Michelle Obama: Iron Woman [Barf Alert!]

The New Republic via CBS News ^ | 6/30/08 | Ed Kilgore

[melt]

In 1828, President John Quincy Adams's reelection campaign reportedly traded on innuendoes that Rachel Jackson had been imperfectly divorced from her first husband. Since her second husband, Andrew Jackson, once killed a man in a duel for the same insult to his wife's honor, Adams was perhaps lucky to lose no more than the presidency to Old Hickory.

So, while there are abundant signs that Republicans this year are itching to take the practice to new lows, let's not forget that attacks on first ladies, actual or putative, go back a long way. And for all of the fear in Democratic circles about the damage these attacks could do to the Obama campaign, there are equally abundant signs that the Republicans have chosen the wrong spouse to trash and bash. Indeed, the proposed demonization of Michelle Obama as some sort of radical, honky-hating Shadow (racial implication intended) Behind the Throne could well backfire.

Despite the long pedigree of presidential spouse-bashing, it didn't really become a regular feature of politics until quite recently. After Rachel Jackson, the first first lady to be thoroughly excoriated was Woodrow Wilson's second wife, Edith, who allegedly ran the country for a while after her husband's 1919 stroke (just prior to the ratification of the Nineteenth Amendment giving women the right to vote).

Then came Eleanor Roosevelt, whose many detractors created the current pattern of going after the spouse as a collateral attack on the president. Roosevelt, an outspoken (for her time) supporter of racial justice, was a particular target of southern white Democrats who didn't want to criticize the wildly popular FDR.

[DocH]

Iron Woman?

How about un-American, afro-centric BITCH.

[Brad’s Gramma]

[rodguy911]

Ditto that for me, this woman is the original meaning of the word Bitch!!

[AZLiberty]

They had to put the spit and polish on Michelle, turning her from the America/ whitey hating foul mouthed banshee that she is into a prim and proper polished all American apple pie baking mom.

Not apple pie, shortbread cookies.