Night at the Met
Yeas & Nays has learned that former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld has been put up for membership at the elite Metropolitan Club in downtown D.C.
After being sponsored by Martin R. Hoffmann and former Rep. Frederick Rooney, D-Pa., Rumsfeld’s name was
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posted on the club’s bulletin board earlier this summer.
Now, he’s obligated to collect at least eight letters of recommendation (though more letters are even better). Then Rumsfeld, his sponsors by his side, will hold court in the club’s living room while the club’s Board of Governors chats him up and gives him the once-over — quite a change for the man who once commanded the entire U.S. military.
Finally, according to the club’s constitution, it’s up to the board to “elect” him to membership. But Rummy be warned: It takes only two “no” votes to keep you out. (We wonder whether any board members are anti-war Democrats.)
Should he run the gauntlet successfully, Rumsfeld would join the likes of White House counsel Fred Fielding, AOL founder Jim Kimsey and former national security adviser Zbigniew Brzezinski, all of whom are members.
A call to the club’s general manger was not returned.
It would be the second high-society membership for the former SecDef this year: As Yeas & Nays reported in May, Rumsfeld and his wife, Joyce, also have joined the Miles River Yacht Club on Maryland’s Eastern Shore.
