'This Town' dives deeply into Washington scene

Kerri's book pick this week is "This Town," an expose of the movers, shakers, power couples and hangers-on in the Washington, D.C., social scene.

Kerri says, "While the inside-the-beltway gossip makes it a great read, the book has a serious message. Author Mark Leibovich argues that when powerful people move to our nation's capital and never leave, it leads to dysfunction and corruption."

Here's part of an excerpt that ran in New Republic:

"I first heard the term "Suck-up City" from a top Obama adviser during the 2008 campaign. Sucking up is as basic to Washington as humidity. It has never been easier for "strategists" and "consultants" and "agents" of all stripes to affix themselves like barnacles to the local money barge, sucking in green nutrients. In recent years, Washington has become a crucible of easy wealth, fame, forgiveness, and next acts. Punditry has replaced reporting as journalism's highest calling, accompanied by a mad dash of "self-branding," to borrow a term that has now fully infested the city. They gather, all the brands, at self-reverential festivals like the April White House Correspondents' Association dinner, whose lineup of "pre-parties" and "after-parties" now approaches two dozen — because a single banquet cannot properly celebrate the full achievements of the People Who Run Your Country."

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