Phillipe & Jorge were lolling in the hot tub the other day, frozen Pernod and grapefruits in hand, perusing the March 27 issue of The New Yorker, when P. suddenly let out a scream. J. thought he had merely sat on one of our toy submarines (a not infrequent occurrence, and they are great conversation pieces, especially given the shape of some of them). But P. quickly cited an item in the famed “Talk of the Town” section by Nick Paumgarten, which featured old friend Sheldon Whitehouse, along with a drawing of Weldon and director extraordinaire Martin Scorsese.
In “Launching Mr. Whitehouse,” readers were treated to a description of the fundraiser hosted by a former Senate majority leader, the diminutive Tom Daschle, which was held in Scorsese’s Manhattan manse, and carried a tariff of a thousand bucks a head. Evidently, Marty (as we know him) and his wife rarely entertain, so this was a big event on the Upper East Side.
Much was made of the plays on words of Sheldon’s last name (Daschle: “Wouldn’t it be nice to have a Whitehouse in Washington we could count on.” Great, Tom. Go back South Dakota.), but a good deal of the story focused on Scorsese. The scribe was so thrilled to enter the sacred portals of the Marty’s brownstone that he spent much time describing the art and memorabilia on the walls. Still, it was a nice feather in the cap for Whitehouse. We’d love to see his next fundraiser feature Sheldon bursting onstage to Smokey & the Miracles’ “Mickey’s Monkey,” and dancing for the crowd, a la Robert De Niro’s legendary Johnny Boy role in Scorsese’s fantastic Mean Streets.
While this national exposure could help with fundraising, perhaps none of Sheldon’s efforts will compare with how the Matt “Scandal a Day” Brown campaign continues to fall apart in plain view. Sheldon should keep the Scorsese ball in play, beginning his first debate by staring over at Matt and reprising the “You lookin’ at me?” bit, again by De Niro, in Taxi Driver (although we doubt Weldon will go for the Mohawk).
Of course, everyone waits with bated breath for the master of self-destruction, “Laugh at Me” Laffey, to get his act into gear. However, we are not aware of Scorsese having any clown movies in his oeuvre. Sorry, Steve.
Judgment daze
Two members of the Rhode Island Judiciary came up in the news this week for completely different reasons. First, the former Traffic Tribunal Judge Marjorie Yashar has apparently become the latest public official to qualify for the JO Cup, an award just invented by your superior correspondents and named for John Orabona, the Biggest Little’s greatest pension genius of all time.
Margie’s move, as detailed in a front-page story in the Sunday Other Paper, was hanging out on unpaid leave for eight months while disputes over her conduct, both on and off the bench, were being scrutinized. Chilling for two-thirds of a year proved quite profitable for the judge, as it seems that she magically needed only that amount of time to bump up her annual pension by an extra $38,660 a year, to $120,310. Nice work if you can get it, huh?
