White House party crashers are winners!
Tareq and Michaele Salahi, America's newest anti-celebrities. Congratulations on making humanity look like chumps.
The game is over, folks… and Michaele and Tareq Salahi have bested us. They win.
Who did they beat?
They beat all of us: the mainstream media; the White House; the gossip rags; the TV audience; humanity…
But they got caught crashing a state dinner at the White House. They’re now known as impersonators, classless social climbers, blatant fame whores and, possibly, criminals… how is that winning?
A week after crashing the White House dinner, we’re not only still talking about this failed vintner and his trophy wife, but they’re appearing on morning news shows, giving interviews and promising to hold more press events. They claim they were invited to the White House, despite the fact that no one in the government can corroborate that (and, indeed, officials refute it). They’ve crashed closed political events before. They’re playing us all like a fiddle perfectly tuned to American fame — by promising future revelations to back up their claims and the ensuing interviews that will surely follow, they’re ensuring that we’ll continue to shine a spotlight on their shallow, empty lives.
Again… they’re known as impostors and people are calling them names. You’re saying that’s what they want?
Since thrusting themselves into the spotlight, the world has learned that the Salahis have a long line of legal troubles in suburban DC courts, including contract disputes, back taxes, failure to pay bills and bankruptcy on the family winery for which Tareq Salahi sued his own mother to control and then drove into the ground. They are being investigated by the Secret Service for lying to federal agents and might possibly face a congressional investigation. They’ve employed an attorney and publicist to speak for them (the wonderfully named Mahogany Jones).
But if that all sounds bad, you clearly aren’t playing in the same arena as Tareq and Michaele Salahi. Because they are reaping the rewards for their behavior.
This is modern American TV celebrity. It’s not about being respected or successful or accomplished… it’s about being famous and being on TV. The Salahis had TV cameras documenting them as they prepped and readied themselves to enter a Secret Service-protected event to which they had no business attending — all in the hopes of being featured on Bravo’s upcoming “Real Housewives of DC.” They’ve posted pictures of themselves online attending other DC black-tie events to which they were not invited. They’re dragging out this episode as long as they can by dribbling out information slowly, picking and choosing what chat shows to appear on and with whom they’ll talk and when. They clearly don’t care about being respected or admired, they care about being famous and well-known. Why else try out for a reality show that’s only purpose is to document their shameless, banal social climbing? They need to keep their story alive as long as they can. This past week has been their coup de grace.
But isn’t their fame more infamy than renown?
Oh, don’t be so naive. The line between infamy and renown barely exists. And the more someone’s name appears in the press, the blurrier that line gets. Joe and Jane Sixpack will just keep hearing the name Salahi over and over on TV and eventually they’ll forget why they know that name and only remember that they know that name.
Don’t give me any nonsense about this being a Faustian bargain or pyrrhic victory for the Salahis; there’s no “Twilight Zone”-like ironic twist at play here (they gained the fame they wanted, but their lives were forever ruined). In a few weeks, the tumult will pass and the Salahis will be sitting pretty.
Why? There’s no stigma or shame left in society, so you can bet your polo club and ascot that the Salahis will be celebrity judges on some game show soon and by next spring, they’ll be guests at the White House Correspondents Dinner table of some middle-tier news organization looking to make headlines for itself.
But, that’s what they want.
Exactly — and that’s why they win. Sign them up to teach a class at the Learning Annex; they’ve been running a master class in How to be Famous that makes the supremely stupid Pratts look like pikers.
Don’t bother fighting it; the game is already over, and we’ve all lost.
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And the solution is….?
I agree with you. But…1) if they broke the law, that’s news, by any classic definition; 2) they crashed the White House — ditto 3) they were photographed with the President — ditto.
Mencher’s classic journalism textbook on the definitions of news include the usual: 1) proximity (it happened in the U.S.); 2) it affects many people (arguably so, if they’d done harm to the President), 3) it touches people with wealth and power, and the President certainly qualifies.
They’re ugly morons. We perpetuate their notoriety by giving them attention. But when, where and how do ratings-starved media (and bloggers who need plenty of hits) collectively and simultaneously decide — OK, kids, we’re done here?
The drug-addicted vein craves the needle. Which is which?
I think, Caitlin, that’s why they Salahis are so diabolically brilliant — their reality-show stupidity is just “newsy” enough (actually, more than enough, as you delineate) that the media can’t ignore it. It’s not like the Tiger Woods story/dilemma (which James Poniewozik smartly dissects – http://tunedin.blogs.time.com/2009/11/30/looking-for-reasons-to-care-about-tiger-woods/) where mainstream media might turn up their nose at “gossipy”
In response to another comment. See in context »news… these dunderheads wandered into the White House. We’re stuck reporting about it.
Mr. Greenberg,
I have met “media junkies” before and like heroin junkies, any fix is better than no fix.
Oh my, have I been out of the loop? I don’t watch TV and your piece is the first I have read about this party-crashing couple.
The media coverage around these two makes humanity look like chumps!
Are you serious?
In response to another comment. See in context »Why, yes! I get almost all of my information from the internet, and you can easily ignore things of no interest. People crashing a presidential party does not merit a click.
In response to another comment. See in context »[...] This post was mentioned on Twitter by Matthew Greenberg and lewisdvorkin, Kristen Faust. Kristen Faust said: Well said @MEGreenberg and nice use of the word Faustian. http://ow.ly/HBrP [...]
I love you like a brother, Matthew, but I gotta say, meh.
There’s no question their crashing a White House state dinner was news, and I think you’re right that people are so desperate to be on TV that they don’t care how stupid they make themselves look. Have you seen the rest of the “Real Housewives” franchise? That Monica Lewinsky-hosted masked dating show from a few years back had loads more class.
I agree with you in general that the state of American celebrity has degenerated to the truly pathetic — my sick fascination with the Gosselins alone proves that. But I still believe, naive as it may be, that there’s a difference between real celebrity and celebrity wannabes. They’re on morning TV shows and supposedly testifying before Congress this week, but it doesn’t make this a story that’s going to last much beyond that. I think we’re stuck with the Salahis only if Bravo does in fact sign them for the next stupid installment of their stupid series — which, come on, surely they have. With all this free publicity, Bravo would be foolish not to.
Which more or less makes your point for you. In Washington, the who are really power players don’t need to pull stupid stunts to get attention — they have pull where it counts. Which is why the whole notion of a “Real Housewives of DC” is just asinine anyway.
I say give it a week or two, depending on whether charges are filed and whose head rolls at the Secret Service. Then there will be another DUI, another rehab stint, another fill-in-the-blank, and the Salahis, no matter how prettily they’re sitting, will end up an asterisk.
I’ve adored you for 15 years, LT, but here’s my point:
It’s not about actual power and fame (in DC or any other city). The Salahis have achieved TV fame. Even if the real world of news moves on in a week or a month, the Salahis have attained this championship belt of notoriety (small as it is) and can dine out on it forever and ever, thanks to the mysterious, swirling eddies of American taste that have given Omorosa, Joe the Plumber and your beloved Kate Gosselin paychecks and headlines.
Roy Hobbs only wanted people to say, when he walked by, There goes the best there ever was.
From now on, the Salahis can forever have people say, Those are the folks who crashed the White House. In their world (the bizarro world of reality TV), that’s fame.
In response to another comment. See in context »Well done Matthew, you’ve caught the launch of TV Reality. Not to be confused with Reality TV. These people actually, really, with flesh-on-flesh contact, shook the hand of the President — and, they have a picture!! Even if they never bring their reality to TV, they’ve brought TV to reality and you caught the moment. Well done!