January 19, 2011
Business Leaders Make Cut at State Dinner With Hu
"WASHINGTON — Jimmy and Rosalynn Carter made the cut. So did Bill Clinton and his wife, the secretary of state. The heads of Microsoft, Boeing, Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan Chase and Walt Disney were on the list. So were the singer Barbra Streisand, the ice skater Michelle Kwan, the cellist Yo-Yo Ma, the architect Maya Lin and the fashion designer Vera Wang.....
The White House was especially private about the planning, for fear of saying or doing something that might offend the Chinese. The theme for the evening was “quintessentially American,” with a menu that featured farm-fresh vegetables, poached Maine lobster, dry-aged rib-eye with buttermilk crisp onions, topped off by old-fashioned apple pie with ice cream. The entertainment, in the White House East Room, was the most quintessential of American music — a parade of jazz greats, including Herbie Hancock.
The guest list was heavy on Chinese-Americans and corporate executives — no surprise, given that President Obama used Mr. Hu’s visit to press China to open its markets to goods made by American companies. One official familiar with the planning of the dinner said there was “definitely a clamoring among business leaders to get in.”.....