I have called Villagers access whores for a long time, we just couldn't put a price on it. Well, thanks to Mike Allen at the Politico we now know the answer to that nagging detail. If you think about it, by DC standards the prices range anywhere from streetwalker to high class out calls. Of course the twist is that they now want to monetize the access they have with government officials!
For $25,000 to $250,000, The Washington Post has offered lobbyists and association executives off-the-record, nonconfrontational access to "those powerful few": Obama administration officials, members of Congress, and — at first — even the paper’s own reporters and editors.
I would also be interested in just who those government officials (elected or not) the WaPo believes would participate in these salons. We could then put the question to them directly. Contact your Senators and Reps to find out if they would participate in this sort of activity.
Has anyone ever heard of anything similar to this previously? Are we being naive in assuming that this has never been done before, but packaged just a little differently to hide what is really going on?
(h/t Balloon Juice)
UPDATE: And just like that it appears to have been cancelled according to Matt Yglesias.
UPDATEBased on an internal email I've been shown, it looks like the Post has responded swiftly to the furor over this by canceling the event. And rightly so.
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