But Youngman — who, bizarrely, admits at the end of his article that he holds out hope of returning to Washington — completely misses the point of what it means to be a journalist here. Many of the best journalists I know here are devoting their careers to covering the people in power and how their decisions affect our lives — all of our lives, whether we live in the District or in Lexington. That is the beauty of Washington reporting, if it’s done right.

Several years ago I wrote about an Environmental Protection Agency study slated for Jacksonville, Fla., in which officials were going to examine the impact of toxic household chemicals on families with children, but they weren’t going to warn them that the chemicals were dangerous. The study was scrapped. This fall I co-wrote articles explaining the key management decisions that contributed to HealthCare.gov’s botched rollout, as well as some of the project’s ongoing technical difficulties. These stories matter; they have real-world consequences.

I still haven’t flown on Air Force One, as Youngman did. Like him, I’ve attended briefings in the Roosevelt Room — though I’ve devoted my time there to watching PowerPoint slides and trying to decipher administration officials’ spin, not being wowed by the scenery.

I think it’s sad that Youngman concludes that, after a while, “there wasn’t a single Washington story I wanted to cover.” How is that possible, when there are so many critical decisions made here?