http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/0,1518,600405,00.html
"But on that evening, new words had appeared on the screen underneath his face: "President-elect Barack Obama." "Wow," Michelle said, "you are the elected 44th President of the United States. What a great country." And for once Barack Obama, sitting on that ugly plaid hotel couch, was speechless. Instead, he simply sat there in his white shirt and pink tie, staring at the screen in stunned silence. She extended her hand and embraced her husband for a moment, but only for just one, because it was already time to leave, to go outside and appear before the crowds. A short time later, as they stood on a stage in Chicago's Grant Park, looking out at 140,000 laughing and crying people, she whispered in his ear: "Well done. Great job." The knighting. The biggest possible compliment." "It is hard to avoid clichés when discussing these issues, but are clichés always wrong? It is true that many black men disappear after fathering their children, and that many wear their underwear higher than their jeans -- two things for which Obama has repeatedly criticized his fellow African-Americans. And when black women appear in the American media, says actress Whoopi Goldberg, "they have no teeth", and if they do "they cannot put a sentence together." There are black female authors who say that black American women still have the reputation of being helpless victims: sexually available, at the financial mercy of others, professionally worthless. But now there is Barack Obama standing on the stage in Chicago's Grant Park and, standing next to him, his wife Michelle, a woman who was not elected and yet has been cast in the role of a queen, a Mrs. America. She is clever and independent and funny, and she is neither surgically enhanced nor anorexic. "I can really make him mad," she says. "He does his best, but he's still a man." "She's more reasonable today," he says. "I know now," she says, "when the fight is worth it." Barack and Michelle Obama come across as a serious, adult couple. They look like people who respect each other, and not two people who, like others before them, present a picture-perfect life to the public while leading a double life in private. Instead, the Obamas are two individuals who trust each other --and, together, have embarked on a journey to change the United States." "If Obama has his way, America will become a different country, at the very least. It will be governed by people who keep their promises. It will be a country that overcomes the economic crisis in 2009 and then successfully tackles climate change. The United States wants fewer enemies and more partners in the future. In Obama's vision, the US will be as agile as China. Americans will be able to talk on the phone while traveling on trains, and no one will have to feel ashamed anymore when walking through the corridors of New York airports. Obama and his team intend to fashion the United States into a modern society." "We are not just seeing a new political star enter the limelight, but the new model couple of our era. And, like Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie or Kate Winslet and Sam Mendes in the world of movies, like Paul Auster and Siri Hustvedt or Nicole Krauss and Jonathan Safran Foer in the literary world, and Steffi Graf and Andre Agassi in sports, the Obamas are allowing us to witness their attempt to live in an equal partnership -- in the most public dollhouse on the planet, the White House." ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~| Adobe® ColdFusion® 8 software 8 is the most important and dramatic release to date Get the Free Trial http://ad.doubleclick.net/clk;207172674;29440083;f Archive: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-community/message.cfm/messageid:284373 Subscription: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-community/subscribe.cfm Unsubscribe: http://www.houseoffusion.com/cf_lists/unsubscribe.cfm?user=11502.10531.5
