It's Michelle Obama Wednesday here in the U.S.A., with our future first lady gracing the pages of our newspaper of record and guest hosting our, uh, bickering-women show of record. She also graces the cover of this week's Us Weekly with her husband.
First, let's discuss today's story about Obama in the New York Times. The reporters tell us that she is looking for a new introduction to the American people after some verbal missteps and blatant sexist and racist attacks from the GOP and MSM.
“You are amazed sometimes at how deep the lies can be,” she says in an interview. Referring to a character in a 1970s sitcom, she adds: “I mean, ‘whitey’? That’s something that George Jefferson would say. Anyone who says that doesn’t know me. They don’t know the life I’ve lived. They don’t know anything about me.”
Now her husband’s presidential campaign is giving her image a subtle makeover, with a new speech in the works to emphasize her humble roots and a tough new chief of staff.
Of course, part of this makeover has to do with her guest appearance on The View today. She gave all of the hosts her signature terrorist fist jabs. Unfortunately, that's all I can relay until I actually see the show.
UPDATE Thanks to New York Magazine's live blog* of today's show:
Joy, Sherri and Michelle are all standing up now interviewing a nutritionist. Michelle is tall. She is also very politic — not even stopping to make fun of prune juice, after Sherri and Joy do their best "Ew, mom!" faces. Michelle has toast, fruit, and bacon for breakfast. "We're bacon people," she admits about the Obama family. What could be more American than that?
Hear that Appalachia? Muslims aren't normally "bacon people." There's also nothing wrong with being Muslim, but that's beside the point.
Check out a brief clip below.
*Thanks "Me"
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The first 25 minutes is up on Youtube now
funny how the feminists were coming to the defense of hilary and her betrayal but ne'er a word defending michelle
The Republicans are making a mistake attacking Michelle Obama. It didn't work when they tried the same thing against Hillary, which Bill was running.
NY mag live blogged her appearance
http://nymag.com/daily/intel/2.....on.html#hp
the whole "make-over" just rubs me wrong. I think it's fucking pathetic how they need to prove their "American-ness" by acting "white."
Not true, jazzymelanin. There are white and non-white feminists who are and were quite perturbed by the attacks made on her. Steinem and Ferraro don't have the patent on feminism… like Sharpton, the media just decides to hand them the bullhorn.
You know they are going to say she was referring to turkey bacon so they can still be Muslims!
Feminism did not have black women in mind. In early writings, they desired black women to be sterilized.
She looks beautiful.
You know it's turkey bacon. It has nothing to do with religion. I just don't see them as the type to clog their children's arteries.
What makeover?
DFP: how are they "acting white"? This is as foolish as saying they need to prove their blackness. What narrow definition are you basing this on? They are like many upper middle class and modestly wealthy blacks.
…and by that I mean that:
*her style is pretty classically feminine (=prissy, and that's not a bad thing), almost always topped off with pearls
*on weekends, he wears light rinsed jeans. LOL. you can take the dad out of the burbs…
*their children are well-groomed, well-behaved and in public, smiling and generally silent
*she has the same hair style as most of the black women in my town, just like Elizabeth has the same hairstyle as most of the white women in my town
*until she left to work on her husband's campaign, she had her own career and is independently successful
DFP said: the whole “make-over” just rubs me wrong. I think it’s fucking pathetic how they need to prove their “American-ness” by acting “white.”,
I like to think of it as acting mainstream American(or see SWPL blog).
"Muslims aren’t normally “bacon people.” There’s also nothing wrong with being Muslim, but that’s beside the point."
Black people aren't normally "______" people. There's also nothing wrong with being black, but that's beside the point.
Little insecurity, fishiness, and indirect advanced prejudice.
Hmmmm… Interesting take. You're ignoring the context, though, aren't you? First of all, I'm not down with the equating-religion-and-race thing. Muslims — a group of people of different races, cultures, and ethnicities bound by their devotion to the tenets of one religion and a belief in God — are not an equivalent group to Blacks (or any other racial group), who, if we're talking the entire Diaspora here, can be bound by little more than skin color and a shared African ancestry. But, whatever, I'll go with your example even if it doesn't work. If there were people "accusing" a non-black person of being black in an effort to make him or her less desirable, I do think that the denial of blackness begs a qualifier, particularly if the one doing the denying doesn't think being black is a bad thing. The two-pronged wrongness of Obama's Muslim "smear" rumors have always gotten to me. Not only is he not Muslim, it also should not be a "smear" to call someone Muslim, although we all know why that succeeds in scaring certain segments of the population. I won't be made to feel bad or prejudiced for calling attention to the issue, even if it was done in a flippant way and directed toward a group of imaginary, racist/anti-Muslim Stereohyped readers from Appalachia. Check the rest of the blog — I'm flippant by nature.
My point was that even if certain folks say Obama is Muslim, he probably wouldn't be ingesting cured pork every morning if that were the case. But implicit in the accusation (and often in the vehement denial of the accusation) is that being a Muslim is a terrible thing. I chose to mention that it isn't, although it was beside the swine-related point I was making. Call me insecure, fishy, and prejudiced if you want.
Pork? Gross… I'll take my "Popye's chicken for breakfast" anyday over some nasty bacon.
Turkey bacon is delicious and I say this though I don't care for bacon or turkey.
Just out of curiosity, how come so many non-Muslim and non-Jewish black folk dislike bacon and pork so much? I have friends who will eat politically incorrect baby cattle but pork is somehow disgusting to them. If TV is any indication, white people eat pork chops.
My reason: My grandpa had pigs on his farm. I've watched them get killed and I've gutted them. If you want to convince someone to go veg, have them slaughter and gut a pig, a cow, a chicken, etc. Also, I can't eat something that tans and sun burns. And whose parts are so close to mine that its ground up organs make our insulin. It's almost like eating a primate. It seems cannibalistic.
Actually, since Jews and Muslims can't eat pork, I'm fairly sure there's some Abrahamic something or other that says that Christians can't eat it. I know there's something about not eating shellfish in the Bible, something that Christians don't abide by but Jewish people do.
This of course is a major tangent. She's not Muslim and even if she wre, so the f— what? I thought Barack was the one under question. Michelle was raised entirely in a Christian home. The whole Muslim thing as an accusation is so ridiculous and bigoted. I'd be surprised if it were pork bacon because I just figured that since the entirely family is trim, they are health conscious, Whole Foods/Trader Joe's people, the kind that would have seitan, wheat germ and spirulina in their grocery cart along with absurd amounts of produce and lean cuts of meat.
Honestly!
I am not equating racial prejedice to religious prejedice. Don't play the heirarchy of oppression game, I'm way too old for that. But I am sick of the vehement cries of: HE"S NOT A MUSLIM, I SWEAR!!!! NOT THAT THERE IS NOTHING WRONG WITH MUSLIM……
It sounds fishy.
It implies something about Muslims. As much as I would love to give you a way to be more PC, I dont have one. I wish you would understand how it sounds.
God, Lauren. You needn't be so vicious. I love this blog.
Was I vicious? I wasn't trying to be. But when I feel that my intent and tone are misunderstood, I'm going to respond. Also, I was not playing the hierarchy-of-oppression game — I don't do that either. There's a very important difference between saying that two things are not equivalent and saying that one is better or worse than the other. It just wasn't a good comparison. That said, if you got past the viciousness (which is what I think you mistook my serious, responding-to-accusations-of-prejudice-and-insecurity tone for) you might have found that we're actually arguing the same point — that either accusing Obama of being Muslim or passionately denying that he is "implies something about Muslims." Hence me saying there's nothing wrong with being Muslim. Again, I'm pretty sure we're arguing the same point; it just seems like you don't like the way I said it either time. Or that I said it at all instead of just thinking it. There's always a way to get one's point across more clearly or in a more PC fashion, and I will definitely give it thought. Anyway, glad you love the blog!
personally lauren I didn't find your blog to be vicious at all, In fact I found that your blog said everything I wanted to say in the words that I couldn't find. Kudos!
how come so many non-Muslim and non-Jewish black folk dislike bacon and pork so much
Daria, it is due to the influence of the nation of Islam and Eastern Islam in the black community that many AAs don't eat pork. NOI has strict beliefs and regulations about diet and a lot of its followers are now moving to a vegetarian diet. NOI were preaching that calorie restriction equaled longer life way before some in the scientific community caught on