by Mark Silva and updated
The White House has made it clear that it did not approve of posters asking the question: "President Obama's daughters get healthy school lunches. Why don't I?"
But the posters stay.
Has the White House Counsel's Office indeed asked a nonprofit organization to take down the posters, which appeared in the Union Station train depot in Washington last week in a bid to convince Congress to offer schoolchildren healthier lunches? (See the ad here: nutrition ad.pdf)
"Without getting into the specifics, we've been very clear, I think, from even before the administration started, that their two girls would have a very private life, and we want to protect that private life and their privacy,'' White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs said today. "And we hope that others will be respectful, as many in the media have been, about not using the girls as a publicity stunt.''
Soon after the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine placed its posters with the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority, in a $20,000 campaign on nutrition policy, White House lawyers asked the group to pull the ads featuring 8-year-old Jasmine Messiah, a Florida resident who says her school offers no vegetarian or vegan lunches.
PCRM President Neal Barnard, a physician and nutrition researcher, received a phone call about the posters from the counsel's office. He made a call of his own, to a First Amendment lawyer, and has asked the White House to reconsider its objections.
"We're definitely keeping them up,'' Barnard told Tribune's Washington Bureau today. "First of all, the president and the first family have no objection to these ads, from what we have seen. I am quite sure that the president would say, 'That girl deserves a healthy meal, just like any other child in America.'
"The president is surrounded by people who are there to protect him.... And sometimes they are overzealous,'' Barnard said. "People are trying to exploit the first family, but our ad is perfectly appropriate. What it does is talks about an important issue.''
The White House counsel's office, when it called last week, ''said, 'Take take the ads down.' They effectively implied that we would be in for legal action if we did not,'' Barnard said. "I called one of the First Amendment attorneys here in Washington who said, "No. 1, they don't have a leg to stand on.... That would effectively constitute censorship.'''
Barnard called the White House back and said, the ads stay.
The group has placed 14 of the ads around Union Station, where congressional staffers coming to work will see them. The group is attempting to convince Congress to consider vegetarian options in the Child Nutrition Act under review this fall. The majority of schools in the National School Lunch Program do not offer vegetarian or vegan options, despite American Medical Association support for those options, according to Barnard.
The president's daughters attend a private school in Washington.
The posters don't mention the president's children by name - nor do they portray their images, the way that the "Sweet Sasha" and "Marvelous Malia'' dolls made by Ty Inc. pictured above. The White House objected to them, and the toymaker stopped using the daughters' names. (Ty moved on to Bo, the Beanie Baby.)
Comments
The Repug mouth-breathers don't care who they hurt when a Dem is in the White House, just ask Chelsea Clinton.
http://www.perrspectives.com/blog/archives/000930.htm
If the Wingnutters don't get their act together soon they won't have a political party anymore.
http://theplumline.whorunsgov.com/political-media/the-incredible-shrinking-gop-only-one-in-five-self-identify-as-republican/
Posted by: buhdydharma | August 11, 2009 3:24 PM
It's just too bad that the Obamas don't have the class to use their children to score cheap political points like Sarah Palin. Palin knows that the proper use of a politician's children is as props to back up outrageous lies and slander.
Posted by: Rightwinger | August 11, 2009 3:39 PM
Are you kidding, Mr. President !! They've sold theirs and the mother's soul for a buck. That's that wonderful creep, known as Capitalism. Also, goes by the name of Corporations. It will take your healthcare premiums and still end up taking your life, by denying you proper medical attention. It is a shame they don't honor the parents wishes and yet they lie and say they are all for " family values". What cold, stone liars !!
SUPPORT OUR TROOPS, BRING THEM HOME, ALIVE AND WHOLE. NOW.
Posted by: Don Fitzgerald, IL | August 11, 2009 4:15 PM
Ahhh, "rightwinger," the Obimbos never used their daughters to score cheap points? Please! What were they doing being interviewed on Access Hollywood last summer? Why do they get trotted out at vacation time? Why do they get trotted out when let's showcase the new dog? Those two daughters have been used like the Olson Twins by Mom and Pops Obama.
But anyway, while Obimbo stopped an educational voucher program in DC, one that helped lower-income blacks and was supported by blacks, his daughters go to private school. And while Obimbo said he would seek the best medical care available for his daughters, he wants to limit medical care for everyone else?
Hypocrite, elitist, liar: three words of many that best describe our president.
Posted by: John D | August 11, 2009 4:42 PM
Hypocrite, elitist, liar: three words of many that best describe our president.
Posted by: John D | August 11, 2009 4:42 PM
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Aren't you supposed to be out terrorizing a Dem healthcare townhall meeting for your Corporate Sponsored Insurance overlords today, Lil' Johnny ManChild?
Posted by: janet | August 11, 2009 5:58 PM
I am a moderate Republican, but I am offended that an organization anywhere on the political spectrum would try to make a political point using the President's children. The First Lady is fair game to the extent that she makes public comments, but pre-teen children are absolutely off limits. [I also admired the Clintons for how they handled coverage of Chelsea when she was in high school, and wish that the Carters had done the same with Amy - sadly Jimmy kept on inserting Amy into political dialogue.]
Posted by: Nick | August 11, 2009 6:00 PM
BO's daughters' lunches are just another difference in the quality between something that is privately run as compared to something that is gov't run.
Posted by: Terry | August 11, 2009 7:25 PM
Hey Fitzgerald, do you ever take a bathroom break? You either have no life away from the computer or the libs are paying you by the word. Good grief man, take a break!
Posted by: vla | August 11, 2009 7:27 PM
Unless they are using the first daughters' image in an ad there's nothing wrong with it. The point isn't about them. It's about elitism and hypocrisy in general.
Posted by: PatrickP | August 11, 2009 7:45 PM
Hey Fitzgerald, do you ever take a bathroom break? You either have no life away from the computer or the libs are paying you by the word. Good grief man, take a break!
Posted by: vla | August 11, 2009 7:27 PM
Fitzgerald is great although I don't agree with him all the time, need more like him on the blog.
Posted by: Inky | August 11, 2009 8:03 PM
BO's daughters' lunches are just another difference in the quality between something that is privately run as compared to something that is
Posted by: Terry | August 11, 2009 7:25 PM
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What do you care, Terri?
You were Wingnut home-schooled, you spent your chidhood "learning" that Jesus rode a dinosaur and being told that the Earth is only 3000 years old.
Posted by: anti terry | August 11, 2009 8:09 PM
Hey Fitzgerald, do you ever take a bathroom break? You either have no life away from the computer or the libs are paying you by the word. Good grief man, take a break!
Posted by: vla | August 11, 2009 7:27 PM
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What do ya know! Another goon Repug who want's to shut down democracy through thuggery.
Keep the great posts coming, Don Fitzgerald, I love them
Posted by: former Republican | August 11, 2009 8:16 PM
Repugs aren't big on Elitism aka INTELLIGENCE.
Just ask them, I mean they gave us eight years of a dry drunk village idiot presidency (Bush Jr) because they all thought it would be cool to elect a guy president because they could see themselves having a beer with him.
Posted by: Lester | August 11, 2009 8:40 PM
My recollection is that the President's daughters appeared on only a handful of occasions during the campaign.
Which was probably the most covered and contentious campaign since maybe 1960.
On election night of course.
When he took them for the first day of school.
And some sappy interview.
That was about it.
O, and he went out for a walk when he was back in Hyde Park with one of them and had to turn around and tell the press to back off.
That's hardly "exploiting kids for political gain."
The Bush twins, now, that's something else.
They were old enough to know better but had to pull the "girls gone wild" routine, boozing and all.
Actually the press sort of soft pedaled their shennanigans.
They really were the worst behaved White House kids in modern memory.
Posted by: ornery | August 11, 2009 9:31 PM
Anti,
Just Catholic schooled. That's why I was able to get college scholarships, get a good college education, a masters degree, and be able to provide for self instead of living in my parent's basement.
Posted by: Terry | August 11, 2009 9:52 PM
That's why I was able to get college scholarships, get a good college education, a masters degree, and be able to provide for self instead of living in my parent's basement.
Posted by: Terry | August 11, 2009 9:52 PM
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Terri,
If there was an institution of higher learning that actually gave a know-nothing buffoon dittohead like you a degree then you should get your money back because they ripped you off.
Posted by: anti terry | August 11, 2009 10:34 PM
Dumb Dumb Janet, I don't terrorize townhall meetings and I am not corporate sponsored. If Little Dickie Durbin was brave enough to hold one, I would attend it and let him know what I think. Get it, DD Janet, what I think, not some corporate-sponsored attender.
Dumb Dumb, most of those attending are there on their own, not because they were sent their by Blue Cross Blue Shield.
Posted by: John D | August 12, 2009 12:36 AM
Has the White House Counsel's Office indeed asked a nonprofit organization to take down the posters, which appeared in the Union Station train depot in Washington last week in a bid to convince Congress to offer schoolchildren healthier lunches? (See the ad here: nutrition ad.pdf) ~ M.S.
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Now that we have reached the standard name-callin’ point in the continuum, could it still be possible for Team Obama to note who placed the posters. I would agree totally that you don’t attack a political somebody’s kids. Well, not something that I would deign to do, anyway. That, of course, never stops the Sarah Palin Hate-ers, but please note, if you possibly can, that this was not the work of the RNC, the Tea Baggers, or even the NRA.
This is one of those organizations that would surely be aligned with the left wingers of the party represented by a donkey of nobility. These folks want stuff. In this case, they want a free stuff upgrade for which they are not looking to pay anyone anything. Sure, it illustrates Elitism and hypocrisy among the democrats czars class, but this is not a Republican inspired effort. democrats, one of yours, got loose. Y’all need Jesus almost as much as you need Django.
Posted by: Django - N Exile In/Around the 30th Parallel | August 12, 2009 6:54 PM
Anti,
The rate of return on my education is very good. I don't need the gov;t to provide my daily needs and I don't live in my mom and dads basement .
Posted by: Terry | August 12, 2009 7:25 PM