...AS OPPOSED TO THE REST OF WASHINGTON, WHICH IS SO SELF-EFFACING

Here are the opening paragraphs of Keith Koffler's new Politico column, which is titled "Obama's Hubris Problem":

Tuesday morning, a peculiar announcement trickled out of the White House press office: President Barack Obama would be holding a moment of silence for the victims of the Boston bombings. At the White House. By himself. No press or other intruders allowed.

Except the White House photographer.

That Obama assumed Americans would want an iconic photo of him privately mourning the victims of the bombings was emblematic of a kind of hubris that has enveloped the president and his White House as the president commences his second term....

Well, here's the picture, an official White House photo by Pete Souza. Your call as to the appropriateness of this.





However, as I was Googling around, I came upon an article about the decision by the House of Representatives to hold its own Boston moment of silence.

Here's the photo accompanying that article:





Notice the caption:

Speaker Boehner speaks to President Obama after the Boston bombing. (Photo courtesy office of House Speaker Boehner)

Oh, but the fact that Boehner called in an official government photographer to take a picture of him being a Very Concerned Person in the aftermath of the Boston bombing is, um, ... well, it's different, because ... um ...

You tell me why it's different.