I know nothing about Michelle Obama and have no interest in finding out because I’m not into gossip and tabloid stuff. But I just caught a glimpse of her on TV saying that she will not run for president because. . . she has two young children. Not because she has zero experience in politics and is woefully unqualified even to think about holding such a responsible position in a field that is alien to her – which is the real reason. No, instead, she mentions children, which is something that never prevented anybody from running for president or any other political office.
Not only did Michelle Obama squander a great opportunity to remind voters that people who never held political office should not be running for president, but she also reinforced a deeply barbaric stereotype about mothers. Of course, not everybody is good at public speaking, but you’ve got to try really hard to mess up this badly.
Clarissa's Blog 
I thought the comment was weird too. The girls are something like 18 and 16. It’s not like they are young girls who need a high level of parental involvement. At this point, they are getting ready for independence and will be both be going to college and moving on with their lives.
Michelle Obama actually had a high-powered career before Barack Obama’s presidential campaign and she did work for Chicago city government (assistant to the mayor) at one point. So a political career wouldn’t be out of the question for her. But she’s not interested–which is fine. I’m not sure why she just didn’t say that. No need to mention “motherhood” as a reason for not being interested.
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I agree, it would be very easy simply to say, “I’m not considering a career in politics at this moment.”
I felt she was trying to make a dig at Hillary with this comment. It sounded as if she were saying, “I, unlike some other people, will not be trying to convert this role into a presidential bid.” It sounded like a joke at Hillary’s expense.
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“It sounded like a joke at Hillary’s expense.”
I didn’t think of it in this way. But I would be surprised if that were the case. Barack Obama is clearly maneuvering to support Hillary. I think once the nomination is decided, he’s going to really throw his support behind her. I’d be surprised if Michelle is trying to undermine that–especially given the brutal Republican field.
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Not because she has zero experience in politics and is woefully unqualified even to think about holding such a responsible position in a field that is alien to her – which is the real reason
You don’t really know that’s her “real” reason. By that standard, look at all of the ludicrously unqualified people who are running or who have run for President this year! No serious public figures are saying or implying Trump or Carson or Fiorina shouldn’t have run because they have zero political experience.
But it does say something about the public that this is the most acceptable answer that evinces the least amount of scrutiny.
Who knows? Maybe she is thinking about her children. It’s hard to be your own person as a young adult when everyone keeps shoving your parents in your face and everything you do becomes a reflection on them. Maybe after eight years and a front row seat to Barack Obama’s stress (the man aged twice as fast), she wants no part of the shellacking and word measuring which is part of being a woman and running for President, let alone being President. On top of that she’s black. Think of how the country lost its mind and how it’s reacting now, and ask yourself how many women would sign up for that.
She had a career before and she made most of the money in the family until Obama became President.
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“this is the most acceptable answer that evinces the least amount of scrutiny”
Not here! But point taken. It’s a Miss America answer, say something vaguely reassuring that has no real meaning but will make people stop asking you.
Had she answered as Clarissa wanted, she would also be drawing fire on a current presidential candidate and she probably has enough party loyalty to not want to say: Being first lady is no qualification!
My assumption is that she’s had a snootful of both politics and being first lady (a suffocating ridiculous role) and is counting the seconds until she can leave the Whitehouse behind and find something more interesting to do.
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Being somebody’s wife or husband is, indeed, no qualification to do that person’s job. Hillary’s qualifications are being a senator and a secretary of state but definitely not being married to Bill.
And yes, Michelle definitely looked like a pageant participant with that response.
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“Hillary’s qualifications are …. definitely not being married to Bill.”
You and I know that, but everything I know about the American media tells me that if she said first lady is not a qualification to be president then everything Clinton’s done besides be first lady would be ignored in a big stupidfest that would probably be played as “Michelle disses Hillary” and create a firestorm of idiocy so great it could disrupt the gravitational fields….
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Yes. Very true. There is a lot of dumbness in the world.
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I believe that it’s an absolute disgrace that people with zero knowledge and experience are running for high political office. It’s ridiculous that we’ve had to listen to the likes of Carson and Trump go on at length about things they don’t even begin to comprehend. And I’m disappointed with Michelle because she contributes to this culture of not taking the office seriously.
Unless we all start taking the profession of politics seriously, we will keep running the risk of ending up with some version of a Carson or a Fiorina as president. We all need to contribute to changing the public discourse around this.
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Michelle is a Princeton grad with a law degree from Harvard. She has both the connections and money to do pretty much anything she wants. This is a pat response she’s been using for years. It’s also possible that she has seen what the office has done to her husband physically and doesn’t want it.
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This is precisely the mentality that brought us Trump. He’s got money and connections, and doesn’t consider himself unqualified in spite of having zero experience. But at least his money and connections are his own and not Melania’s. Melania at least isn’t inflicting her reasons not to run for office on us.
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His own?
HA.
So why is his money and his career his own if he owes ALL of his start to his father (let’s be real, four failed businesses/restructuring doesn’t make for stupidly rich unless you start out that way, and for most business people any kind of bankruptcy is like a large scale earth quake) but plenty of people think Clinton is nothing without her husband? What is it about “daddy” that makes it acceptable but “husband” that doesn’t for many people, especially if the recipient of one is male and the other is female?
Let’s interrogate the sexism in nepotism! :-p
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I hate nobody more than people who inherit. 🙂 But Trump didn’t inherit yesterday. It’s been a very long time and he did an enormous lot with that money. In the same way, Hillary today is not the Hillary of 1999. Back then she was not qualified to do anything in politics but today she is a person with a decade and a half of solid experience. It’s not a whole lot but it’s something.
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Elizabeth Warren @ elizabethforma 28m28 minutes ago
Listen to experts who say @ realDonaldTrump might have more money today if he’d put his inheritance in an index fund & left it alone.
See how @ realDonaldTrump kept his father’s empire afloat using strategic corporate bankruptcies to skip out on debt.
Let’s be honest – @ realDonaldTrump is a loser. Count all his failed businesses. See how he cheated people w/ scams like Trump U.
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These are valid points. But there are more people who think that because of how she started, everything she did since then counts for nothing then people who think that of Trump. Why? Is it just sexism?
It’s like how “affirmative action” beneficiaries get to hear about it forever, but nobody says anything about “legacies”.
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\ I believe that it’s an absolute disgrace that people with zero knowledge and experience are running for high political office.
One good thing in Israeli politics is that our “prime minister is usually the leader of the largest party in the governing coalition,” which usually tends to come with some experience.
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In some countries including the United States, the policy of “widow’s succession” has sometimes been used to fill the seat of a deceased legislator. The senator or congressman dies in office, and then the surviving spouse (in practice always the wife) serves out the remainder of the dead legislator’s term, with the possibility of running for election at the end of the term. (Depending on a specific state’s rules, the spouse may be appointed by the governor, or may be nominated to run in a special election.)
In most “widow’s succession” situations, the spouse has no special experience or qualifications for the position that her husband held, and usually (but not always) merely serves as a “placeholder” until the next regular election.
There have been exceptions. When Congressman Sonny Bono died in a skiing accident in 1998, his widow Mary Bono won the special election to fill the vacancy, and then was repeatedly re-elected to serve in the House until 2012.
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I interpreted what Michelle Obama said as, “I have seen what being the children of a (black) President has been like for my two kids over the past eight years. Eight years is enough.”
She probably also doesn’t want to be President, mind you. But not wanting to put your kids through another eight years of being called every evil racist misogynistic name in America’s lexicon, not to mention forcing them to have to live every moment of their lives as perfect angels, lest the Right-Wing Press descend on them… well, as a parent, I agree with her. Eight years is enough to ask of any two kids.
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