Thursday, May 22, 2008

BARACK OBAMA

Time Declares Michelle Obama's 'Gritty Realism' Is Not Whining

Also in tomorrow's Time magazine:

In their Michelle Obama piece, which is titled, "The War over Michelle," Time's Nancy Gibbs and Jay Newton-Small note that conservatives and some others "hear ‘whining’ from a woman preaching a ‘Gospel of Misery,’ about everything from her student loans to the high cost of piano lessons,” and other “deteriorating conditions."

They point out: “They are probably right that most Americans have a happier impression of the past 40 years. But the skies have darkened in the past year … Those who hear Michelle in person often talk about feeling that they are seeing for the first time a political figure who understands what their lives are really about.”

The article is fairly balanced but comes down mainly on her side. After noting complaints by conservatives, the writers observe: "The attacks make one wonder how those who find Michelle Obama's gritty realism out of bounds would mount a campaign in this climate. By suggesting everything is swell? By gliding silently over the battered economic landscape at home in order to talk instead only about terrorism abroad?."

To refresh, from Byron:

So how does she keep it all together? “I’m fine, because I have a strong informal support network,” [Michelle] Obama says. “I have a mother who lives five minutes from me. I don’t know what I would do, even if we weren’t running, I don’t know what I would do as a professional without having that kind of support system. So that keeps me sane.”

But not everyone has a close relative living nearby. And not everyone can afford to keep it all together, especially here in Muskingum County, where, according to the census, the median household income in 2004 was $37,192, below both the Ohio and national average. Out of that, there’s the mortgage. And child care. Health care. Education. Lessons. “I know we’re spending — I added it up for the first time — we spend between the two kids, on extracurriculars outside the classroom, we’re spending about $10,000 a year on piano and dance and sports supplements and so on and so forth,” Mrs. Obama tells the women. “And summer programs. That’s the other huge cost. Barack is saying, ‘Whyyyyyy are we spending that?’ And I’m saying, ‘Do you know what summer camp costs?’”

Other Michelle Obama greatest hits:

On men: "What I notice about men, all men, is that their order is me, my family, God is in there somewhere, but me is first."

On women: "I wake up every morning wondering how on earth I am going to pull off that next minor miracle to get through the day. I know that everybody in this room is going through this. That is the dilemma women face today. Every woman that I know, regardless of race, education, income, background, political affiliation, is struggling to keep her head above water." (This presumably includes her friend Oprah.)

On the state of plumbing in America: "How many of us have had to be the ones, when a child gets sick, who is the one who stays home? Or, when a toilet overflows? This was a couple of months ago. I was scrambling around to reschedule being at a 9 o’clock meeting and Barack, love him to death, put on his clothes and he left!"

On life in America: Obama begins with a broad assessment of life in America in 2008, and life is not good: we’re a divided country, we’re a country that is “just downright mean,” we are “guided by fear,” we’re a nation of cynics, sloths, and complacents.

On the nefarious labeling of products on supermarket shelves: "And the notion of trying to think about a lunch every day! . . . So you grab the Lunchables, right? And the fruit-juice-box thing, and we think—we think—that’s juice. And you start reading the labels and you realize there’s high-fructose corn syrup in everything we’re eating. Every jelly, every juice. Everything that’s in a bottle or a package is like poison in a way that most people don’t even know. . "

On the high cost of fruit: "Now we’re keeping, like, a bowl of fresh fruit in the house. But you have to go to the fruit stand a couple of times a week to keep that fruit fresh enough that a six-year-old—she’s not gonna eat the pruney grape, you know. At that point it’s, like, ‘Eww!’ She’s not gonna eat the brown banana or the shrivelledy-up things. It’s got to be fresh for them to want it. Who’s got time to go to the fruit stand? Who can afford it, first of all?”

On national pride: "For the first time in my adult life I am proud of my country because it feels like hope is finally making a comeback." Later that day: "For the first time in my adult lifetime, I'm really proud of my country, and not just because Barack has done well, but because I think people are hungry for change."

No word on whether Time's Nancy Gibbs and Jay Newton-Small are interviewing for positions on the Obama campaign like National Journal's Linda Douglass.

05/22 12:42 PMShare