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Valued commentor LAMH36 emailed me this link, because she thought it should not be missed. She was, of course, correct.
This post is in: Absent Friends, Women's Rights Are Human Rights, Stuff About Black People Written By a Black Person
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Valued commentor LAMH36 emailed me this link, because she thought it should not be missed. She was, of course, correct.
Comments are closed.
rikyrah
The First Lady was wonderful and powerful in this tribute. It came from her core.
Unabogie
I really do love this woman. That such a gracious and sweet woman can be so hated by the right is the clearest symptom of their mental illness.
Mr Stagger Lee
I am honored to live in the era of First Lady Michelle Obama.
Violet
Love Michelle Obama. Such a great First Lady. Just as I wonder what President Obama’s next chapter will be, I also wonder what her next chapter will be. She won’t be Mom-in-Chief forever and she’s such an amazing woman. Wonder what she’ll choose to do next.
SiubhanDuinne
@Violet:
I love her too, and if she does anything remotely public-service connected, I will give all I can in terms of money and time to help her get elected or further her plans, whatever they are.
The person I would actually like to know more about is Marian Robinson, Michelle’s mother. AFAIK she is still First Grandma, living in the White House and looking after the girls when their parents are otherwise engaged. I guess it has been a deliberate decision to keep her out of the spotlight, but I have to think she is a remarkable woman, and I’d really like to know more about her contributions to the Obama Family.
Here’s to you, Mrs. Robinson.
schrodinger's cat
Caturday thread needs kitteh!
Steeplejack
@SiubhanDuinne:
Off topic, but this is the first I’ve seen of you since I found your sheet music.
Thlayli
That Senate seat Barack won in 2004? It’s got an election in 2016.
Just saying….
Bex
@SiubhanDuinne: Try “American Tapestry” by Rachel L. Swarns for the story of Michelle Obama’s family history.
Comrade Scrutinizer
@Thlayli: Because we don’t have enough family dynasties in politics now.
Ash Can
I always liked Jackie Kennedy — our last truly glamorous First Lady — because she always seemed to be able to juggle and handle motherhood, style, class, humanity, and the nation’s expectations of her. Now, along comes Michelle Obama — everything that Jackie was, PLUS being brilliant enough to lead any nation on Earth by herself.
AND — here’s the really important part — doing it all while being fucking vilified by way, way more white Americans than my naive pasty white ass thought back in 2008 would vilify her.
Jackie was elegant, Eleanor Roosevelt was a powerhouse, Abigail Adams was a smart cookie, and Hillary Clinton can do anything. But all things considered, Michelle Obama might just be our greatest First Lady ever.
bmoak
@SiubhanDuinne:
I would leave the Mother-In-Law-in-Chief (MILIC?) alone. Putting her in the spotlight would just unleash the feces-flinging howler monkeys and give them a shiny new bone to gnaw on.
SiubhanDuinne
@Steeplejack:
You are SO AWESOME!! That’s it! Honestly, I’ve been searching for ages (not constantly, of course) and I have never found it. You are amazing, and if you were a few hundred miles closer and I were a few decades younger, I’d probably propose.
Thank you so much, I can’t believe it!!
gene108
@Thlayli:
I’d love it!
He’d just torment the crap out of McCain and all the other Senators, who think they could be President.
gene108
@Comrade Scrutinizer:
Obama continuing to hold elected office is not a dynasty. If his wife, sister, or daughters, when they are old enough, choose to run for office based on his name recognition, you have the makings of a political dynasty.
Otherwise it is one person continuing to hold elected office.
Steeplejack
@SiubhanDuinne:
Heh, happy to help. When you do your East Coast grand tour I’ll make you buy me a drink.
Greg
I was so moved by this. I just do not understand why the right hates her so much. They are just vile towards her. You know, I despised George Bush. But I never said an unkind word about Laura Bush. She was a lovely intelligent woman. I just always felt sorry for her because I always thought she would have been happier just being a teacher or a librarian in her small home town. But she did good works and she was also a great First Lady. So why, WHY, does the friggin right wing have to say such horrible things about Michelle Obama? It is truly psychotic.
rikyrah
@Greg:
I was so moved by this. I just do not understand why the right hates her so much
To go to the depth of why they hate her, I have to go back years, to something I saw another on another blog.
This is from 2007, and I’ve never forgotten it:
http://skepticalbrotha.wordpress.com/2007/05/22/michelle-obama-the-good-morning-america-interview/
I believe that there are many people who are simply uncomfortable with Michelle Obama, because she seems to be as comfortable in her skin as Barack Obama is in his. If Michelle had some downtrodden story, the ‘acceptable’ story for Black folk, then possibly they could handle it. But, Mrs. Obama grew up in a loving, two-parent home. Her parents instilled in her and her brother the sense that they just had to apply themselves, and they could achieve and succeed, and that she did, first at Princeton, then Harvard Law.
Michelle Obama is a pretty, slim, well educated smart woman, who went after her own career, all the while marrying, producing children, and doing it well – from the outside. Why wouldn’t she be intimidating? Michelle Obama is an actual real life Clair Huxtable – Lawyer wife, high powered job, kids, home -without the help of a nanny. Doing the Black middle-class ‘Strivers’ juggle.
Genine
This was so beautiful and moving. Thanks for sharing this!
SiubhanDuinne
@bmoak:
Please don’t misunderstand (I probably phrased it badly) — I don’t want to put Mrs. Robinson under a spotlight, especially an unwelcome one. I just think she herself must be a pretty extraordinary woman to have raised Michelle and assisted significantly in raising Malia and Sasha. I will most certainly read American Tapestry as Bex recommended.
SiubhanDuinne
@Steeplejack:
Name your tipple. It will be my pleasure.
satby
@rikyrah: I think that nails it!
Elie
Amazing eulogy — filled with feeling and love —
I read a larger part of Psalm 139 at my mother’s memorial service a month ago — it is an amazing Psalm filled with the mystery of our being, our doubts and fears and how God knows and loves us from before we were even made. Here is the segment we used:
Psalm 139 — verses7 – 18
Where can I go from your spirit?
Or where can I flee from your presence?
If I ascend to heaven, you are there;
if I make my bed in Sheol, you are there.
If I take the wings of the morning
and settle at the farthest limits of the sea,
even there your hand shall lead me,
and your right hand shall hold me fast.
If I say, “Surely the darkness shall cover me,
and the light around me become night,”
even the darkness is not dark to you;
the night is as bright as the day,
for darkness is as light to you.
For it was you who formed my inward parts;
you knit me together in my mother’s womb.
I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made.
Wonderful are your works;
that I know very well.
My frame was not hidden from you,
when I was being made in secret,
intricately woven in the depths of the earth.
Your eyes beheld my unformed substance.
In your book were written
all the days that were formed for me,
when none of them as yet existed.
How weighty to me are your thoughts, O God!
How vast is the sum of them!
I try to count them â they are more than the sand;
I come to the end â I am still with you.