America's best roaster (in the comic tradition) Jeff Ross weighs in on the controversy over Michelle Wolf's speech at the White House Correspondents' Dinner. I might quibble with his insistence that the event is a roast. It's an entertainment that might take the form of a roast but doesn't have to. Craig Ferguson didn't really "roast" and I doubt Ross would look at whatever it was Rich Little did in 2007 and say, "Yeah, that's the same kind of thing I do."
But when you invite Michelle Wolf to perform, what you get is exactly what she did. It would be like hiring Frank Ferrante to perform and being outraged when he did Groucho…which, come to think of it, would be a pretty good idea.
I still think the whole premise of the dinner is a bad one but Ross is right. There is something very wonderful and American about a comedian doing jokes about the President of the United States to his face. Then again, I disagree that Trump would be the same kind of Good Sport he was on those Comedy Central roasts. On those, Trump was just delighted to be seen as important enough to be the topic for an hour of television. He's way past that now. Now, he's too important to let anyone even jest about the crookedness of his tie, let alone his entire administration.