Washington, Apr.30 (ANI): Socialising and partying in official Washington has undergone a change in the last decade and a half.

Washington doesn’t demand or even want a sit-down dinner with an evening port.

According to Politico, partygoers tend to prefer more-breezy, fly-in, fly-out casual events, like birthday parties for A-list reporters and staffers.

Faced with the most terrifying economic crisis since the Great Depression, two wars, the looming collapse of the auto industry, a swine flu epidemic and even a few pirate attacks, the city’s new establishment hasn’t had the time – or perhaps the inclination – to elect a new power hostess.

“The first 100 days, the economy wasn’t solved and the new hostess hasn’t been identified,” says journalist Margaret Carlson, who has a knack for bringing people together.

Its essentially par for the course that every incoming administration reshuffles the Washington deck – effectively determining who’s powerful and who’s not. But as any decent lobbyist will tell you, access is the key to power, and few control the access to the city’s political hierarchy more directly than the reigning social chair.

The doyennes of yesteryear — Democratic powerhouse Esther Coopersmith, the well-known Sally Quinn, and Beth Dozoretz, a friend of the Clintons, remain social fixtures. These women still host fabulous parties.

Several years ago, two new party players – Juleanna Glover and Nancy Jacobson Penn – popped up on the horizon, offering food, drink and expansive homes for White House officials, members of Congress, senators, Capitol Hill staff, lobbyists, reporters and even then-Vice President Dick Cheney.

Glover, a Republican, was more than willing to throw a party for anyone from the newly minted head of CNN’s Washington bureau to visiting A-listers such as businessman John Tisch.

Jacobson Penn, conveniently a Democrat, used her impressive Rolodex to transform her palatial Georgetown home into a sort of social foxhole for Democrats in a town that was run by Republicans.

Between them, Glover and Jacobson Penn had the social cartography of political Washington covered.

Still, the grandeur of a Katharine Graham soiree is missing – the utter sophistication and French chefs replaced by appetizers from Costco.

So who’s in line for the new throne?

Communications guru, avid party-thrower and overall Washington political scene expert Jim Courtovich says that “the list is still emerging.” (ANI)