Heisler tells the Tribune that curbing the free food and coffee was one of several budget cuts the firm has made – most notably, cancelling a black-tie event at the Field Museum to celebrate its 75th anniversary and repurposing those funds to supplement severance packages to the 60 associates and 89 staff members laid off last month. "Clients want to know their providers are sacrificing in the same way as they are."

[Hat Tip: The Heel, an Ivy-educated attorney with a prestigious New York firm, and occasional contributor to this blog.]

† Updates To Previous Posts (fifth item, Pearson's Knickers Still In A Knot Over His Pants): Back in December, a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit brushed off an appeal of a ruling dismissing former administrative Judge Roy Pearson’s $54 million lawsuit against a dry cleaner who he says lost a pair of pants. Now, the entire nine-judge panel of the District's Court of Appeals has denied a second request for an appeals hearing, reports The  Associated Press. Pearson’s court of last resort is the U.S. Supreme Court. If the high court denies Pearson’s cert petition, this zombie lawsuit finally dies the death it deserves.