John McCain either deserves 100 percent of the credit for crafting the looming Wall Street bailout (draft proposal here,) or he deserves no credit at all, depending on whether you believe his chief campaign strategist, or John McCain.
Meanwhile, where was John when the details of the bailout were worked out? Dining, though apparently, not "al fresco..."
So lawmakers struck a deal on the bailout last night, but where was John McCain? Was he part of the negotiations that he rushed back to Washington, DC to rescue? Was he valiantly battling the forces of the status quo to get something done for Main Street? Well, it turns out that he wasn't. Instead, he indulged in a luxury dining experience at CityZen, an icon of haute cuisine Cafe Mozu in Washington, DC. More about Mozu courtesy of the Washingtoninan:
 Located in the Portals project just east of the 14th Street bridge and overlooking the Washington Channel and its yacht moorings, the hotel is not convenient either to the marble corridors of Capitol Hill or the office buildings of downtown. The streets nearby are mostly deserted in the evenings.
The hotel's management seems to be counting on the draw of two high-profile restaurants to help to make the hotel a destination. The first, Café Mozu, the hotel's less formal restaurant, opened in March. The second, Cityzen, under the command of Eric Ziebold, formerly at the very highly regarded French Laundry under Thomas Keller, will open for dinner only in September.
Café Mozu belies the Washington rule that restaurants with views don't have very good food. The room is modern, serene, and full of light. Floor-to-ceiling windows look out--across a freeway--to the Washington Channel and the Jefferson Memorial. The hotel's Asian roots are alluded to in the restaurant's waiting area, built to evoke the veranda of a grand colonial hotel and furnished with white rocking chairs.
To run Café Mozu and serve as the hotel's executive chef, the Mandarin Oriental has hired Hidemasa Yamamoto, for many years chef of the Jockey Club on Massachusetts Avenue. Limited by the preferences of the Jockey Club's clientele--a coalition of politicians and cavedwellers who never got much beyond crabcakes, red meat, and chicken salad--Yamamoto never really had a chance to spread his wings. At Café Mozu, the menu is his own.
Yes, well it seems a satisfied palate is the best foundation for arms length deal-making. Even more about the fine dining establishment from the Mandarin Hotel website:
Lunch and dinner menus showcase irresistible selections such as Roasted five spices Duck, raisin couscous, orange scented curry jus”, Crispy Wild Salmon with fingerling potatoes, Brussels sprouts and haricots verts, Braised Pork Belly with sweet potato puree, baby onions and goat cheese polenta and Black Sea Bass with bok choy, string beans, snow bean sprouts and aromatic lemongrass broth. Heavenly desserts from our pastry department include a Bitter Chocolate and Passion Fruit Mousse, Flourless Poppy Seed Cake, Lychee Crème Brulee and Champagne-Verbena Parfait.
Mmm-mm. Pass the bailout, AND the fingerling potatoes!! Hey, did you say couscous? John McCain LOVES coucous! (It's very down-home...)
By the way, why did the completely "fair and balanced" Politico feel the need to scrub its references to McCain's dinner? Per the Huffpo: Politico reports (update: Politico has updated the article and removed the reference to McCain's dinner, but as you can see in this Google search, the reference was there in the original article): As his colleagues worked on the deal at the Capitol Saturday night, McCain and his wife, Cindy, dined with Sen. Joe Lieberman and his wife, Hadassah, at CityZen, one of Washington's best restaurants. [Note: they got the right hotel, wrong restaurant...]
Could it be that Roger Simon has pulled yet another Ron Fournier on behalf of McCain? After all, Simon was almost alone among the pundits not working for Fox News, in saying that McCain was the winner of Friday's debate...
To be fair, McCain did say of his whereabouts last night: I was working on all of the other stuff that I was working on, and contacting people, and working away." Yeah, working away on a $300 bottle of wine (after which even Joe Lieberman probably sounded interesting...)
Labels: 2008 election, economic crisis, John McCain, presidential candidates, rich people, the Bush bailout, Wall Street |
