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First lady Michelle Obama and Pentagon officials planned to announce the effort Thursday during a visit to Little Rock Air Force Base in Arkansas, where the military has been experimenting with the idea through a pilot program designed to improve the quality and variety of foods served on base.

It’s not just about giving members of the armed services a more svelte profile.

“The Department of Defense considers obesity not only a national problem, but a national security issue,” said Dr. Jonathan Woodson, assistant secretary of defense for health affairs. “About a quarter of entry-level candidates are too overweight to actually either enter the military or sustain themselves through the first enlistment.”

The Pentagon spends an estimated $4.5 billion a year on food services, and $1.1 billion a year on medical care related to excess weight and obesity.

Check out the rest of the story at theGrio.

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Mrs. Obama and Fallon did pushups and twirled hula hoops. They competed at dodge ball and tug-of-war. And the first lady triumphed over the comedian in a climactic potato sack race.

After a defeated Fallon said, “It doesn’t matter if you won or lost,” the first lady replied, “It matters.”

The segment was taped last month and aired early Wednesday on NBC’s “Late Night” program.

Mrs. Obama has been making the talk-show rounds to celebrate the second anniversary of her campaign against childhood obesity. In the past few weeks she has appeared on “The Tonight Show With Jay Leno,” “The Ellen DeGeneres Show” and “Rachael Ray.”

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But never has a First Lady been so disrespected, ridiculed, demeaned or vilified in the manner that Michelle Obama has. With such high approval ratings (at times even higher than her husband), there’s a clear explanation for the continual attacks against Mrs. Obama – her race – and come to think of it, his race.

During the Presidential campaign of ’08, many Black women like myself were beyond excited to see a strong Black woman as the next potential First Lady. An educated, extremely intelligent female who dedicated much of her efforts towards working in the community and uplifting others, Michelle Obama represented what many of us either strive to be, or already regard ourselves as. And the fact that President Obama, a biracial man, married an independently minded and strong-willed woman like Michelle, only solidified our appreciation and support for this couple. It’s exactly that admiration and love for Michelle Obama that conservatives and those with an ax to grind hate so much. And they’ve proved over and over again that they will try to do anything to tarnish her image.

When Barack Obama was on the campaign trail, the verbal assaults against Michelle already began. First, they attempted to turn her comments about being proud of her country into a negative, as if she was somehow unpatriotic her entire life. During the rest of the that period and throughout Barack Obama’s Presidency, the right continued throwing insults against Michelle for everything from the clothes she wears to her fight against obesity, to supposed lavish vacations. Following in conservative footsteps, now everyone appears to think it’s appropriate to make outrageous claims against the First Lady. The latest example: British publications printing stories of Michelle spending $50,000 on undergarments.

The fact that White House press secretary Jay Carney had to take time on Monday to denounce the  underwear rumor is proof that the allegations against the First Lady are out of control. And now that we’re in an election year, things are likely to get worse. Because Michelle Obama represents so much of what we love, they will do everything they can to smear her image and that of the President. It’s our duty to make sure that they don’t succeed. Make no mistake: smearing them is an attempt to diminish our own self-esteem.

I asked my mother the other day if she’s ever seen any First Lady repeatedly insulted like Michelle Obama has been. The answer, not surprisingly, was a definite “NO.” Throughout it all, Mrs. Obama has taken the barrage of attacks with grace and dignity, while disproving everything with her actions – just like a strong Black woman would. And I should know, a strong Black woman is me; she is you and we cannot allow her to be slandered.

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President Barack Obama showed the world that he is musically inclined, when he coyly sang a few lines from Al Green’s romantic ballad “Let’s Stay Together” at a campaign event in January.  “That was completely spontaneous,” Mrs. Obama told Jay Leno during the interview.   “I didn’t even hear about it until it got on YouTube, but he does have a beautiful voice, and he sings to me all the time.”

The First Lady, who admits she can’t sing, was caught on video last May busting a few moves at a middle school dance party.  She demonstrated without a bit of shyness that she can do the Dougie, Running Man and Cha-Cha with the best of them.

“Let’s Stay Together” is apparently one of Obama’s favorite songs according to the First Lady.  She also admitted that the president seems to prefer the classic slow jams. “I knew when people said he sang, I thought I’ll bet he sang Al Green,” Mrs. Obama said. “He sings a lot of Al Green, Marvin Gay, a little Stevie. He likes the classics.”

On the flip side, while Mrs. Obama doesn’t mind having her husband serenade her, the children feel differently.  Malia and Sasha aren’t big fans of their dad’s crooning and are big believers in the adage “silence is golden.”  “Anything we do is highly embarrassing. They just want us to be very quiet, very quiet,” Mrs. Obama said.

As for the Mitt Romney‘s rendition of “America the Beautiful,”  the First Lady tactfully said, “It’s beautiful! It is America’s song, and it’s a song that’s meant to be sung by every American.”

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And he’s right, Limbaugh added, they do that well.  Mom and Dad and the two kids.  It’s a good-looking family.

Limbaugh then went in on the First Family, stating that Mrs. Obama needs to get rid of her nutritional standards to combat childhood obesity.

That’s not the kind of teamwork, you see, that the people of this country want.  They don’t want their government telling them what they cannot eat.  They don’t want the government telling them what they must eat.  Even little leftist robot kids don’t.

Then in a really insulting remark, Limbaugh went back to the hypocritical Republican position that poor people simply need to learn family values:

You know, the best thing Michelle Obama could do — and I’m not joking here — the best thing Michelle Obama could do for people in poverty is to simply highlight the solid nuclear family that she has with her husband, Barack, and the two kids.

It’s easy to see why Limbaugh wouldn’t be happy about Michelle Obama’s nutritional standards: She and her family are healthy, and Rush Limbaugh is not.  The poor man has fought with obesity, drug addiction, and nearly every other symbol of a gluttonous, self-absorbed life.  His position on disciplined family values is heavily contradicted by the way he’s lived his own life — but that’s essentially what makes him a good Republican.

Limbaugh is correct that the Obamas have the kind of family that even most Republicans can’t criticize.  They are not defying the norms of the Black family; they are reflecting them.  Millions of Black families across America consist of good, normal people who want to do what’s best for their children.  Limbaugh’s code language involving the use of words like “poor,” “urban,” and “unprivileged,” are nothing more than modern day manifestations of the same old self-righteous racism that has held our country back for the last 400 years.

Limbaugh may want to take time to reflect on his own values.  If every poor family in America decided to take on the ethical disposition of Rush Limbaugh, then God help us all.  The man almost went to prison for his drug addiction for goodness sake, and it’s amazing that so many Republicans are listening to him.

Dr. Boyce Watkins is a Professor at Syracuse University. To have Dr. Boyce commentary delivered to your email, please click here.

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Pizza won’t disappear from lunch lines, but will be made with healthier ingredients.

Mrs. Obama, also joined by celebrity chef Rachael Ray, said youngsters will learn better if they don’t have growling stomachs at school.

“We have a right to expect the food (our kids) get at school is the same kind of food we want to serve at our own kitchen tables,” she said.

After the announcement, the three went through the line with students and ate turkey tacos with brown rice, black bean and corn salad and fruit — all Ray’s recipes — with children in the Parklawn Elementary lunchroom.

The new rules aren’t as aggressive as the Obama administration had hoped. Congress last year blocked the Agriculture Department from making some of the desired changes, including limiting french fries and pizzas.

A bill passed in November would require the department to allow tomato paste on pizzas to be counted as a vegetable, as it is now. The initial draft of the department’s guidelines, released a year ago, would have prevented that. Congress also blocked the department from limiting servings of potatoes to two servings a week. The final rules have incorporated those directions from Congress.

Among those who had sought the changes were potato growers and food companies that produce frozen pizzas for schools. Conservatives in Congress called the guidelines an overreach and said the government shouldn’t tell children what to eat. School districts also objected to some of the requirements, saying they go too far and would cost too much.

The new guidelines apply to lunches subsidized by the federal government. A child nutrition bill signed by President Barack Obama in 2010 will help school districts pay for some of the increased costs. Some of the changes will take place as soon as this September; others will be phased in over time.

The guidelines will limit the total number of calories in an individual meal and require that milk be low in fat. Flavored milks will have to be nonfat.

While many schools are improving meals already, others still serve children meals high in fat, salt and calories. The guidelines are designed to combat childhood obesity and are based on 2009 recommendations by the Institute of Medicine, the health arm of the National Academy of Sciences.

Vilsack said food companies are reformulating many of the foods they sell to schools in anticipation of the changes.

“The food industry is already responding,” he said. “This is a movement that has started, it’s gaining momentum.”

The subsidized meals that would fall under the guidelines are served as free and low-cost meals to low-income children and long have been subject to government nutrition standards. The 2010 law will extend, for the first time, nutrition standards to other foods sold in schools that aren’t subsidized by the federal government. That includes “a la carte” foods on the lunch line and snacks in vending machines.

Those standards, while expected to be similar, will be written separately and have not yet been proposed by the department.

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On an episode of her “Both Sides Now With Huffington and Matalin” radio program, multimillionaire Arianna Huffington decided to take the First Lady to task for not being Black enough. Of course, she didn’t say, “Black enough,” she just said that Michelle Obama should be more like former First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt and visit “South Central.”

Huffington, whom I agree with on most matters, stated that the First Lady should avoid lavish fundr-aisers in swanky L.A. neighborhoods and focus more on demonstrating her compassion for people’s suffering:

“I’d love [Michelle] to be more [like] Eleanor Roosevelt right now, because the country needs an Eleanor Roosevelt who’s going to go around and at the same time that she’s doing fund-raisers in Beverly Hills and Bel Air … she should go to South Central [Los Angeles], I mean, if I were Michelle Obama right now, I would not go anywhere for a fund-raiser without going and seeing the places where there is pain, where there is struggle, where there is homelessness, where there is unemployment, because we need to bring that conversation to the center of the debate and there’s nothing like a first lady or … a candidate to take us there.”

Dear Arianna:

You can take your elitist criticism of Michelle Obama and shove it into a tall pile of money.

First of all, that area hasn’t been called “South Central” since 2003; it is now South Los Angeles. If that wasn’t the first clue that you have no idea what you’re talking about, what exactly would you have her do in “South Central” — get shot nine times like 50 Cent so she can have some street cred?

I agree that when the Obamas come to Los Angeles (besides wreaking havoc on the 405 freeway), the president is either speaking at a university, meeting with the Latino community or hob-nobbing in Hollywood. There definitely needs to be more of a focus on providing comprehensive outreach to the poor among us, but suggesting that the First Lady of the United States stroll through an urban war zone just so she can prove how “down” she is with the plight of suffering, unemployed, Black and Brown people, is about as insulting as Rick Santorum saying that it’s “remarkable” that Obama is pro-choice, considering that he’s Black.

Now that I’ve entertained your stereo-typical insinuations about “South Central,” let’s talk about reality. When was the last time you visited South Los Angeles, Ms. Huffington? Are you relying on clips of “Boyz in the Hood” and “Menace II Society” for your information, or have you driven through Compton and Inglewood and seen the neighborhoods for yourself?

Do you even know the ethnic make-up of South Central or are you still operating under the presumption that it’s over-run with poor,”suffering” African Americans? You do realize that it’s nearly half Belizean, Hispanic, and Latino, right? You do realize that there are thriving African businesses in Leimert Park, right? You wouldn’t just be throwing out the the most destitute, “ghetto,” Black place you could think of for our first Black First Lady to visit, would you? You didn’t open your mouth before familiarizing yourself with the affluent African-American neighborhoods of Baldwin Hills and Ladera Heights, did you?

I know you meant well, Ms. Huffington … or did you?

Because on second thought, it seems that you’re perpetuating the myth that the First Lady is an “uppity” Black woman who wouldn’t understand poverty if it smacked her in the face with a food stamp. With your statement, you join the exclusive club of people who brush over her hard-knock life, where her only riches were found in her family. You negate her work to eradicate obesity among children, specifically African-American children — obesity often being a symptom of poverty. You dismiss her efforts to attract grocery stores that sell fresh food to impoverished neighborhoods; you discount her push to provide tax-breaks to breastfeeding mothers — which, surprisingly [please, note sarcasm] is an issue facing many women in poverty who can’t afford to stay home to nurse their children.

But I guess those initiatives aren’t “Black enough” for you?  You’d rather passively endorse the Marie Antoinette drawing, Hawaii vacation-envying crowd who would prefer that a Harvard-educated attorney and Mother of two “visit” the hoods of “South Central” to prove how much she cares about Black unemployed people. That would be the equivalent of critics telling you that if you really care about your native Greece, then when you dined there with the Greek prime minister George Papandreou, you should have stopped in the hood — if you really care.

See how insulting and narrow-minded that is?

As the mastermind behind the merger of Huffington Post and AOL Black Voices and a keynote speaker at the National Association of Black Journalists, Ms. Huffington, it might be a good idea to familiarize yourselves with the many voices in the African-American community — and they aren’t just poor and suffering in South Central; nor, do many of us prefer a symbolic, executive drive through the hood to the necessary work that the First Lady is actually doing in those communities.

Michelle Obama is more than doing her part. If you must criticize anyone, then reserve that for the Commander-in-Chief, who is so afraid that conservatives will catch him uttering the word “poverty,” that he wouldn’t order “Colors“ on Netflix.

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1)  She’s just as smart as her husband: Barack Obama went to an Ivy League school, and so did Michelle.  Barack is a highly trained attorney, and so is Michelle.   In fact, Michelle actually mentored Barack when he first got his job at Sidley Austin, a fancy law firm in Chicago.  I’m sure she can go toe-to-toe with him in any debate.

2) It’s about time we let a woman lead our country. Given that women are now the majority of the American workforce, it is about time for us to let a woman run the country.  Who knows?  Maybe choosing the best person for the job without discriminating based on gender will actually make us better off in the end.

3) She has guts. Michelle has stated that there is nothing shameful about being a strong black woman.  She doesn’t feel the need to make others unnecessarily comfortable or to give in to the irrationality of racism.  Quite frankly, there are times when the president folded in situations where I truly believe Michelle would have stood strong.  She’s not in Washington to make friends, and sometimes, that can be a good thing.

4)  She would choose better advisers. Every time I see a silly decision being made by the Obama Administration or hear that they’ve chosen yet again to ignore the growing Black unemployment problem, someone tells me, “It’s not President Obama, it’s the people around him.”  I don’t disagree:  Obama’s cabinet is whiter than an episode of the TV show “Happy Days.” Reports that Michelle Obama has had friction with the president’s cabinet are not surprising, since she appears to be the one willing to tell them the ugly truth about their choices.

5) She’s not afraid to be Black. Throughout her life, Michelle has written about diversity issues and fought for them. Her graduation thesis at Princeton was titled, “Princeton-Educated Blacks and the Black Community.” She has protested against the Harvard Law School’s atrocious record of not hiring African-American professors and seems genuinely concerned about the Black men and women who can’t find jobs.  In fact, Michelle is likely the one who remembers that during the last two months when the country celebrated improvements in the unemployment rate, Black unemployment actually got worse — I’m not sure if the rest of the Obama Administration got the memo.

While no one can prove that Michelle is more qualified than Barack, the fact that being Black and female amounts to automatic disqualification from the presidency reminds us that we are a long way from fulfilling the dream of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.  Still, I’m going to go out and find me a “Michelle Obama for President” T-shirt.  Somehow I’m sure I won’t be the only one wearing it.

Dr. Boyce Watkins is a professor at Syracuse University and founder of the Your Black World Coalition.  To have Dr. Boyce commentary delivered to your email, please click here.

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1) She is a great Mother. It is evident that Mrs. Obama is a hands-on Mom to daughters Malia and Sasha.  Responsible parenting is her credo, and despite a grueling schedule, the mom-in-chief is a devoted nurturer who is intent on keeping her children grounded.

2) She is a dedicated wife. Mrs. Obama has been very vocal about the fact that she thinks her husband, Barack, is a wonderful partner, husband, and father, “We’re each other’s best friends and closest advisors,” she said during an interview with Babble.com.

The First Lady seems to be her husband’s biggest supporter and often speaks out about what she thinks he brings to this country.  The Obamas are openly affectionate toward each other and present a powerful example of what a modern-day partnership between equals looks like.

3) She loves and respects animals. After being contacted by the New York Post on whether or not she wears fur, Press Secretary Semonti Mustaphi responded:

Mrs. Obama does not wear fur.

So in PETA’s eyes, she looks pretty darn fabulous.

4) She champions healthy eating for children. Mrs. Obama launched the “Let’s Move!” healthful eating campaign to help fight childhood obesity.  At its core, the initiative has four pillars:

• increased awareness about nutrition
• more physical activity
• easier access to healthier foods
• personal responsibility

The campaign is not a war on fast foods, but about getting the nation’s kids on a fast track to good health, which leads to increased self-esteem.

5) She is a fashion icon. Mrs. Obama is a mix-and-match master, and while she loves designer duds, she isn’t afraid to pair them with budget-friendly finds from stores like the Gap or J. Crew.

6) She is very intelligent. A product of Chicago public schools, Mrs. Obama studied Sociology and African-American studies at Princeton University. After graduating from Harvard Law School in 1988, she joined the Chicago law firm Sidley & Austin, where she met her future husband.  She is only one of three first ladies to have received a Master’s degree (the other two are Laura Bush and Hillary Clinton).

7) She admits to food vices. While Mrs. Obama has admitted that she loves hot wings, French fries, and bacon, she eats them in moderation and presents realistic ways of managing unhealthy food, making her all the more lovable!

8) She can dance! As part of her “Let’s Move!” campaign in a a D.C. public school last May, Mrs. Obama demonstrated that she can do the Dougie and the Running Man.

9) She smells good. The First Lady is smitten with Creed’s Love in White, which is a crisp mix of orange blossom and citrus notes.

10) She has fabulous arms. We all have arm envy of Mrs. Obama’s first guns, nicknamed “Thunder and Lightening.”  Her arms are buff and she’s not afraid to show ‘em!

11) She hates pantyhose. And so do 99.99 percent of women! Mrs. Obama finds the restrictive,  male-invented legwear “painful!”

12) She works out like a fiend. Mrs. Obama loves to exercise, and it shows.  The First Lady keeps her hot bod fit by changing up her exercise routine, hitting the treadmill, lifting weights, jumping rope, kickboxing, and taking pilates. One of her favorite artists to sweat to is Beyonce.

13) She is a good daughter. When the Obamas moved into the White House, the First Lady’s mom, Marian Robinson, was in tow.  Mrs. Robinson has been described as the bedrock of the Obama family. After he was elected president,  Obama said on “60 Minutes,” “She’s just been an unbelievable support for all of us during this process.” The love among mother, daughter, son-in-law, and grandkids is oh-so-evident.

14)  She supports military families. Mrs. Obama and Dr. Jill Biden launched a national initiative to support and honor America’s service members and their families. “Joining Forces” was created to address the unique challenges and needs of military families. The initiative focuses on key priority areas (employment, education, and wellness), while working to raise awareness about the lives of military families.

14) She is not an ice princess. Mrs. Obama actually shows emotion and isn’t afraid to laugh, cry, dance, or sing in public.

15) She is beautiful. Named as one of People Magazines “World’s Most Beautiful People 2009,” Mrs. Obama has both outer and inner beauty.  The First Lady credits her father and brother for giving her high self-esteem, making her the confident woman she is today.

16) She is a good cook. When Mrs. Obama has time to get down in the kitchen, she admits that she can “burn a pot.”  Mrs. Obama’s shrimp linguine is one of her husband’s fave dishes.

17) She loves to shop at Target. Even though being a First Lady makes things difficult, Mrs. Obama loves shopping at Target.  It’s nice to know that Mrs. Obama, like the rest of us, wants to “expect more and pay less.”

18) She has nice hair. No clips, weaves or wigs, the First Lady’s do is always polished, always stylish and is all truly hers.

19) She is a good sister. Mrs. Obama and her brother Craig, who is 16 months older, were often mistaken for twins growing up.  The pair are so close that the First Lady even followed her brother to Princeton University.  She often refers to her brother as her best friend.

20) She loves healthy food. Mrs. Obama has supported the organic food movement, instructing the White House kitchens to prepare organic food for guests and her family.  In 2009, Michelle worked with 23 fifth graders from a local school in Washington, D.C., to plant a 1,100-square-foot garden of fresh vegetables and install bee hives on the South Lawn of the White House.

21) She is a role model. Always poised and well-spoken, Mrs. Obama exudes a confidence and grace that is exemplary for young girls everywhere.

22) She is a friend in our heads. Mrs. Obama is like a sisterfriend: She seems like the kind of friend who could bring you out of your deepest funk with her indefatigable smile and words of wisdom.

23) She supports the arts. The First Lady has often said that it is through music, literature, art, drama, and dance that we tell the story of our past and we express our hopes for the future.

24) She loves to read. Whenever Mrs. Obama picks up a book, it generates tons of buzz.  She loves reading books to not only her own children but has to countless students as well.

25) She has a nickname. The Robinson family call her “Miche,” and her husband refers to her as “my rock.”

26) She is outspoken. In addition to some of the memorable things she said on the campaign trail, she told her teachers when she got to Princeton that they weren’t teaching French correctly.

27) She has a favorite TV show. Mrs. Obama likes to kick back by watching reruns of 1960′s comedy “The Dick Van Dyke Show.” (And so do I!)

28) She knows what it’s like to lose a loved one. Mrs. Obama’s dad died from complications of  multiple sclerosis when she was in her 20s.

29) She likes all kinds of music. The First Lady’s personal playlist includes cuts like “No Diggety,” by BlackStreet; “Poison,” by Bel Biv DeVoe; and songs by Guns N’ Roses and rapper Eminem.

30) She loves Sudoku. The psychological appeal of the puzzle game has gained popularity over the years.

31) She keeps it real. The First Lady has shared some personal stuff with the public about her hubby, like his smelly socks and how he forgets to put the butter away.

32) She can think on her feet. During the election campaign, the First Lady wrote her own speeches and spoke without using notes.

33) She calls it as she sees it. When Mrs. Obama first met her husband, she thought he had a big nose.

34) She keeps connected to her husband. Mrs. Obama and the President are in constant communication even when he’s away.  To keep in touch, they use a webcam.

35) She puts her husband to work.  Mrs. Obama can still make her husband do the dishes whenever she cooks.

36) She has a familiar lineage. Jim Robinson, the First Lady’s great-great grandfather, was a slave in South Carolina before the Civil War.

37) She is anti-smoking. President Obama was a smoker, and after years of pressure from the First Lady, he finally quit the habit nearly a year ago.  The President had been a smoker for 30 years.

38) She is a mover and shaker. Before she became the First Lady, Mrs. Obama was on the board of six major organizations, including the prestigious Chicago Council on Global Affairs, the University of Chicago Laboratory Schools, and Tree House Foods. She was also vice president of Community and External Affairs at the University of Chicago Hospitals.

39) She is an ambassador of goodwill. Last year, Mrs. Obama made official trips to Africa, India, Latin America, and the U.K., showing her talent as a goodwill ambassador and spokesperson for the less fortunate.

40) She is popular. More popular than her husband, Mrs. Obama’s approval ratings hover near 70 percent while President Obama’s ratings are less than 40 percent.

41) She is a feminist. Mrs. Obama seems to embody the notion at the center of feminism: women can be both intelligent and powerful.

42) She is into Twitter. Since joining Twitter on January 12, the First Lady has occasionally tweeted as herself with posts signed “mo.”

42) She loves jumping double Dutch.  We all watched Mrs. Obama on the news last September jumping  double Dutch with D.C.-area kids on the White House south lawn.  She said it made her happy.

First Lady Michelle Obama Worldwide Day of Play Spot from Jessica Wilson on Vimeo.
43) She likes dark chocolate. What are her favorite sinful treats?  The Seattle-based Fran’s Chocolates is her weakness.

44) She is a good baker. The First Lady runs the White house like a home and still finds the time to bake.  Mrs. Obama loves her Apple Cobbler recipe.

45) She is a cool Mom who lets 13-year-old Malia use makeup. Before she allowed her oldest daughter to apply makeup, Mrs. Obama talked through the grown-up move with her.

46) She has zero-tolerance for bullying. The First Lady works to dispel the myth that bullying is a normal rite of passage for kids.

47) She loves America. Mrs. Obama loves the United States and the opportunities it has given her, such as living the Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. “I Have a Dream” speech.
48) She loves her job as First Lady. Mrs. Obama loves her job, loves people and likes having a positive impact on America.  She is eagerly awaiting a possible second term in the White House and feels there is still much work to do:

We’ve really just begun to lay the foundation,” Mrs. Obama told ABC News.

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A screaming, raucous auditorium filled with elementary and middle school students greeted Obama and the cast of the Nickelodeon TV show “iCarly” at Hayfield Secondary School in Fairfax County.

The appearance promoted an upcoming episode featuring Obama in which she thanks military families for their sacrifices. On the show, star Miranda Cosgrove plays the daughter of an Air Force colonel deployed overseas.

A staple of the show is a segment of random dancing, which Obama performed both in the episode that premieres Monday and on stage Friday.

Obama’s dance moves drew plaudits from the “iCarly” cast.

“I think she showed everybody up in the dance department,” said Jennette McCurdy, who plays Samantha on the show.

The onstage dance session Friday lasted only a minute or so, far less than the extended dance session Obama did last year when visiting Deal Middle School in the District, when she joined students doing “the Dougie” and “The Running Man” in a clip that has been viewed more than 4 million times on YouTube.

Her acting skills also drew praise. The cast was impressed with Obama’s ability to deliver her lines in the compressed time they had to shoot the scenes.

“She has good comic timing in real life, too,” Cosgrove said.

Obama said she watches the show with her daughters, and wanted to appear because it dovetails with her campaign to support and recognize military families. Last year, Obama went to northern Virginia to deliver the commencement address at the high school on Quantico Marine Corps Base.

Hayfield, few miles south of the Pentagon, was chosen in part because it is home to large numbers of military children.

During a question-and-answer session with students, Obama drew a handful of playful boos when she was asked about school lunches and talked about legislation she and her husband supported to add more vegetables to the school lunch program.

Taking note of the reaction, she said, “But this is for you all. … It’s hard to do what you do if you’re not healthy.”

She concluded with a simple admonition: “Eat your vegetables.”

She also handled other student questions:

- Asked what super power she wished she could have, she said, “You know what? I’ve always wanted to fly. When I was young, I used to always have dreams about flying.”

-Her favorite room in the White House? The Yellow Oval Room, which opens up to the Truman balcony. “It’s one of the few places the president can walk outside and be by himself,” she said.

-Her favorite TV shows? Besides “iCarly,” Mrs. Obama said, “we watch all kinds of things. We try not to have too much TV time during the week, though.”

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Mrs. Obama tells CBS News she hasn’t read New York Times reporter Jodi Kantor’s new book that characterizes her as a behind-the-scenes force in the Executive Mansion, whose strong views often draw her into conflict with President Barack Obama’s top advisers.

“I never read these books,” she told CBS’s Gayle King in an interview broadcast Wednesday. “So I’ve just gotten in the habit of not reading other people’s impressions of people.”

In the book, Mrs. Obama is said to have occasionally bristled at some of the demands and constraints of life in the White House.

In the interview, Mrs. Obama said, “I love this job. It has been a privilege from day one.”

“Now there are challenges,” she added. “If there’s any anxiety that I feel, it’s because I want to make sure that my girls (Malia and Sasha) come out of this on the other end whole.”

The Kantor book portrays a White House where tensions developed between Mrs. Obama and former White House chief of staff Rahm Emanuel and former press secretary and presidential adviser Robert Gibbs. The book, titled “The Obamas,” describes Mrs. Obama as having gone through an evolution from struggle to fulfillment in her role at the White House, while labeling her an “unrecognized force” in pursuing the president’s goals. Neither the president nor his wife agreed to be interviewed for the book.

“I do care deeply about my husband,” Mrs. Obama said in the CBS appearance. “I am one of his biggest allies. I am one of his biggest confidants.” But she sought to put aside “this notion that I sit in meetings.”

“I guess it’s just more interesting to imagine this conflicted situation here,” she said. “That’s been an image people have tried to paint of me since the day Barack announced, that I’m some kind of angry black woman.”

“There will always be people who don’t like me,” Mrs. Obama added, and said she could live with that.

Mrs. Obama said that she’s “just trying to be me, and I just hope that over time, that people get to know me.”

Asked specifically about an assertion of dissension between herself and Emanuel, now the mayor of Chicago, the first lady said she has “never had a cross word” with him. The same, she said, applies to Gibbs, whom she described as “a good friend, and remains so.”

“I’m sure we could go day to day and find things people wished they didn’t say to each other,” Mrs., Obama said. “And that’s why I don’t read these books. … It’s a game, in so many ways, that doesn’t fit. Who can write about what I feel? What third person can tell me what I feel?”

Mrs. Obama said that when questions or conflicts arise involving her and the White House staff, her East Wing staff resolves the issue with her husband’s staff in the West Wing.

“If there’s communication that needs to happen, it’s between staffs,” she said. “I don’t have conversations with my husband’s staff.”

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New York Times reporter Jodi Kantor, in a book to be published Tuesday, portrays a White House where tensions developed between Mrs. Obama and former White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel and former press secretary and presidential adviser Robert Gibbs.

The Associated Press obtained a copy of the book, “The Obamas,” Friday evening and The New York Times posted a 3,300-word adaption on its website that appeared to capture its most revealing accounts. The book is based on interviews with 30 current and former aides, though President Barack Obama and the first lady declined to be interviewed for the book.

The book portrays Mrs. Obama as having gone through an evolution from struggle to fulfillment in her role at the White House but all the while an “unrecognized force” in pursuing the president’s goals.

She is seen publicly as the friendly and popular face of the softer side of the White House, the one reading to school kids or promoting exercise as a means to reduce child obesity.

According to Kantor, early in 2010 as the president’s health care agenda seemed in danger of collapsing, Mrs. Obama let it be known she was annoyed by how the White House was handling the strategy. After media reports indicated Emanuel was unhappy pursuing the health care overhaul, Emanuel offered to resign, Kantor wrote. The president declined the offer.

By that spring, however, Kantor writes that Mrs. Obama “made it clear that she thought her husband needed a new team, according to her aides.”

Among the book’s most provocative anecdotes, Kantor recounts a scene in which Gibbs, frustrated after tamping down a potential public relations crisis involving the first lady, exploded when presidential adviser Valerie Jarrett told him the first lady had concerns about the White House response to the flap. The initial commotion had been over an alleged remark by Michelle Obama to French first lady Carla Bruni-Sarkozy that living in the White House was “hell.”

Gibbs cursed the first lady, who was absent. Kantor writes that Gibbs later said his anger was misplaced and that he blamed Jarrett for creating the confrontation. Kantor writes that Jarrett appeared to have been too quick with her criticism of Gibbs and that two aides to the first lady later said Jarrett had misspoken.

The White House had a cold reaction to the book, calling it an “over-dramatization of old news” and emphasizing that the first couple did not speak to the author, who last interviewed them for a magazine piece in 2009.

“The emotions, thoughts and private moments described in the book, though often seemingly ascribed to the president and first lady, reflect little more than the author’s own thoughts,” White House spokesman Eric Schultz said. “These secondhand accounts are staples of every administration in modern political history and often exaggerated.”

The book, in an array of reconstructed anecdotes, depicts a first couple often wishing they could escape the confining White House life more freely; a president who at times gets deeply frustrated by how the press covers him; and a former chief of staff, Emanuel, who let loose with profane outbursts on staff members. All of those themes have been presented in some form in other publications.

One incident recalled that Jarrett used a phone aboard Air Force One to call a New York Times reporter. The New York Times was pursuing a story about how Obama’s West Wing was essentially a big boys’ club, and Jarrett was calling to argue that the premise of a male-dominated operation was overblown. The book says even though Jarrett was the one making the call, it was Obama himself who was managing the response to The New York Times’ story even before it came out by “personally dictating talking points to the aides who would speak to the writer.”

In another, the book describes how Obama, after winning a U.S. Senate seat and writing a best-selling book, “The Audacity of Hope,” sought self-protection and privacy as he came to terms with his new fame. Some staffers came up with a word to describe times when the senator couldn’t connect with people: “Barackward,” a combination of “Barack” and “awkward.”

But despite the White House pushback to the book, Kantor also includes many positive portrayals of both Obamas as committed parents and a down to earth power couple who have not lost their perspective.

Other revelations in the book:

- Mrs. Obama initially chafed at life in the White House and for a short period before the inauguration had even mulled staying in Chicago in 2009 at least until the two Obama daughters completed their school session.

- During the struggle to pass health care reform, Obama was committed to tackling the massive problem of rising health care costs despite the political costs. “Michelle and I are perfectly comfortable if we’re only here one term if we feel like we really accomplished something,” the book quotes the president as telling aides.

- Despite her reticence in 2010 to campaign during the midterm elections, the book says Mrs. Obama now has no qualms about 2012. “Michelle had been playing it safe, storing up political capital, and now she wanted to spend it all on her husband’s re-election campaign.”

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The email featured a photo of Michelle Obama juxtaposed with an image of the cartoon character “The Grinch” with the subject line reading “Twins separated at birth?” Written in the email was: “I’m sure you’ll join me in wishing Mrs. YoMama a wonderful, long Hawaii Christmas vacation — at our expense, of course”

O’Neal forwarded the email to several of his Republican colleagues in the Kansas House, adding his own words, “Sorry, just had to forward the latest holiday message! I’ve had worse hair days but this is pretty funny.”

The Huffington Post reports:

He said Thursday he was sorry to those he offended, adding that he missed the text in the body of the email. He said, however, that the picture “made me laugh.” Earlier his communications director defended him, saying that political cartoons are a “part of American culture.”

Read More At The Huffington Post

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“I’ve been doing the show for a long time and I usually don’t get nervous, but having the first lady on the set, I was really nervous,” laughed Cosgrove, 18, in an interview Wednesday.

Nickelodeon and the White House want to show support for U.S. military families with a cameo by the first lady on the show.

On “iCarly,” Cosgrove plays Carly Shay, the daughter of an Air Force colonel who is serving overseas.

In an episode titled, “iMeet the First Lady,” Carly gets upset when her father’s return from active duty is canceled because he is deployed again. Her friends decide to surprise her with a live feed to her father during an iCarly webcast. After Mrs. Obama sees the webcast, she praises Carly for being such a supportive daughter to a father who is serving his country.

Cosgrove said that despite being nervous about meeting Mrs. Obama, she found her quite approachable, calling the first lady a “nice, pretty normal person” who even danced with the cast during a regular segment called “Random Dancing.”

“It was probably the most fun thing we did. We all just got to let loose and have a good time,” Cosgrove said.

To promote the show, cast members will appear at four screening events for military families. The screenings will be held in Miramar, Calif., on Jan. 9; Groton, Conn., on Jan. 11; Fort Dix, N.J., on Jan. 12; and Alexandria, Va., on Jan. 13.

Cosgrove said the goal is to “let (military) kids know how important their parents are.”

The episode of “iCarly” featuring the first lady will air Jan. 16 on Nickelodeon at 7:30 p.m. EST.

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Sensenbrenner was heard talking on his cellphone at Reagan Airport in Washington, D.C., bragging about what he said at a church auction after someone praised the First Lady.

MediaBistro reports:

Our source, a Democratic operative who heard the whole thing, said he was “very loud.” Sensenbrenner was overheard saying that after buying all their “crap” (his word) a woman approached him and praised first lady Michelle Obama. He told the woman that Michelle should practice what she preaches — “she lectures us on eating right while she has a large posterior herself.”

Read More at MediaBistro.

1. MOOD MUSIC

She partnered with Beyonce and Swizz Beatz to change the lyrics to “Get Me Bodied” for a remix dubbed “Move Your Body.” Bey shot a video for the new song in a middle school cafeteria. In it she teaches youth a workout that combines hip hop, Latin, dancehall, and aerobics. Mrs. O distributed the video to junior high schools around the nation. [hellobeautiful.com]

2. #TWITTER

She and the USDA launched the #MyPlate Twitter and Flickr campaign to coincide with the new federal icon of a plate that shows how our new daily food pyramid should be properly proportioned at each meal (half the plate should be fruits and vegetables). Social networkers were prompted to upload real-life pictures of their plates. [usda.gov]

3. NATIVE TRADITIONS

She invited American Indian children to the White House kitchen garden to use traditional planting techniques to plant the “three sisters” crops: squash, corn, and beans. She plans to release a book next year, “American Grown: How the White House Kitchen Garden Inspires Families, Schools and Communities.” [newsone.com]

4. PLAYING WITH PROFESSIONALS

She visited the U.S. Open and played doubles with Serena Williams (her served clocked in a 55mph), she played soccer with the U.S. Women’s Soccer Team in a clinic for youth soccer clubs that she invited to the White House, she co-hosted a clinic with the MLB players, took Olympians to an elementary school, and partnered with the NFL PLAY 60 effort.

5. ON THE BOOKS

She urged Congress to pass the Heathy, Hunger-Free Kids Act to ensure that schools meet more rigorous nutrition guidelines; and to increase the amount of money schools are reimbursed for meals and the number of low-income students eligible for free and reduced-price meals. The Act was signed by her husband in December 2010. [theroot.com]

6. DOWN THE AISLE

She spoke to the Grocery Manufacturers Association, asking food executives to be more mindful of what they market. While there has been progress, she said, “more than 70 percent of foods marketed to kids were still among the least healthy, with less than 1 percent being among the most healthy.” In May 2011, the Healthy Weight Commitment Foundation, a coalition of food manufacturers including Campbell Soup, Coca-Cola, General Mills, Kellogg, Kraft Foods, and PepsiCo, promised to eliminate 1 trillion calories from their products by 2012 and 1.5 trillion by the end of 2015. [obamafoodorama.blogspot.com]

7. MENU CHANGE

She spoke to the National Restaurant Association, challenging restaurant owners to exercise portion control and offer healthier menus including making fries a request and fruits and veggies a first option. In July, McDonalds announced adding apples to Happy Meals and in September, Darden Restaurants Inc. (which is the largest full service restaurant company, owning and operating 1,900 restaurants in 49 states including Olive Gardens) promised to reduce calorie and sodium counts by 10 percent by 2016 and by 20 percent by 2021. [theatlantic.com]

8. GET COOKING

She launched “Let’s Cook,” a video series posted on the “Let’s Move” website featuring some of the country’s top chefs demonstrating how to prepare simple, affordable, nutritious family meals from an array of cuisines including North African, Caribbean, and South American. She also deployed professional chefs in a national adopt-a-school program to work closely with school administrators and families to help instill healthy eating practices. [mnn.com]

9. DOING THE DOUGIE

Though she’s been working on raising major money to eliminate food deserts, she also advocates for simple things like “turning on the radio and dancing with your children in the middle of your living room for hours,” she told the NAACP at the National Convention in July 2010. She was seen learning how to dougie with a group of Washington, DC middle schoolers in May of this year. [hellobeautiful.com]

10. BABY BLOOMERS

She developed a Child Care component of the campaign to advocate for really young youngin’s (1 in 5 are overweight by the age of 6), recommending parents provide 1-2 hours of physical activity, no screen time (TV, computer, or mobile devices) for children under 2 years-old, fruits or veggies and water with every meal, and breastfeeding (“babies that are breastfed are less likely to be obese as children”). [newsone.com]

The first lady announced in an email Monday that her October bid to break the record for the most people doing jumping jacks in a 24-hour period succeeded. Mrs. Obama says 300,265 people participated, shattering the old record.

In order to achieve her goal, Mrs. Obama led about 400 elementary and middle-school students from Washington in jumping jacks on the South Lawn of the White House. Other jumping jacks events were held around the world on Oct. 11.

The effort was organized by National Geographic Kids magazine in support of the first lady’s Let’s Move! initiative to promote physical fitness and healthy eating for children.

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Limbaugh defended the booers, claiming that they had a right to do so, considering her healthy eating initiatives and vacations, accusing her of “uppity-ism.”

The term “uppity” has historically been used to describe African-Americans who didn’t know their place.

“I’ll tell you something else — we don’t like paying millions of dollars for Mrs. Obama’s vacations,” he said. “The NASCAR crowd doesn’t quite understand why, when the husband and the wife are going the same place, the first lady has to take her own Boeing 757 with family and kids and hangers-on four hours earlier than her husband, who will be on his 747. NASCAR people understand that’s a little bit of a waste. They understand it is a little bit of uppity-ism. First ladies have not been known to hop their own 757s four hours ahead of their husband when they’re going the same place.”

The event, held at the Homestead-Miami Speedway, had both women serving as Grand Marshals this past Sunday.

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According to Mediaite, when the first lady was introduced, “loud booing could be heard above the cheers.” The booing was not audible in the television broadcast, but was picked up by ESPN microphones.

The first lady and Mrs. Biden were at the event in support of Joining Forces, the initiative the women lead in support of military families. In fact, NBC Miami reported that a group of military families, including an Iraq war veteran, Sgt. Andrew Barry, and a group of children of military families were with Mrs. Obama and Mrs. Biden when they were booed.

Read more at The Grio

“We knew that it would be unacceptable during the renovation timeframe for the public to go two years without this popular and almost 100-year-old tradition at the Smithsonian,” interim museum director Marc Pachter said.

When it first opened in 1914, the first ladies collection was the first time the Smithsonian Institution gave women a prominent place in history, he said. Every first lady since Helen Taft has followed the tradition of donating her inaugural gown to the collection. Last year, Obama gave the museum her dress designed by Jason Wu.

According to the Smithsonian, the term “first lady” was first used in 1894 by President Zachary Taylor in his eulogy of Dolley Madison. Before that, a variety of other terms were used over the nation’s first 100 years.

The new exhibit examines how first ladies have shaped their roles as the influence of women in society has changed and ponders what will happen when a woman is elected president. Eight dresses and at least 10 other items, including Laura Bush’s state china service, are on view for the first time or the first time in decades as the museum freshens its display and incorporates new stories.

“There is no job description for first lady of the United States,” said Lisa Kathleen Graddy, curator of the collection. “Each one remakes the undefined and challenging position to suit her own interests, the needs of the presidential administration and the public’s changing expectations of women in general and first ladies in particular.”

Sections of the exhibition are devoted to the first ladies’ impact on fashion, her role as the nation’s hostess, inaugurations and formal events and the changing role over time. Madison, for example, got engaged in politics early by gathering information and talking about public opinion, and Mary Todd Lincoln was criticized for her attempts at patronage.

For decades, first ladies have influenced fashion, whether through popularizing colors like Nancy Reagan’s red or setting trends as with Jacqueline Kennedy or Lou Hoover, who was first to appear in Vogue magazine in a bid to promote American-made clothes.

The public scrutiny of their fashion sense is an unexpected part of the job for many first ladies, Graddy said.

Curators refer to Caroline Harrison’s evening gown, on display for the first time, as “early bling.” The burgundy velvet and gray satin gown is embroidered with a floral gray pearls and steel beads.

For the first time, curators also mixed in mementos and other “secondary objects” along with gowns and china, Graddy said.

There’s a scrap of fabric from Lincoln’s redecoration of the White House parlor, a piece of burnt wood from when the British burned the executive mansion and a copy of the book “Treasure Island” that Edith Roosevelt gave to her son’s friend Charley Taft, the next child who would occupy the White House. She signed it “Charley, from Quentin’s mother,” and Charley took the book to read during his father’s 1909 inauguration ceremony, presumably to keep from getting bored.

“I really wanted it to be about memory,” Graddy said of the revamped exhibit. “My word was always scrapbook. These are the things that people save. These are the things that women especially save, and this is so much a women’s show.”

As the museum plans its renovation of the 120,000 square feet of its west wing exhibit space, there will be a permanent home for the first ladies’ gallery in a larger section devoted to American democracy, Pachter said. There will be floors devoted to the nation’s economy and entrepreneurship, the underpinnings of the political system and culture ranging from music and entertainment to sports.

“We’re going to give people a way to think about the whole of our society and who we are,” Pachter said.

Construction is slated to begin in spring of 2012 and with the wing reopening in late 2014 for the museum’s 50th anniversary.

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Obama stretched, jumped and marched in place before reading to the children who gathered in a classroom with their parents and teachers at the Royal Castle Child Development Center. The center focuses on preschoolers from families with moderate and low incomes.

In June, the first lady announced a new national initiative called “Let’s Move,” designed to get child care centers to promote healthy eating and exercise habits. She promoted that initiative here after speaking at a fundraiser earlier in the day for the Democratic National Committee in New Orleans.

At the daycare center, the first lady read Denise Fleming’s book titled “Lunch,” about a mouse that eats vegetables and fruit. During the reading, she asked the children to raise their hands if they liked to eat corn. Many of the children raised their hands, prompting the first lady to declare: “I love corn.”

On another page, the mouse eats green peas. “Do you know who likes these?” the first lady said. “President Obama.”

With gusto, she also read from “Where the Wild Things Are,” the children’s classic by Maurice Sendak. Her voice rose and fell with the drama of the book, which she said was one of her family’s favorites.

The first lady’s “Let’s Move” child care checklist stresses five principles:

–Provide one to two hours of physical activity daily.

–No TV or media screen time for children under age 2. Limit screen time for older children to no more than 30 minutes per week during child care, and ensure children have no more than one to two hours of quality screen time per day overall.

–Serve fruits and vegetables at every meal, eaten family-style when possible and no fried foods.

–Provide access to water throughout the day, and do not serve sugary drinks.

–Support mothers who want to breast-feed by providing mother’s milk to infants and welcoming mothers who want to breast-feed their children during the child-care day.

At the earlier fundraiser, Obama spoke to a prominent crowd of Democratic supporters, including New Orleans Mayor Mitch Landrieu. She urged the crowd to back her husband’s re-election and highlighted what she said were his accomplishments — from passing health care reform to success in the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.

“This is going to require every single one of us to work so hard to fight so forcefully to help people understand the stakes and the choices,” she said.

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Crown Publishers announced Monday that the complete title of the first lady’s first book is “American Grown: How the White House Kitchen Garden Inspires Families, Schools and Communities.” It is scheduled to be published in April.

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The book will explore how improving access to healthy, affordable food can influence eating habits for the better and improve public health. The first lady has become an advocate for healthier eating and exercise, and she is leading a nationwide campaign to reduce childhood obesity in the U.S.

Mrs. Obama received no advance for the book and will donate all proceeds to a charity or charities to be named later

“Like any mother, I am just hoping that I don’t mess them up,” the First Lady said regarding her daughters Sasha and Malia. She continued discussing her daughter’s eating habits, limiting TV time and steering clear of  ”Keeping Up With The Kardashians.”

With a morning start of 5 a.m., Michelle’s first task of the day is email, although she isn’t expecting responses back that early. Then depending on if Malia and Sasha are up, she is either working out or getting the girls ready for school. Exercising is a way of life for the president and the first lady, so it’s no surprise she explains that it keeps her balanced, even if “it’s a daily struggle.”

Read more at the Huffington Post.

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The first lady will lead hundreds of local children in doing one minute of jumping jacks on the South Lawn on Tuesday.

The event will be reviewed by an official from Guinness World Records and will signal the beginning of a 24-hour challenge.

To break the record, more than 20,000 people around the world will need to do jumping jacks for a minute.

National Geographic Kids is leading the effort to break the record.

The exact record to break is 20,425 jumpers, set on March 22, 2011.

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Sasha wants Scott. So does Malia. The first lady wants Beth. So does Barack.

Turns out everyone’s dickering over who gets which Secret Service agent.

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Michelle Obama revealed the tongue-in-cheek family feud as she paid a visit to Secret Service headquarters on Wednesday to thank workers at the agency that, among its many duties, protects the first family.
It was another of her periodic visits to government offices around town. But this visit was more personal than most.

“You all have really made us feel at home and safe, and there is no amount of thanks that I could convey that would give you a sense of how important you all are to us,” Mrs. Obama told hundreds of Secret Service employees. She spoke to the group for about five minutes after touring classified areas of the building, including the protective intelligence division and the joint operations center.

The first lady paid tribute not just to the agents who protect the Obamas, but to all the workers behind the scenes, “whether it’s filing or looking at terrorists.”

“The work you do here is pretty scary,” she said. “All I can say, after my little tour, is ignorance is bliss. I just don’t want to know. You all can handle that. Just tell me where to run.”

The first lady said the Obamas have a special affinity for the agents assigned to protect them.

“People always ask what it is like to have Secret Service around,” Mrs. Obama said. “It’s like having family around. … We have a fight among our family over who’s getting which people.

“Sasha will come in, it’s like, ‘You took Scott!’” Mrs. Obama said. “Malia’s like, ‘You took Scott? That’s not fair!’ And then I’ll say the same thing to Barack. It’s like, ‘Why did you get Beth?’ It’s dinner table conversation.”

Mrs. Obama said a good relationship with the agents is important “when you’re trying to live a normal life and raise a couple of girls in the White House.”

The president, in an interview with ABC News this week, said it’s a challenge to give his daughters plenty of “space to make mistakes, be teenagers” while also ensuring they’re protected.

“They’re still going to the mall. And they’re still going to movies. But they’ve got this guy with a gun following them around,” Obama said. “Our Secret Service detail is terrific about it. But it’s a balance that has to be struck.”

The first lady, hard to recognize in a baseball cap and sunglasses, shopped Thursday at a Target store in Alexandria, Va., just outside Washington.

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Casually dressed Secret Service agents arrived about a half-hour before Mrs. Obama, who walked in through the main entrance with an assistant. She spent 30 to 40 minutes shopping, pushing her own cart. She apparently was recognized only by the cashier who rang up her purchases.

Since coming to the White House, Mrs. Obama has lamented missing out on what she calls “normal stuff,” like Target runs.

She isn’t the first first lady to try to go out unrecognized. Hillary Rodham Clinton went for walks wearing a baseball cap and sunglasses, too.

The episode spotlighted Barbara Marshall, a U.S. Navy veteran, who opened up her home to serve homeless female veterans in N.C.

“I hope lots of people will be inspired by her story to give back to their communities – especially to service members and their families,” said the first lady.

Read more at the Grio.

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According to their findings, prevention and treatment are necessary, but more of an emphasis needs to be placed on treatment, especially among minorities.

“Effective treatment strategies, particularly targeted to minority children, are especially needed,” says Joyce M. Lee, M.D., M.P.H., assistant professor of pediatrics and communicable diseases at the U-M Medical School and lead author of the study. “There is a lot of discussion about obesity prevention for children. That’s certainly important, but it’s not the whole story. Because so many children are already obese, there need to be greater efforts focused on treatment if we’re going to have success,” she said in a news release.

Read more at the Huffington Post.

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Pajamas Media, Powerline, The Lonely Conservative, and Gateway Pundit are among the far-right sites that have been peddling the National Enquirer’shate story, which attacks the First Lady as a spoiled and arrogant shopaholic with expensive taste in alcohol.

London’s notoriously unreliable(and Obama-hating) Daily Mail first put the National Enquirer story in play, quoting the tabloid’s unnamed sources who denounced the First Lady’s “out-of-control” and  “disgusting” behavior. Bloggers have linked approvingly to the Daily Mail article, effectively hyping the National Enquirer’s lurid brand of check-out aisle gossip.

Read more at The Root

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LOS ANGELES — E! Online has a post on their website with Michelle Obama and Gayle King wearing the same dress titled “Bitch Stole My Look.”

Its not the first time E! Online has done something of the sort. They have used the “Bitch Stole My Look” theme for Rihanna, Leighton Meester, and Brandy vs Michelle Obama as well.

Both women were wearing Marc Jacobs dresses in the face-off where voters pick who wore it better.

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Company executives from Wal-Mart, Walgreens and Supervalu joined the First Lady at the White House for the announcement, which the White House and retailers estimate will create tens of thousands of jobs and serve more than nine million people.

Studies have shown that limited access to healthy foods, such as fresh fruits and vegetables, can lead to higher levels of obesity and diet-related diseases.

Read more at The Grio.

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Mrs. Obama, who is the spearhead of the Let’s Move! campaign, geared toward the end to childhood obesity and exercise awareness, has been criticized for ordering a fattening meal of a burger, fries, chocolate shake and diet coke.

The Huffington Post Reports:

Is the criticism warranted? To what degree should the Obamas be perfect role models of a healthy diet?Neil Barnard, M.D. president of the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine, wrote on The Huffington Post:

The First Lady’s signature anti-obesity campaign — Let’s Move — is no match for the administration’s ongoing purchases of sausage, cheese, burgers and other fatty foods that are sent to schools everyday. And the U.S. Department of Agriculture continues to bow to the interests of meat lobbyists and heavily subsidize the production of meat and other unhealthful foods.

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Instead, Mrs. Obama managed to inspire South Africans, through relating to their story of struggle and the telling of her own.

Rohit Kachroo, from The Grio, highlights the success of the first lady’s trip to South Africa and the impact it made.

An excerpt reads:

A key moment was her meeting with Nelson Mandela on Tuesday. From their short time together, a tender image emerged of him reading to his guest. She seemed attentive. Here was a woman from a powerful country which has a painful racial past, pictured with the father of South African’s racial struggle. It was poignant; the image resonated in both countries.

Read More At TheGrio.com

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A photo provided by the Nelson Mandela Foundation showed the 92-year-old Mandela sitting on a couch next to Mrs. Obama, pen in hand to sign an advance copy of his new book, “Nelson Mandela By Himself: The Authorized Quotations Book.” Mandela was wearing one of his trademark shirts, richly patterned and buttoned at the neck.

Mrs. Obama, daughters Malia, 12, and Sasha, 10, and her mother, Marian Robinson, were viewing some of Mandela’s personal papers at his foundation when he sent word that he wanted to meet them at his home in a leafy Johannesburg neighborhood. It was the first meeting between America’s first black first lady and the political prisoner who later became his country’s first black president

Mrs. Obama’s entourage spent about 20 minutes with Mandela and his wife, Graca Machel, who is a former first lady of Mozambique.

Mrs. Obama’s niece and nephew, Leslie Robinson, 15, and Avery Robinson, 19, who are traveling with her, were also invited to meet Mandela.

White House officials had no immediate comment on the meeting. No aides, except for photographers for the foundation and the White House, witnessed the meeting.

Mandela, who stepped down in 1999 after serving one term as president, is rarely seen in public anymore. At age 92, he is in fragile health and was briefly hospitalized in January with an acute respiratory infection. But he apparently felt well enough Tuesday to invite the Obama family to visit.

Mrs. Obama is traveling without President Barack Obama, who met Mandela on a previous visit to Africa when he was a U.S. senator. Obama and Mandela have spoken by telephone several times since Obama took office, most recently last June, the White House said. Obama also wrote a foreword for Mandela’s book, “Conversations with Myself.”

Mandela spent 27 years in prison for his role in the movement against apartheid, South Africa’s now-abolished system of racial separation.

Mrs. Obama began a weeklong goodwill visit to South Africa and Botswana on Monday.

Earlier Tuesday, the first lady met with Nompumelelo Ntuli-Zuma, a wife of South African President Jacob Zuma, who has three of them. She and her family were ending the day with a tour of the Apartheid Museum.

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WASHINGTON — She didn’t come from a wealthy or well-connected family. She came from the South Side of Chicago and is a descendant of slaves. But she says it’s a passion for an education that she and President Barack Obama shared and a willingness to work hard that helped them become successful.

It’s a message that young leaders in Africa soon will hear when Mrs. Obama makes her second solo trip abroad as first lady, visiting South Africa and Botswana this coming week.

“In so many ways, I see myself in you all. And I want you to see yourselves in me,” she recently told Washington high school students, hoping to inspire them with her personal story.

The weeklong visit, beginning with the first lady’s arrival Monday in Johannesburg, is intended to improve relations between the U.S. and Africa and promote youth engagement, education, health and wellness. In the centerpiece speech of the trip, she will appear Wednesday before a U.S.-sponsored forum of young women leaders from sub-Saharan Africa.

The president is not going, but Mrs. Obama will be joined by her daughters, Malia and Sasha, as well as her mother, Marian Robinson, and a niece and nephew, Leslie and Avery Robinson. Her family will join her on most outings, probably exposing her daughters to more of the media spotlight than they’re used to.

It was during her first solo trip outside the U.S., to Mexico in April 2010, that the first lady started an effort to encourage young people to become involved in their communities and countries and not shy away from trying to solve persistent global problems.

The youth population outside the U.S. is growing fast, with young people ages 15 to 24 making up 20 percent of the world’s population.

“The fact is is that responsibility for meeting the defining challenges of our time will soon fall to all of you,” Mrs. Obama told thousands of university students in Mexico City. “Soon, the world will be looking to your generation to make the discoveries and to build the industries that will fuel our prosperity and ensure our well-being for decades to come.”

That message is likely to resonate in a place such as South Africa, where two of three residents are younger than 30, said Jennifer Cooke, an Africa scholar at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a Washington think tank.

Botswana is a regular stop for U.S. officials. Well governed, it is considered one of Africa’s best functioning democracies, Cooke said.

Many of the stops on Mrs. Obama’s trip will highlight South Africa’s past under apartheid, the system of white-minority rule. She’ll also pay tribute to the legacy of Nelson Mandela, who spent 27 years in prison for his role in the anti-apartheid movement. He later became South Africa’s first elected black president.

The size of Mrs. Obama’s traveling party is sure to invite comparisons to her vacation last August in Spain with Sasha and friends. The five-day trip to Spain’s Costa del Sol stoked a bit of a firestorm about the wisdom of taking a glamorous trip with such economic hurt at home and raised speculation about who was paying the bill.

Attempting to head off similar criticism this time, the White House said Mrs. Obama is allowed to bring guests with her on the plane because she’s on official U.S. business, as the president is allowed on his official trips. All other costs regarding her family are to be paid for privately.

Mrs. Obama’s visit opens Tuesday in Pretoria, the South African capital, at a meeting with Nompumelelo Ntuli-Zuma, one of President Jacob Zuma’s three wives, at his official residence. Zuma was scheduled to be out of the country. Back in Johannesburg, Mrs. Obama meets with Mandela’s wife, Graca Machel, and tours the Nelson Mandela Foundation and the Apartheid Museum.

A meeting between America’s first black first lady and the 92-year-old former president is hoped for but remained in doubt, given his fragile health. Mandela had an acute respiratory infection in late January that led to a two-day hospital stay. He retired from public life after leaving office in 1999 after one term, but remains a larger-than-life figure in his country and around the world.

Mrs. Obama delivers her speech Wednesday at the Regina Mundi Church in the black township of Soweto, one of many churches that became hubs of activity for political gatherings after such meetings were banned during the anti-apartheid movement. She’ll also view a memorial honoring a 13-year-old boy shot and killed by government police during a June 1976 student uprising in Soweto.

In Cape Town on Thursday, Mrs. Obama and her family will ride a ferry to Robben Island for a moving visit to the closet-sized cell where Mandela spent 18 of his 27 years in prison.

She’ll highlight education by inviting disadvantaged students to spend the day immersed at the University of Cape Town, before meeting with groups that work to halt the spread of HIV/AIDS in South Africa, including by using soccer to teach children about the deadly disease. Between 5 million and 6 million South Africans live with HIV/AIDS.

Mrs. Obama also was scheduled to meet with Archbishop Desmond Tutu, a Nobel Peace Prize laureate and key figure in the struggle against apartheid and in later helping South Africa overcome its past.

She heads to Botswana on Friday to call on President Ian Khama in Gaborone, the capital, and drop in at a combination clinic and center for teenagers that teaches about leadership and HIV/AIDS.

With the official business concluded by Saturday, the first lady and her family will head off for private time, including a safari and an overnight stay in the animal park.

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The event was spearheaded by the national non-profit group KaBOOM!, which is dedicated to saving and creating play space within walking distance for every child, according to organizers.

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LOS ANGELES — Michelle Obama is going to be on one of Nickelodeon’s most popular shows.

The first lady is set to appear on an upcoming episode of the comedy “iCarly” to promote Joining Forces, an initiative aimed at increasing awareness and support for military families, network president Cyma Zarghami said Wednesday.

The show’s main character, Carly Shay (Miranda Cosgrove), is the daughter of a colonel serving overseas in the military. When Carly’s two best friends break some rules to set up a web chat so Carly can speak to her dad on his birthday, “the first lady discovers it and comes to have a chat with them in the most positive way possible,” Zarghami said.

Show creator and executive producer Dan Schneider wrote the episode just for Obama and her Joining Forces initiative.

“When she approached us, after he was done jumping for joy, Dan sat down and came up with a very, very clever idea,” Zarghami said.

The network president said she wasn’t concerned that featuring the First Lady and promoting the Joining Forces program would make a political statement for the show or Nickelodeon.

“It’s a feel-good initiative,” she said, “and regardless of your political affinity, everybody cares about these families, so it just feels right.”

Zarghami says Obama’s daughters are fans of the show. The Obama “iCarly” episode is likely to air in January.

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Michelle Obama invited a group of Native American children to her plot on Friday to help plant what are called the “three sisters” — corn, beans and squash. They also harvested vegetables that were planted two months ago, and some of that will be used on Tuesday.

Planting corn, beans and squash together apparently is good all around: the corn gives the beans something to grow on, the beans provide nitrogen for the soil and the squash blocks sunlight and prevents weeds.

Last week, Mrs. Obama focused her anti-obesity campaign on Native Americans. The White House says 1 in 3 Native American children are overweight or obese by age 5.

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The first lady will visit Johannesburg and Cape Town in South Africa and Gaborone, Botswana, during the June 21-26 trip.

Besides youth leadership, Mrs. Obama will also focus on education, health and wellness.

Officials said the visit will highlight the important stake the U.S. has in the success of Africa’s many nations, as well as the historic ties between Americans and people who live in Africa. President Barack Obama’s late father was Kenyan.

South Africa is a political leader and economic powerhouse in Africa, and an example of a successful democratic transition on the continent. Botswana has held free and fair democratic elections since gaining independence in 1966.

The trip will be the second one in which the first lady travels abroad without the president. She will be accompanied by her daughters, Malia and Sasha, and her mother, Marian Robinson.

Last year, Mrs. Obama visited Haiti after its devastating earthquake, and Mexico.

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My mother is the greatest woman that I know or know of, yet I wouldn’t describe her as “strong”.

I would describe her as clever, shrewd, and frequently outraged, intellectually curious and open to any and all possibilities.

She is kind and she is beautiful, quick with her wit, slick with her tongue, among the best in her field (database programming) and ready to be anything but wrong.

Nobody’s laughter is more sudden, startling, or contagious.

She raised me as a single parent and badmouthed my father almost as much as she gave him credit.

She was overprotective and underconcerned, confident that I’d make plenty of mistakes but sure that I’d pull through.

It took a lot to see her as a woman outside of being a mother—my mother—but I’m glad that I finally did and as such she was even more spectacular.

She’s fly as a teenager with her fashion, she also was—and is—always out there, out front, doing whatever it is that gets one noticed, but not because she wants to be noticed, just because out front is where you’ll find the best view of the action.

But I still wouldn’t describe her as “strong”.

She put me through college by herself and picked me up (and held me up) whenever I stumbled and fell.

And I can’t even say that she did this because it was the right thing to do or because she loved me. Not that I doubt that either one of those are true, but it’s just that in my mom’s case, she simply doesn’t know any other way to be.

So is that strength?

We hear so much about “Strong Black Women”—recently even newly crowned NBA MVP Derrick Rose described his mother as a “Strong Black Woman”—that it almost seems as if the words “Black woman” should also, by definition, have the word “strong” implied.

But “strength” is a masculine trait.

And as the psychological warfare continues that is now trying to explain to us that Black women are the ugliest women alive because they have more testosterone than other women, forgive me if I don’t feel comfortable using any terms even remotely manly when describing someone as lovely, tender and delicate as my mother.

Suffice it to say, I always believed that Nikki Giovanni wrote Ego Trippin’ with her in mind.

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