Children pressed First Lady Michelle Obama with questions during an event to welcome children of Executive Office employees at the White House's annual take our daughters and sons to work day. First Dog Bo did a lot of barking, too. (Photo by Evan Vucci / AP)
by Mark Silva
Does First Lady Michelle Obama like living in the White House?
One of the children of staffers who brought their children to work today, on bring the children to work day, wanted to know.
"Yes, it's fun living in the White House,'' she said.
At which point, the first dog barked.
"Bo likes it, too.,'' the first lady said. "Bo likes living in the White House, too.''
How does it feel being the First Lady?
"I think it feels like being me, you know? You don't change as a person just because you have a different job, you know? ''
What are you doing for Earth Day?
"I think we're having a reception this evening,'' she replied. "Sometimes it's hard for me to keep up with all the things that we're doing. There's a reception here this evening for Earth Day. And Sasha brought home some energy-efficient bulbs that we have to put in the house. So we're going to do some bulb replacement. ''
Do you miss Chicago?
"Yeah, there are some things that I miss about Chicago,'' she said. "But I think the things that I miss about Chicago are the things that I would miss anywhere.
"And one of the things that the president and I can't do is sort of just walk down the street by ourselves, you know? We can't just leave the house and walk by ourselves because we always have security and we have to make sure that we got a lot of people with us. And I think that the thing I miss in Chicago is like being able to walk out of my house and go down on the lake and ride my bike -- but I can't do that here, either.''
As many questions as she faced in this session, she was interrupted often by the barking Bo, the Portuguese water dog who was a gift to the Obamas from the late Sen. Edward M. Kennedy of Massachusetts -- a pooch who has celebrated his first year at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue and will turn two in October.
"I'll let him get his energy out with you guys,'' the first lady said of the first dog, leading to some play time. "All right, he's in play mode. So we're going to -- I'm going to take him out, and then we're going to -- I'm going to let him come back in.''
The water dog, a breed known for helping sailors at sea, didn't take to the water immediately, she noted. "At first he didn't always want to swim -- we had to teach him how to swim -- but now he loves the water and he gets in the water any chance he can get. ''
What's the first lady's favorite room?
"My favorite room is actually the Blue Room,'' she said. "It's oval. It's the oval shape. And when you walk down this hallway, it's in the center, and it's -- there are only three rooms in the residence that have an oval shape. And one is in the bottom. It's called the Diplomatic Room, and it's one of the rooms you come into. And then the second one, which is the Blue Room, and then there's a room upstairs in our house that's called the Yellow Oval Room.
" And all of them look out onto the South Lawn, and you can see the fountain, and you can see the Washington Monument, and you can see so much of Washington. And it's still a cozy-feeling room. So when we have a lot of guests over, it's really nice to be able to have them see the view. ''
How often does she go to the Oval Office?
"Not as often as you think,'' she said. "I can't think of the last time I was over there. No -- because that's work to me. So that's my husband's job.''
Is there anything she doesn't like?
"I think it's just responsibility,'' she said. "Sometimes you just don't want any. You want to do what you want to do all the time. And I don't think grown-ups are any different. Right, parents in the room? We're not different. We want to be hanging out, too. But a lot of the things that I have to do are a lot of fun. Like, this is something that I love to do. And it's -- and is this something that I have to do? I think so.''
(Photo of First Lady Michelle Obama and the family dog Bo above during an event to welcome children of Executive Office employees at the White House's annual take our daughters and sons to work day by Evan Vucci / AP)





Comments
& HHH says cue the right wing hate machine..DING DONG.
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No HHH, nobody hates Bo.
Dogs are man's best freind
just like taxes & spending are Democrats best freind.
I think Michelle is lying about her favorite room in the WH, unless the bathroom is a Blue Room also.
Posted by: wingnut master | April 22, 2010 2:29 PM
Meanwhile, in real Michelle Obama news (not the fluff above), the Tribune, the newspaper that sponsors The Swamp, reported yesterday that Muntu, a Chicago theater group that has Michelle Obama and other clout-heavy IL Democrats on its Board, received $6 million in tax money for a theater that has never been built and likely never will be built. See http://articles.chicagotribune.com/2010-04-21/news/ct-x-c-muntu-dance-loan-20100421_1_arts-center-grants-monica-haslip for the sad details (though the Trib article hides the Obama/Dem ties to Muntu).
Posted by: Bruce | April 22, 2010 2:41 PM
Party Gal Bruce,
Thanks for bring Muntu to our attention. Seems like a great group with a great mission, contrary to the sleaze you're attempting to throw at it:
http://www.muntu.com/about_muntu/muntu_people.html
Posted by: Kenny Bunkport | April 22, 2010 4:02 PM
Harry Truman said the White House was like a prison. Nice furnishings, but a prison.
Too bad the President has to be limited in freedom to enjoy children while they're growing up.
But that's one of the drawbacks of being one of the youngest elected Presidents.
Posted by: ornery | April 22, 2010 5:19 PM
MIchelle Obama has become the new Princess Di. She is known and loved around the world. She is trusted. She is fabulous. .......
http://thefiresidepost.com/2009/04/03/michelle-obama-the-new-princess-di/
Posted by: Ohg Rea Tone | April 22, 2010 6:25 PM
I'll bet Bo is proud of his country.
Posted by: Terry | April 22, 2010 8:03 PM
She will be regarded as one of the great First Ladies, like Eleanor R. and Jackie K., Martha W. and Dolly M.
I have a notion that dog is presenting a bit of a challenge, notwithstanding.
If you haven't grown up with/trained a big dog before, it can be somewhat intimidating.......
Posted by: ornery | April 22, 2010 10:07 PM
There's a reception here this evening for Earth Day. And Sasha brought home some energy-efficient bulbs that we have to put in the house. So we're going to do some bulb replacement. '' ~ Michelle Obama
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Well, there you have it Amerika. Liberals ~ Saving the World, as promised, with their energy efficient bulbs, one gala reception at a time.
Posted by: Django - N Exile In/Around the 30th Parallel | April 23, 2010 1:10 AM
Too bad the President has to be limited in freedom to enjoy children while they're growing up.
But that's one of the drawbacks of being one of the youngest elected Presidents.
Posted by: ornery | April 22, 2010 5:19 PM
Please, I can't stand it. It's so sad. Set him free. Tragedy on tragedy. Poor, poor BO and MO forced to live a life of luxury while the rest of have to work for a living. Raising taxes at their whim, oh it's too much Ashley. I think I'm going to faint.
Posted by: Free To Watch Liberals Tax and Spend | April 23, 2010 3:37 AM
I love these small-minded, girls and boys of the Republican-Libertarian-T.Baggers, they even have to attack our President's wife, some more silly points brought to us by their ventriloquists !! I am ecstatic when they reveal their pettiness and their vitriolic partisanship, it just enhances their prospects for gaining the majority, again !! Keep it up, boys and girls, maybe we will see you back in our White House, when you really grow up !! By then though, you may come to your own, adult conclusions and realize that the Republican-Libertarian-T.Baggers' agenda is unhealthy for America and that the Democrat's agenda, not only makes more sense, it really does foster a great America, with liberty and justice for all !! Try it, you might like it !!
SUPPORT OUR TROOPS, BRING THEM HOME, ALIVE AND WHOLE. NOW.
Posted by: Don Fitzgerald, IL | April 23, 2010 9:18 AM
Don,
Pettiness.... you mean the comments your posting aren't. Maybe you should grow up as well.
Posted by: Lisa C | April 23, 2010 10:09 AM
Please, I can't stand it. It's so sad. Set him free. Tragedy on tragedy. Poor, poor BO and MO forced to live a life of luxury while the rest of have to work for a living. Raising taxes at their whim, oh it's too much Ashley. I think I'm going to faint.
Posted by: Free To Watch Liberals Tax and Spend | April 23, 2010 3:37 AM
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Yeah, it is quite sad. And, he is concerned about the “limits” on his freedom. I seem to have that concern too. Every damn day.
Posted by: Django - N Exile In/Around the 30th Parallel | April 23, 2010 10:11 AM
I think it's wonderful we have a woman who hates the people and the country she represents so much. I don't recall Princess Di ever being like that or Jackie K for that matter, seems weird how the media dares to compare them. But with the media bias I can actually see their warped minds trying to. One thing I can say Diana and Jackie were beautiful women, not a bull dog like Mrs. Obama. The dog looks better then her. No matter what the Obama's do, they will never be like the Kennedy's. Funny when his polls started to slump all of a sudden Mrs. Obama came up out of the woodwork with all these causes. Seems I remember her saying in a speech once she was only gonna be there for her hubby and stay out of the business of the country, but guess she lies like her hubby. It's sad to see those hat support her using comments made a year ago. Wipe your noses guys that a$$ kissing got it brown.
Posted by: Democrat no longer | April 23, 2010 10:30 AM
Posted by: Django - N Exile In/Around the 30th Parallel | April 23, 2010 10:11 AM
*
*
Why don't you provide an itemized list of all of the "limits" that President Obama has placed on you - above and beyond any "limits" that were set by President Bush and continued under Obama, such as illegal and unathorized wiretapping?
Posted by: BC | April 23, 2010 1:41 PM
Dj, you aren't, are you? Incarcerated, I mean?
That was just a figure of speech, right?
Posted by: ornery | April 23, 2010 1:50 PM
Bruce, I think they have "ties" to the Chicago Symphony Orchestra.
Would you object to a grant to the CSO?
Posted by: ornery | April 23, 2010 1:58 PM
Free to Watch Liberals---My federal income tax went down thanks to Obama and the Democrats. Are you sure that you didn't fill out your income tax form wrong????
Posted by: JazzQuipster | April 23, 2010 3:25 PM
Hey Ornery,
“Letters from a Harris County Jail”. No, nothing like that, at this time. I doubt that the Jail-Keep would have guitars on the check-in OK list.
When you limit or take away economic opportunity, you are, in effect, limiting freedom over the long run. Mustapha’s anti-hydrocarbon based energy policies HAVE affected me very directly and very negatively. Math World is a 55% pay cut, for me, over Engineering World. Fortunately, I do have somewhere to go. Many engineers do not.
The Houston Chronicle is a VERY liberal newspaper which has nothing but deep, affectionate love for this guy, Mustapha Mond. I guarantee you that the Houston Chronicle is not Fox News. In the Business Section, there are, amazingly, articles several days a week, that scratch the surface with respect to how the policies of Mustapha Mond are absolute job, growth, and economic opportunity killers for the Energy Industry that the economy in this area of TX relies on so heavily. It affects, quite negatively, school districts and everything else on some level.
This is one article from among many:
http://blogs.chron.com/txpotomac/2010/02/texas_republicans_say_capandtr.html
Gene Green, a democrat who represents the 29th Congressional also knows the reality. Gene Green’s clients are democrats that do work. They are just being hammered, but Congressman Gene Green, democrat, can't state the obvious. He has to stay on the plantation and sugar-coat the beat-down as best that he can. Sugar-coating is a painfully sad to watch.
Mustapha’s war on the Natural Gas Industry benefits NO ONE or NO THING. It makes absolutely NO sense, but it is what energy hate-ing Socialists truly believe. They have to follow through.
The rest of Amerika will start to catch up to where I already am when “Cap and Tax” is passed. You WILL pay more for less. The worst is yet to come as Sinatra would say.
BC,
Explaining something of this nature to you, is largely an exercise in futility. I will share with you that I do not have a relationship with al Queda. Mustapha has had the opportunity to repeal the Patriot Act and FISA with his huge democrat majority in the House and the Senate, or via Executive Order. True to the gross hypocrisy of Liberalism, He has not. Don’t like Patriot Act, don’t like FISA, then repeal them. Mustapha could do that today. He hasn’t and he won’t.
Posted by: Django - N Exile In/Around the 30th Parallel | April 23, 2010 5:10 PM
JazzQuipster,
I give you that there was that $10 a week cut in taxes, or whatever it was, in 2009. But give us credit for recognizing that this does not represent any philosophical tax cutting epiphany from the Economic Team of Mustapha Mond.
My tadpole niece and nephews making a lowly $25,000 benefitted from the Bush Tax Cuts in better days past. I really don’t think that 25k is rich. What a grand lie that has been. Those tax cuts will expire at the end of the year. We should worry Not, for them. For they DO profess their love for Mustapha and they DO hate Prince.
The Healthcare Load of Crap has tax implications that apparently the IRS will have to enforce. You can’t cut the prime (Federal Funds) interest rate very much when it is already 0.25%. Maybe we cannot complain now, but clearly, higher taxes, on somebody, are coming to PARTIALLY cover all of the deficit spending. Or maybe the Socialists prefer that the price of a loaf of bread rises to where it takes out a Hamilton.
A VAT seems to be on the table. How can it not be. This IS what they do in Europe, and presumably France. The only good thing there is that EVERYBODY will get to wallow in that pain.
We are not Dolts. We know how these people view their holy mission to redistribute wealth. We could whistle through the grave yard or we could lie prostrate in the Koolaid, but we do know some very serious taxes on people NOT making 250K, are coming.
Posted by: Django - N Exile In/Around the 30th Parallel | April 23, 2010 6:02 PM
I like her white cardigan, and I especially like the flower embroidery on it. I also read somewhere that Sash's number one question to her dad is, "what's he doing for the tigers?" Yeah, dad, what are you doing for the tigers? Girl's smart to take advantage of her father's sphere of influence to raise an awareness for anything really. I think that was so fast and cute.
Posted by: Proky | April 23, 2010 8:33 PM
Free to Watch Liberals---My federal income tax went down thanks to Obama and the Democrats. Are you sure that you didn't fill out your income tax form wrong????
Posted by: JazzQuipster | April 23, 2010 3:25 PM
You fall for the bait like a nice fish. Every state will have to raise taxes to pay for their share of Obamacare.
BO raised tobacco taxes. In fact, he's raised taxes on those he promised not to. And, of course you've heard of the VAT right? That will tax everyone on just about everything they buy. Then there's Cap and Trade. Have fun spending your extra couple hundred bucks this year, because you are gonna pay for it.
http://americanglob.com/2010/04/21/obama-has-raised-taxes-over-670-billion-since-taking-office/
Since January of 2009, President Obama and Congressional Democrats have enacted into law gross tax increases totaling more
than $670 billion, or more than $2,100 for every man, woman and child in the United States. The list of tax increases includes at
least 14 violations of the President’s pledge not to raise taxes on Americans earning less than $200,000 for singles and $250,000
for married couples.
President Obama's budget proposes $989 billion in new taxes over the course of the next 10 years, starting fiscal year 2011, most of which are tax increases on individuals.
1) On people making more than $250,000.
$338 billion - Bush tax cuts expire
$179 billlion - eliminate itemized deduction
$118 billion - capital gains tax hike
Total: $636 billion/10 years
2) Businesses:
$17 billion - Reinstate Superfund taxes
$24 billion - tax carried-interest as income
$5 billion - codify "economic substance doctrine"
$61 billion - repeal LIFO
$210 billion - international enforcement, reform deferral, other tax reform
$4 billion - information reporting for rental payments
$5.3 billion - excise tax on Gulf of Mexico oil and gas
$3.4 billion - repeal expensing of tangible drilling costs
$62 million - repeal deduction for tertiary injectants
$49 million - repeal passive loss exception for working interests in oil and natural gas properties
$13 billion - repeal manufacturing tax deduction for oil and natural gas companies
$1 billion - increase to 7 years geological and geophysical amortization period for independent producers
$882 million - eliminate advanced earned income tax credit
Total: $353 billion/10 years
I know you liberals like the idea of the government sticking its hand in your pockets. Maybe it gives you tingles down your leg, like Chris Matthews. But, I know that the government is a wasteful bureaucratic wasteland. And, we all of us, will pay more for all the taxes levied on business, or are you so naive as to think that the extra cost won't be passed on to you?
Posted by: Free to Watch Liberals Tax and Spend | April 23, 2010 11:22 PM
When you limit or take away economic opportunity, you are, in effect, limiting freedom over the long run. Mustapha’s anti-hydrocarbon based energy policies HAVE affected me very directly and very negatively. Math World is a 55% pay cut, for me, over Engineering World. Fortunately, I do have somewhere to go. Many engineers do not.
Django, the dolts that have nothing better to do than cheer-lead for Obama won't ever know that they have lost any freedoms or opportunity until the government taxes momma out of her home and makes Jr. pack up his Xbox and computer and move out of her basement.
Posted by: Free to Watch Liberals Tax and Spend | April 24, 2010 9:27 PM
Django, the dolts that have nothing better to do than cheer-lead for Obama won't ever know that they have lost any freedoms or opportunity until the government taxes momma out of her home and makes Jr. pack up his Xbox and computer and move out of her basement.
Posted by: Free to Watch Liberals Tax and Spend | April 24, 2010 9:27 PM
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Free to Watch,
Yes. Unfortunately, but absolutely.
There always seemed to me, to be something uniquely special about American culture and American entertainment. Not something necessarily intellectual or cerebral, but still something that I could consider uniquely Americana and appreciate. Unfortunately, the mindless things that we love so much, seem to also reflect the mindless way that our democrat friends, at times anyway, indulge in politics. With all proper respect, the youth demographic of voters are not the deepest thinking individuals on the Mother Planet.
When you have less income and less opportunity to generate income, the social services and various packages of free stuff, that democrats would promise you, will probably begin to look very appealing after a while. In that we are in the 67th year of FDR styled politics, to my friends of the democrat party, I have to say to you though that I do question your intentions.
There may be some good things accomplished here and there, but there is also a real loss of economic freedom that is never going to be returned. If we could revive FDR, and have an honest moment with him, I think (based on the biographical FDR history that I am familiar with), he would flick away a little cigarette ash, and say something quite clever and sly. The one thing that he would not do is disagree.
Posted by: Django - N Exile In/Around the 30th Parallel | April 25, 2010 4:01 PM