Parton: ‘Enough boobs’ in the White House

Speaking at a National Press Club luncheon on Tuesday, the country superstar was asked — inevitably — about last year’s presidential race. She said while she’s excited about the “new energy” President Obama is bringing, she was also intrigued by Hillary Clinton’s candidacy and the possibility of having a female president.

“I thought it would be great to have a woman in the White House,” she said, before raising an eyebrow and adding, “But then I thought, ‘Every 28 days…'”

She added that she was once asked if she would ever run herself, but “I think we’ve got enough boobs in the White House.”

Parton, who looks exactly like you’d think — small, huge hair, sequined suit, long pink fingernails, nice as pie — wasn’t shy about explaining her well-known look, either.

 

“It costs a fortune to make someone look so cheap,” she joked. “I did take my look from a serious place. It’s a country girl’s idea of glam. … I do make good money, but as I said, I need it.”

She explained: “There was a woman in our hometown–when we did go to town. She was one of the most beautiful women I’d ever seen. She had this mop of beautiful yellow hair and she used to wear high heels made of plastic and inside the heels were fish that swam around. … Every time I said that the women would say, ‘She ain’t nothing but trash.’ And I said, ‘That’s what I wanna be!'”

As usual, she embraced her fan base, which turned out en masse for the overflow event. Parton posed for photos with a line of people that began 45 minutes before the program. Lacking a band, she only sang bits and pieces of three songs a capella. But she involved the crowd there, too, asking everyone to bang out a rhythm and help her chant the lyrics to one of her new songs, which were inspired by the Cherokee nation.

On Tuesday night, she appeared at the Gaylord National resort at National Harbor, band in tow, to perform selections from that project. 

(Photo: Carrie Devorah)