The Other Obama

raison detre, March 21st, 2008 

this article

obama

gave me so many images to draw. especially after reading the political drawing approaches of prominent illustrators in Heller’s article in the NYT.

Obama’s pride chafes at being asked to make herself seem duller and less independent than she is. Photograph by Chris Hondros.

i challenge you to read on. read the whole article. here’s something from the first page:

It’s not that Obama doesn’t know the anodyne, wifely things to say (essentially, nothing). She is, after all, a “community and external affairs” professional. But her

pride visibly chafes at being asked to subsume her personality, to make herself seem duller and less independent than she is, even in the service of getting her husband elected President of the United States. In Wisconsin, I asked her if she was offended by Bill Clinton’s use of the phrase “fairy tale” to describe her husband’s characterization of his position on the Iraq War. At first, Obama responded with a curt “No.” But, after a few seconds, she affected a funny voice. “I want to rip his eyes out!” she said, clawing at the air with her fingernails. One of her advisers gave her a nervous look. “Kidding!” Obama said. “See, this is what gets me into trouble.”

3 Comments »

  1. byronius wrote,

    Thanks for this.

    It’s perfect that he would be married to someone like this. I mean, almost too perfect.

    ‘Camelot’.

    Michelle ’16?

    Wiki:

    Michelle Robinson was born in Chicago, Illinois to Frasier Robinson (who died in 1990), a city water plant employee and Democratic precinct captain, and Marian Robinson, a secretary at Spiegel’s catalog store; she grew up in the South Shore community area of Chicago. She was raised in a conventional two-parent home where the family convened around the dinner table nightly. She and her brother, Craig (who is 16 months older), skipped the second grade. Michelle graduated from Whitney Young High School in 1981 and went on to major in sociology and minor in African American studies at Princeton University, where she graduated cum laude with an Artium Baccalaureus in 1985. She obtained her Juris Doctor degree from Harvard Law School in 1988.

    Barack and Michelle Obama

    She met Barack Obama when they were the only two African Americans at their law firm and she was assigned to mentor him while he was a summer associate. Their relationship started with a business lunch and then a community organization meeting where he first impressed her. The couple’s first date was to the Spike Lee movie Do the Right Thing. The couple married in October 1992,and they have two daughters, Malia Ann (born 1999) and Natasha (known as Sasha) (born 2001). Her brother Craig was the fourth leading scorer in Princeton University’s men’s basketball history, and is now Brown University’s men’s basketball coach.

    She once requested that Barack, who was then her fiancé, meet her prospective boss when considering her first career move. Now, she is her husband’s closest adviser. Early in the presidential race she did not portray herself as an adviser, however. In fact, she was quoted in interviews saying “My job is not a senior adviser.”

    I understood exactly what she meant with the ‘pride’ comment. Both of them seem to be able to express their spirit clearly even when in the fishbowl. It’s a mark of strength, and character. I think most people understand that.

    Comment on March 21, 2008 @ 3:55 pm

  2. Demonweed wrote,

    In the best of all worlds . . . wait, scratch that — in the best of all worlds Democrats and Republicans would be two of many parties struggling to uphold fragile governing coalitions (as opposed to uniquely entrenched, and almost uniquely viable, U.S. political parties.) However, in the best of all bipartisan oligarchy worlds, I believe Barack Obama would be inaugurated in ’09 with a huge and genuine mandate for change, and Michelle Obama would later succeed at what Hillary Clinton endeavors to achieve in this election cycle.

    In the worst of all bipartisan oligarchy worlds, Hillary Clinton secretly hires Karl Rove. Together they somehow manage to torpedo the Obama candidacy with a series of attacks demonizing the very idea of a strong First Lady in the East Wing. The legacy of American political irony grows larger, Tehran is flattened under a nuclear fireball, and the United States of Military Industrial Complex goes on to preside over a new dark age.

    Comment on March 22, 2008 @ 11:48 am

  3. byronius wrote,

    Yeah, that first thing, there, you said.

    It’s Barack or Rollerball.

    Comment on March 22, 2008 @ 8:45 pm

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