Nothing gets New Yorkers to jump on a bus faster than a party, especially a party where the guest of honor is the Barack Obama. For the second time this year, journalists and celebrities flocked to the Beltway to party it up with the prez–this time for the White House Correspondents’ Dinner on Saturday.

Our colleagues over at FishbowlDC have extensive coverage of the weekend in the capitol. They hit all the fashionable pre-parties including ones hosted by The National Journal and The Atlantic and CBS. They hung out with celebs like Connie Britton, Ellen Burstyn, Tim Daly, Dana Delany, Kerry Washington and Rachael Leigh Cook at the Creative Coalition’s Thursday night fete and spied Ashton Kutcher, Demi Moore, Rashida Jones, Jon Bon Jovi, Owen Wilson, Jason Bateman, Natalie Portman, Julia Louis Dreyfus, Brad Hall, Bradley Cooper, Amy Poehler, Dennis Leary, Glenn Close and BJ Novak at the Vanity Fair/Bloomberg after-party.

Of course, FBDC correspondents were also at the main event. If you missed it, you can watch Obama’s full (and pretty funny) speech here. Our favorite part of the President’s speech was when he teased Rahm Emanuel with a Mother’s Day jab: “He’s not used to saying the word day after ‘mother.’”

A weekly meta-roundup of our favorite (mostly) New York media pundits, what they’re saying, why they’re saying it, and an all-important grade, subjective and arbitrary — just like their columns!

Apparently. According to Nikke Finke, Sacha Baron Cohen, Will Ferrell, Ben Stiller and Jack Black were supposed to don the cover of Vanity Fair‘s annual Hollywood issue, but Cohen and Ferrell’s manager, Jimmy Miller, reportedly nixed the deal, contending his clients were too big for a shared cover. Owen Wilson and Chris Rock were then summoned.

You’ll recall that Cohen was rumored to have been up for the magazine’s November cover [click on our faux rendering, right] but Graydon Carter went with George Clooney.

EARLIER:

The Daily News is putting a p.r. push behind the heir to Lloyd Grove‘s gossip throne, Ben Widdicombe, whose Gatecrasher columns have gone daily. We like to think of Widdicombe as the Owen Wilson to our Luke, at least on the media party circuit. This well-meaning Daily News flack apparently agrees:

From: [FLACK REDACTED]
To: dylan@mediabistro.com
CC:
Date: Wed, 10 Jan 2007 16:56:34-0500
Subject: DAILY NEWS: Ben Widdicombe’s Gatecrasher hits the stands Sundays through Thursdays

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The Daily News is putting a p.r. push behind the heir to Lloyd Grove‘s gossip throne, Ben Widdicombe, whose Gatecrasher columns have gone daily. We like to think of Widdicombe as the Owen Wilson to our Luke, at least on the media party circuit. This well-meaning Daily News flack apparently agrees:

From: [FLACK REDACTED]
To: dylan@mediabistro.com
CC:
Date: Wed, 10 Jan 2007 16:56:34-0500
Subject: DAILY NEWS: Ben Widdicombe’s Gatecrasher hits the stands Sundays through Thursdays

——————————————————————————–

For those of you not familiar with our columnist, Ben Widdicombe, or his good news here is the latest. Please consider booking him for your show. He is witty, charming, funny …

Gatecrasher [Daily News]