Rummy’s big night out

Donald Rumsfeld’s public appearances have been rare since he stepped down from the Pentagon in December. But the former defense secretary was all smiles and handshakes Tuesday night at the conservative Hoover Institution’s annual Washington reception at the Willard Hotel.

A glass of wine in hand, he stood at the ballroom’s entrance, greeting a steady parade of well-wishers.

“I want to thank you for what you did for the military,” gushed a woman admirer before posing for pictures.

The Wall Street Journal’s John Fund offered a hearty handshake and asked for Rumsfeld’s private phone number. “Not for an interview. Just to talk,” the conservative columnist said.

Rumsfeld still shows up for work each day at a Pentagon transition office, where he, his aide Stephen Cambone and Defense Department employees read and sort thousands of pages of documents generated during his nearly six years as Pentagon chief (his tenure was the second-longest in U.S. history).

While Rumsfeld held court, wife Joyce worked the room. She said the couple plan a two-week stay at their rustic ranch in Taos, N.M., before heading back to the capital.

Several observers noticed Rummy chatting up another architect of the Iraq war, former Under Secretary of Defense for Policy Douglas Feith.

Blogger Howard Mortman noted that the two former colleagues were “not just chatting, laughing. Laughing really, really hard. The kind of laughter that’s so hard it could cause a mistrial if the Scooter Libby jury ever heard it.”

“We couldn’t figure out the joke,” he added, “but we saw Feith sipping red wine, and Rumsfeld holding a glass of what seemed to be white. We had Glenlivet, but liberals could have been just plain livid.”

Feith is on a public relations campaign to clear his name in the wake of a three-year assault from Sens. Carl Levin, D-Mich., and Jay Rockefeller, D-W.Va. Their charges concern a slide show Feith’s office created that criticized the CIA’s analysis of Iraq/al-Qaida links.

“It wasn’t even my idea,” an exasperated Feith said. “But now it’s the ‘Feith Report.’ ”

Time for the ‘Kid’ to play

You may remember Chris Reid as “Kid” from the hip-hop duo Kid ‘n Play (he was the one with the tall, Leaning Tower of Pisa-like hair style). Kid ‘n Play produced three albums between 1988 and 1993 and also starred in the “House Party” movies.

Beginning tonight, “Kid” helps usher in the new Riot Act Comedy Club at 1610 14th St. with a three-night comedy stand. But this is hardly Reid’s first time in D.C.

“I’ve been there a million times,” Reid told Yeas & Nays. “D.C. is chocolate city!”

Reid fondly recalls his days in D.C. when his rap career was just taking off, hanging out and appearing at such places as Howard University’s Homecoming Weekend, the DC Improv, Georgetown basketball games and the Florida Avenue Grill. Oh, and one other place. “Is Camelot still around?” Reid asked, referring to the M Street show bar.

Reid admits he’s a political person and he’s got his eye on Sen. Barack Obama and former Sen. John Edwards for 2008. “I don’t subscribe to the belief that Obama doesn’t have enough experience,” Reid said. “That may be just what we need right now. … As for Edwards, I like his honesty. Part of me wishes that he was the presidential candidate last time out, when I saw how [Sen. John] Kerry kept constantly bumping his head.”

And be careful about a big bump on your head: You could end up having to cover it up with a haircut like the one Reid used to sport.

_{Chris Reid, right, is appearing at the Riot Act Comedy Club this weekend.}

The Wilsons say goodbye to D.C.

On Wednesday, Valerie Plame Wilson made what she called her last public appearance before she and husband Joe Wilson move to Santa Fe next week.

The couple, who rose to notoriety after columnist Bob Novak reported Plame’s identity as a CIA operative, stopped by Nathans of Georgetown yesterday to listen to WJLA’s Gordon Peterson and WRC’s Jim Vance chat with Nathans’ owner Carol Joynt for her regular Q&A Cafe lunch discussion.

Plame said a verdict in the Scooter Libby trial — expected any moment now — wouldn’t change her plans.

Joynt, Peterson and Vance tried to combine their forces and put Plame and Wilson under the spotlight at the end of the interview, but they politely declined to answer any questions.

“Now’s not the time,” they said.

But Valerie said that her husband, never one to shun the cameras, may well make some comments after the Libby verdict is announced.

_{(Photo Courtesy Carol Joynt)
WJLA's Gordon Peterson, former CIA operative Valerie Plame Wilson, former ambassador Joe Wilson and WRC's Jim Vance.}

Simmons slims

When fitness guru Richard Simmons made the rounds on Capitol Hill Wednesday to support legislation combating juvenile obesity, he declined lunch so that he could busy about the Capitol instead. However, Rep. Zach Wamp, R-Tenn., who spent four hours with Simmons throughout the day, did not, opting for some tuna fish, cottage cheese and crackers — a meal Simmons later lauded him for.

Wamp loved Simmons’ energy and called him “a heat-seeking missile.” Wamp told Yeas & Nays, “I told Richard: ‘When the Lord made you, he wound you up really tight.’ He’s like an Energizer bunny!”

Think tank

“On an Al Gore ’08 ticket, who gets the VP spot and why?”

“It is obvious — he’ll pick a woman and a Hispanic who is widely popular in the country: Cameron Diaz. If not, I would suspect he would look to a Western governor, with Bill Richardson, Janet Napolitano and Kathleen Sebelius high on the list.”

– Norm Ornstein, AEI

“Fred Thompson, so that this time he has a chance of winning his home state of Tennessee.”

– John J. Miller, National Review

“Our military strength has been weakened because of Iraq, and Wes Clark would be a perfect VP candidate to deliver the Democratic message with Gore.”

– Adam Shapiro, Widmeyer Communications

Rowan Scarborough contributed to this page.