After a second look, voters decide Michelle "not that pretty..."

...a funny thing happened on the way to the 2010 mid-term elections. On the heels of a stimulus package that didn’t stimulate, healthcare reform that socializes medicine in this country, and a financial reform bill that gives the government expanded powers of regulation over our money (and our lives), the American people decided to shelve their “white guilt” and fight Marxism once more. As a consequence of this, President Obama’s approval numbers have plummeted, the Republicans are poised to dominate in the November elections, and Mrs. Obama just isn’t that pretty anymore.

That’s right, the bloom is off the rose: Mrs. Obama is rarely described in the glowing terms that were used to describe her during 2008 and 2009. And while a lot of this is due to her husband’s socialism, her nearly $400,000 Spanish vacation didn’t help matters either.

And of course we can’t overlook the fact that Mrs. Obama never was pinup material to begin with. Like her husband’s “hope and change,” the beauty the media fawned over in Mrs. Obama wasn’t real from the start. It was simply a mirage in the harsh and graceless climate that is her real self.

A sense of entitlement plays out at a luxurious Spanish resort

AS THE US economy endures high unemployment and a jittery stock market, President Barack Obama has preached sacrifice and fiscal discipline. But the pictures coming out of a sun-splashed Spanish resort may be sending a different message.

First lady Michelle Obama is in the midst of a five-day trip to a luxury resort along with a handful of friends, her younger daughter, aides and Secret Service. Her office said the Obamas would pay for personal expenses, but would not reveal the taxpayer cost for the government employees.

Elected officials - Democrats and Republicans - were reluctant to weigh in, not wanting to appear critical of the President's wife. But the trip provided fodder for television news shows, talk-show hosts and bloggers. Critics portrayed the foreign getaway as tone-deaf to the deep economic anxiety back home. Every first family takes vacations: the criticism aimed at Mrs Obama is that she chose to visit a foreign country rather than remain in the US and support its fragile economy.

Just last month, Mrs Obama flew to the Florida panhandle, a tourist draw hit hard by the oil spill crisis, and delivered the message that for parents ''looking for things to do with their kids this summer … this is a wonderful place to visit''.

The opulence of the European trip also has drawn scrutiny. Mr Obama has urged frugality in lean economic times. He once cautioned that families saving money for college shouldn't ''blow a bunch of cash in Vegas.''

As ordinary folks pinch pennies, Michelle plays Marie Antoinette

Sacrifice is something that many Americans are becoming all too familiar with during this economic downturn. It was a key theme in President Obama's inaugural address to the nation, and he's referenced it numerous times when lecturing the country on how to get back on its feet.

But while most of the country is pinching pennies and downsizing summer sojourns - or forgoing them altogether - the Obamas don't seem to be heeding their own advice. While many of us are struggling, the First Lady is spending the next few days in a five-star hotel on the chic Costa del Sol in southern Spain with 40 of her "closest friends." According to CNN, the group is expected to occupy 60 to 70 rooms, more than a third of the lodgings at the 160-room resort. Not exactly what one would call cutting back in troubled times.

Reports are calling the lodgings of Obama's Spanish fiesta, the Hotel Villa Padierna in Marbella, "luxurious," "posh" and "a millionaires' playground." Estimated room rate per night? Up to a staggering $2,500. Method of transportation? Air Force Two.

To be clear, what the Obamas do with their money is one thing; what they do with ours is another. Transporting and housing the estimated 70 Secret Service agents who will flank the material girl will cost the taxpayers a pretty penny.

Perhaps it could be that the Obamas, who seem to fancy themselves more along the lines of international celebrities than actual leaders, espouse a different view of sacrifice. When Michelle Obama accompanied her husband to Copenhagen along with best buddy Oprah Winfrey, she billed the trip - an ultimately unsuccessful bid to bring the Olympics to Chicago - as follows: "As much of a sacrifice as people say this is for me or Oprah or the President to come for these few days, so many of you in this room have been working for years to bring this bid home."

A quick jaunt to Denmark is a sacrifice? What portraits in courage!

Who will be first to critique the "oil spill chique" look"

Enquirer offers blow by blow of Oprah-Michelle feud

A distraught Oprah Winfrey is telling pals her "thank you" for helping Barack Obama win the presidency has been a knife in the back.

A jealous first lady has frozen the talk queen out of the White House inner circle, say insiders. "Oprah is devastated," revealed a friend.

"She had no idea that Michelle was so jealous about the influence she had on Barack. She hated the way her husband would huddle with Oprah over strategy and jump when she called.

"The jealousy and anger was eating up Michelle. During the campaign, she vowed Oprah would not be a part of the new administration.

"Oprah had visions of being a close adviser to the president and a regular visitor to the White House. She was actually planning to redecorate the famous Lincoln bedroom, which is reserved for special guests of the first family.

"But in the first 10 months of the Obama administration, Oprah has visited the White House only twice, and one visit was for a business meeting to do an interview with Michelle for O magazine.

"And that was a disaster. Oprah arrived with her friend Gayle King, but was shocked to find Michelle cold and distant. Worse, she all but ignored Oprah and directed her attention to Gayle. It was as though Oprah wasn't even there."

The meeting got off to a bad start when Oprah, 55, greeted Michelle. The TV host leaned to kiss her cheek, but the first lady stepped back and extended her hand instead.

Then Michelle, 45, seemed to ignore a question Oprah asked about the Obama children, instead taking a question from an aide and then returning only to chat with Gayle again - ignoring or forgetting Oprah's question.

By the end of the day, Oprah felt roundly snubbed.

Expert on narcissism needed to cover White House

Washington Examiner: "First Lady Michelle Obama spoke at a mentoring event for girls at the White House today. In her remarks, she told the story of her career as a lawyer and hospital executive. But before that, the First Lady told the girls that they should relate to her, even though she is now living in the White House.

"One of the things that my mom always said -- because people ask her all the time, 'What did you do to create Michelle Obama?'" Mrs. Obama told the audience."

My take: So, is narcissism contageous? Who knew?

Sitting on daddy's lap at 20?

From MichelleMalkin.com

"From Michelle Obama’s failed pitch to the International Olympic Committee:

'Some of my best memories are sitting on my dad’s lap, cheering on Olga and Nadia, Carl Lewis, and others for their brilliance and perfection.'

Um. Ew. Oof.

Mrs. Obama was 20 years old when Lewis first competed in the Olympics in 1984.

Senior White House adviser and Chicago slumlord overseer Valerie Jarrett promised earlier this week that 'there wouldn’t be a dry eye in the room' after FLOTUS spoke.

She probably wasn’t expecting tears of…laughter.

Mrs. O is looking more and more like Mrs. Clinton every day."

Michelle goes to Russia: don't call it a homecoming

In light of past assertions that Michelle Obama is a Marxist, especially those published on this site, TheRightFieldLine, in this post, offers some helpful suggestions on what she should not say while in Russia.

"I feel so at home here."

"The architecture is so leveling. By the time we leave the White House, I hope America will look like this."

"I think the czar's idea of Potemkin villages was brilliant. We're going to arrange for villages just like that on strips that have been boarded up because of the recession. In fact, we're going to have a Potemkin Village stimulus bill soon."

"When we flew into Washington for the inauguration it reminded me of Vladimir Lenin arriving on a train at the Finland Station in 1917."

"I'm fascinated by the way Russia treated dissidents. Free room and board. No pesky visitors. Frequent confessions. Is there any chance you'd share some of the insights you gained from that process?"

"Mr. Putin, it's as if we're opposites. Everybody likes us, but nobody is afraid of us. Nobody likes you, but everybody is afraid of you. How can we make people at least a little bit afraid of us?"

"Num chucks? No, we can't carry num chucks. They're illegal in lots of places in the United States. Of course, we could try to get those laws repealed, or struck down by the Supreme Court."

There is one thing Michelle Obama should say in Russia: "Mr. Putin, the average life expectancy in Russia is 59. The only people who die at 59 In the United States are those who vote the wrong way in Chicago."