New club to identify D.C.’s elite 200 for VIP access

Washington’s movers, shakers and denizens of high society are all hoping they’re one of the lucky 200 to receive an uber-exclusive “black card” at Posh, the new supper club opening downtown next month.

The card lists a private reservations number for its holders and allows the staff to track clients’ preferences for seating and food. But it’s also the only way to get access at all times to the VIP second floor. And you can’t buy one.

“We don’t sell them,” said Josh Sagman, who handles “conceptual development” for the club. “We’re giving them to the most connected people in the Washington area.”

So who will be among the eating and drinking elite? NBC’s Tim Russert? Super hostess Juleanna Glover Weiss? Former party honchos and new pals Ed Gillespie and Terry McAuliffe? The ‘Skins’ Dan Snyder or the Caps’ Ted Leonsis?

Sagman is mum, saying only that they’ll be a cross-section of D.C. powerbrokers and “tastemakers.”

“We’re recreating a supper club of the 1930s and ’40s,” he said. “We’ll have dancing on Friday and Saturday evenings. It will be small, lean and exclusive.”

Executive chef Chris Willis was formerly author Tom Clancy’s personal chef at his Eastern Shore home.

BET founder Robert Johnson’s company, RLJ Companies, manages the space, which is located at 11th and H streets. It formerly housed Ortanique and BET on Jazz.

Among the first parties at the club is Oct. 27, for “Sopranos” star Lorranie Bracco’s national launch of her Italian wine label. Sources say some other cast members may fly down for the bash.

And when they ask for a black card, they don’t take no for an answer.

D.C. welcomes possible female president for ’08

Though everyone assumes Hillary Clinton will make a presidential run in 2008 and possibly become the first female U.S. president, she’ll first have to fend off 12-year-old Caroline Zurbrugg, of Alliance, Ohio.

Zurbrugg won a nationwide essay contest for girls ages 7 to 13 on “Why I Want To Become President.” She flew into town Friday and spent the weekend throughout the District as part of her prize package, which included a VIP tour of Capitol Hill — arranged by the office of Rep. Melissa Hart, R-Penn. — a visit with her congressman, Rep. Ralph Regula, D-Ohio, and an expenses-paid visit to United Colors of Benetton in Georgetown, where she picked out “modern-day inaugural attire for hip young people,” in the words of one of weekend’s coordinators and promoters.

Now that Zurbrugg knows her way around Washington and has the clothes to impress, what would she do as president?

“I would put the needs of my own country first,” she wrote in her winning essay, which she read Sunday at the prize ceremony at the Renaissance Mayflower Hotel, no stranger to presidential inaugural balls.

But Zurbrugg doesn’t think that curing what ails the U.S. would take that long: She went on to say, “[B]ut what would I do after it was taken care of?” Ah, maybe this instant-gratification society has warped our children’s sense of sloth-like bureaucracy.

Everyone was dying to know her view on the war on terrorism, and we can assure you that President Zurbrugg wouldn’t simply unleash the U.S. military might on the world … except when she has to.

“Other than war and fighting, I would try to solve the problem peacefully.”

A politician who wants to have it both ways? She’ll fit right in. – Kelly Mahon and Andrew White contributed to this report

Agassi gives District an image boost

He makes his home in Las Vegas, just put an emotional cap on his tennis career in New York and is set to open a resort in Idaho.

So what was Andre Agassi doing in Washington last week? Heads (including that of Yeas & Nays) snapped on Thursday night as he made his way through the lobby of the Four Seasons in Georgetown with longtime friend and manager Terry Rogers, and pulled away in a brand new white Subaru Tribeca SUV.

“He disappeared as fast he approached,” said one observer, which lets us know that his bad back isn’t bogging him down too much in retirement.

A Four Seasons spokeswoman said he wasn’t a guest of the hotel that day, but he did have a drink at the bar.

We finally tracked down Agassi’s spokesman in Las Vegas, Rob Powers. Turns out the bald-headed backhander was in town for a reception hosted by Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., regarding the raising of the minimum wage.

Coleman’s glass house

The problem with political talking points is that, if you’re not careful enough, they might point right back at you.

When Sen. Norm Coleman, R-Minn., learned that likely 2008 Democratic Senate opponent — and political satirist/comedian/author/radio talk show host — Al Franken had established a “Midwest Values PAC,” all Coleman could do was chuckle.

Referring to Franken’s entertainment background, and the fact that such Hollywood stars as Barbara Streisand, Phil Donahue and Norman Lear have contributed to his PAC, Coleman quipped, “Hollywood values aren’t Midwest.”

Well, senator, that must make for some awkward conversation around the Coleman household, as his own wife, Laurie, has been itching for a Hollywood career for years now — she appeared in the TV movie “Homeland Security” and the miniseries “Kingpin,” as well as a stint in “The Vagina Monologues” when it pulled into the Twin Cities.

In 2005, she also allowed The Washington Post to print provocative pictures in her in her undies.

For the neighbor’s sake, let’s just hope that the senator’s glass house had the drapes drawn when those photos were taken.

Media mix

Conservative-turned-liberal pundit, author and blogger Arianna Huffington has just released her 11th book, “On Becoming Fearless.” She spoke with Yeas & Nays last week from the D.C. premiere of the new documentary “The U.S. vs. John Lennon.”

Q: What book are you reading?

Kristen Gore’s “Sammy’s Hill.” It keeps me awake.

Q: What’s your favorite TV show?

I think I know what it’s going to be. Aaron Sorkin’s new miniseries on NBC, “Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip.”

Q: What’s the last movie you saw?

“The Wicker Man” with Nicholas Cage.

Q: What’s your favorite Web site?

The new section of the Huffington Post, called Becoming Fearless.

Q: What song are you listening to now?

Jill Sobule’s song, “Fearless,” on the Web site. I recorded a verse in rap.