Plus, youtube ceo is talking about the doubleedge sword of politicians using web video. But first, the reason why were in washington this morning. President obamas blunt messages for the media at his eighth and final white house Correspondents Dinner. This is how he kicked things off. [ applause ] youre gonna miss me when im gone you cant say it, but you know its true. Now, there was nervousness in the room when his speech started. I think it was embraced by the end of it. All the reviews, of course, have been positive for president obama. Most, actually, not all. Not so much for the other performer, Larry Wilmore, who had to follow obama last night. Lets talk about what the president said and how he said it with an our allstar panel here in washington. Here at the table, tammy hidad, a former executive producer of shows like Cnns Larry King live and msnbcs hardball. Thank you, all, for being here this morning. Its our morning. We had to be here. Well, you were in the room, tammy. You thought the president received rave reviews from the audience. He did, indeed. He had a great time. I dont think this is partisan politics. I think its the appreciation for the president as a performer. He took his time. He waited. You just showed the pause before he started to get the room together with him. Thats what a master performer does. Then he hit it out of the park, according to most people in the room. Lets watch his comments about donald trump. This was certainly the most anticipated part of the evening. Heres what he said. They say donald lacks the Foreign Policy experience to be president. But in fairness, he has spent years meeting with leaders from around the world. Miss sweden, miss argentina, miss azerbaijan. And theres one area where donalds experience could be invaluable. Thats closing guantanamo. Because trump knows a thing or two about running Waterfront Properties into the ground. All right. Thats probably enough. I mean, ive got more material. No, no. [ applause ] i dont want to spend too much time on the donald. Following your lead, i want to show some restraint. Because i think we can all agree that from the start, hes gotten the appropriate amount of coverage befitting the seriousness of his candidacy. I hope yall are proud of yourselves. The guy wanted to give his Hotel Business a boost, and now were praying that cleveland makes it through july. I think the president really looked forward to saying that in particular. Weve heard his media critique about trump coverage before, but this was in depth in front of all the people who make the decisions. I wonder if you think theres something here about all the audience members saying more, more, more, encouraging president obama to say more about trump. Is that a sign of media bias, a sign that there are a lot of journalists in that room who do want to see donald trump elected . I dont think so. I fell for the head fake in the middle of the speech where he was starting to do the fake close. I thought, we have to get to more trump. I think some of this material writes itself. Its natural. I think he enjoyed the digs at trump. I think hes obviously but the room did as well. Ron, do you agree its not media bias to hear the folks in that room, including myself, applauding a lot of the jokes . That thats a sign of what the press corps doesnt want to see in november . It might be part of it, but i think the press is doing some introspection and realizing the president might have a point. Although, i think hes a little off. I dont think the problem is the amount of attention, its the type of attention. Hes the front runner. We have to write a lot about him. But we have to stop writing about just what he says and dig in and say, what is it hes saying and doing and how does that reflect the kind of leader he might be and the president he might be. Were not doing enough accountability journalism against trump. Were doing a lot of flash in the pan, celebrity, reality tv type coverage. Betsy, you know about scrutiny. You said thats whats lacking, you think . I think so. The hourlog interviews we used to do, you dont see candidates doing those, getting put through the ringer. Wait a minute. Can i defend cable though . Can i be the person to defend cable news . This man is running for president. Millions of people are following him and are voting for him, and were not supposed to carry the coverage . Were supposed to step away and show what . I mean, isnt that our responsibility . Were supposed to carry him, but we use that time to hold him accountable and give real scrutiny. Thats your department. The print guys ought to started doing that. No, no, no. Its the cable news division. Theres analysis going on. One of the president s points was we need more fact checking. If were going to be showing these live events, there needs to be more fact checking. He ended his entire speech on that note. It seemed to me he wanted to get serious. The irony there, of course, heres a gentleman who came into office promising to be the most Transparent Administration ever and hes been one of the least. So theres a lot of hypocrisy. Thats important. We see this coziness at the dinner. One of the critiques is everyones cozy. The reality is when youre covering the white house day to day, theres very little access pop you dont get to schmooze with administration officials. Has that improved in the eight years . Its the Worst Administration ive covered. Each one has gotten worse. I suspect the next one will be even less access and accountability to the public, which is one of the reasons the public is so upset. They can tell their politicians arent accountable to them anymore, arent paying attention to them anymore. You know this dinner used to be, as reporters, you used to be able to invite our own sources to the dinner, 20 some odd years ago. The people at the dinner were your sources. Maybe cabinet officials, administration officials. It gave reporters the opportunity to sort of have that one on one access. That has now since evolved into more celebrity guests, more advertisers. I think betsy means this parenthetically. The importance wasnt sop we got to know them. It was to build a relationship so we could get information out of them that we wouldnt otherwise. Theyre making you defend a dinner now. Youre cohost of the most popular garden brunch of the weekend. Tell us your defense. My defense is how could it be bad to be able to sit together with all of these officials from government its not bad. No, its not bad. And its not bad having celebrities hear. Its not bad having executives. At bloomberg, we bring in executives. We bring in tech folks. We bring in all kinds of people who are doing business with government. Whats bad about that . More people get involved in the process of this election. More people are going to vote. Can i just say the one political piece, what the president did . How about his restraint in going after trump . What is that about . That is about this election. Thats about the general campaign. Thats about this president getting on the campaign trail, saving all his good material for that campaign. Thats an interesting theory. I like that. News organizations are putting advertisers in seats that reporters once occupied. I think thats something we need to look at. My takeaway, when im here this weekend, is that we have to have a little bit of distance the whole time. Even when its exciting to see some celebrities on the red carpet. Always have to have a little bit of that distance. Let me play one more sound bite from last night. This is an interesting moment. Were talking about the Obama Administrations access and whether theres enough access to white house officials and whether theyre transparent enough. This is what president obama said about the movie spotlight which recently won the oscar. Take a look. I also would like to acknowledge some of the awardwinning reporters we have with us tonight. Rachel mcadams, mark ruffalow, maria shriver. Thank you, all, for everything youve done. Im just joking. As you know, spotlight is a film, a movie about investigative journalists with the resources and the autonomy to chase down the truth and hold the powerful accountable. Best fantasy film since star wars. That cuts pretty deep, i think. That line, i think that resonated widely at the dinner. What i heard the president doing was creating a divide between two types of journalists. I want to know if you agree. One type who prides conflict and controversy and another type that prides investigative reporting and digging deeply. It seemed to me he was trying to encourage that investigative journalism, even though his administration stymies that kind of work. Investigative journalism costs money. Thats the problem with a lot of news organizations that dont have the resources to devote to that anymore. This administration has gone after investigative reporters and even threatened criminal action against them. He should look deeply inside himself when he makes those accusatio accusations. Although, hes making a broader point that is true. Since the spotlight investigation was done, theres a third fewer reporters working in this business. Theres far fewer who get up every day that get six months to work on a story. Its expensive. This is a dinner. Its a party. But what we should also talk about is the reporters covering the Trump Campaign who have no access, who are so controlled. Its not just the Obama Administration that limits access. No, and theyre not taken care of. They have to do everything on their own. The other thing about donald trump calling into shows, hes so smart. He figured it out. You know what, when you call into a show, you control a show. Youre controlling it. If i werent sitting here and you had to listen to me on the phone, you would have to listen to me finish, otherwise youd be the rudest host. So why do the shows take the calls . Its leverage. Its leverage. The man knows it. Radio interview, people call in for that. We have seen a recalibration of this role as well. Hes doing less phoners than six months ago. Real quickly, before we go, i mentioned your book. Its about your son tyler and your relationship with him. Also about your relationship introducing the president s over the years. Do you worry about this campaign . Do you have him watch television coverage, or do you try to limit it . Ive heard a lot of parents say they try to shield their children from coverage of this campaign because of the crude nature. I dont have to because hes not interested in politics. But its not just with trump. Although, i think hes a very coarse, vulgar figure. One thing i realize looking aside myself, when i sat there for an hour with bill clinton talking to my son and george bush, they did it because theyre public servants. It reminded me of something i knew a long time ago that i tend to forget. Im not just covering a title. Im covering a human being. Most of the men and women in this business, its my job to be cynical and hold them accountable, but theyre human beings, who are trying to do the right thing. Its a tough balance. You can see me conflicted on this show with that balance. Thank you all for being here this morning. Coming up next, something you wont see anywhere else this morning. Were going behind the scenes of the president s speech with the man who was his chief joke writer. Thats a real title. Its an important title. Youll find out why after this. I have a blog called daddy doing work, its funny that ive been in the news for being a dad. 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Peeking at the overnight ratings here, the whois Correspondents Dinner was a big hit on tv. It drew a much bigger audience than last year. Maybe thats because people wanted to see what president obama would say about president ial candidate donald trump. Some said this is the hardest speech the president has to give all year. This was obamas last time. He talked about who he thought might be performing this time next year. Next year at this time, someone else will be standing here in this very spot, and its anyones guess who she will be. [ laughter ] [ applause ] now, lets peel back the curtain here. When i really want to know is who really comes up with this stuff . Joining me now is the answer. The actual answer. A former speech writer for president obama, he led the joke writing for the last four of these dinners. Hes now the head writer at funny or die d. C. I know a team comes up with these jokes. You were leading the team in recent years. How many jokes are conceived before this performance each year . Well, i think the key to having the 35 or 40 really funny jokes is to have several hundred less funny jokes that get written. Every year i would personally write hundreds of jokes, most of them not at all funny. Hundreds . Yeah, you just keep at it. Then we would also have, you know, both former staff, some comedians who remain discreet and work pro bono. If you have that in submissions, wouldnt anybody be funny . Wouldnt i be funny . The truth is, no matter the joke, the president really does make it better. You saw this last night. Hes got an incredible sense of comic timing, especially for somebody who has a day job, and its a very demanding day job. Hes really funny. It feels like a requirement of the job now, that a president has to be able to perform in these circumstances because hes able to say things through humor he cant say otherwise that he really wants to say. One of the things that funny or die did was working on the between two ferns video with Zach Galifianakis and president obama with the health care video. We have seen instances where the white house can use comedy to get a message across. Lets take a look at an example of his comic timing. This is him talking about Prince George. Watch. Its not just congress. Even some foreign leaders, theyve been looking ahead, anticipating my departure. Last week Prince George showed up to our meeting in his bathrobe. That was a slap in the face. So in that case, that joke, thats all about the timing, right . Its all about the timing. When the president sort of paused and said that was a slap in the face, as far as i know, that was an ad lib. Thats just his sense of audience. Okay, heres a way to tag this and make it funnier. One nice thing about working on this dinner in past years is the president always makes his joke writers look good. Thats a nice feeling. I wanted to show the end of his speech. I thought what he did here lets take a look at this. I thought he was creating a gift moment. Lets watch. With that, i just have two more words to say. Obama out. [ cheers and applause ] my take on that was he was trying to create something that would be turned into a gif, a dropping of the mike, it will live on forever. Do you think he and his aides think that way . Whats changed is you have the audience in the room which loved it, but you also have this audience online. Whether thats on twitter, sharing the gif of the mike drop, you have these multiple audiences and it makes it a chance for what the president does in that room to go way beyond it. Right. Bottom line though, this is my gut feeling. Tell me if im right. When the president is making jokes about the press, when hes chastising in a humorous way about overcoverage of trump or something, i think its because he has real animosity, real hostility toward some of the coverage. What do you think . The way i always thought about this, the dinner, the point is to be funny. If its not funny, its not working. The president s been very funny. If you get to do a little truth telling, if you get to Say Something in a tone you wouldnt normally get to say in a speech, thats a side benefit. Sometimes youll see the president , you know, hell make a point or two. I think he did. I think he did last night. David, great to see you. Great to see you too. Thanks for being here. Coming up, weve been talking about the best of last nights dinner. My next guest says the gala and the hoopla represents the worst. Hear his argument after this break. You know when i first started out, it was all pencil and paper. The surface pro is very intuitive. With the pressure of my hand i can draw lightly, just like i would with a real pencil. Ive been a forensic artist for over 30 years. I do the composite sketches which are the bad guy sketches. You need good resolution, powerful processor because the computer has to start thinking as fast as my brain does. I do this because i want my artwork to help people. My School Reunions comi fast. Could be bad. Could be a blast. Cant find a single thing to wear. Will they be looking at my hair . Wont be the same without you bro. When its go, go to choicehotels. Com. The site with the right room, rewards and savings up to 20 when you book direct. Book now at choicehotels. Com welcome back to washington. Ill admit, i kind of like watching immediawatch ing media types squirm in their seats while being roasted. Larry wilmores performance last night was very polarizing. A lot of people thought he bombed. Others loved it. I heard boos in the room from where i was sitting. I also heard people cheering at various times. I know one thing for sure. Some of his very best lines were directed at us. Welcome to negro night here in washington. Or as fox news will report, two thugs disrupt elegant dinner in d. C. I am a black man who replaced a white man who pretended to be a tv newscaster. In that way, lester holt and i have a lot in common. Cspan, of course, is carrying tonights dinner live. Which is ironic because most of their viewers arent. Cnn is here tonight. Ive been watching cnn a long time, yep. Used to watch it back when it was a news network. I did. Is it all cnn here tonight . Have you seen oh, come on, guys. Seriously. Morning joe has their heads so far up trumps ass they bumped into chris christie. Y