Michelle Obama

Michelle Obama was at Macalester College's new and fantastic Leonard Athletic Center today and I was there! The star trib says there was more than 4000 people who showed up in the rain to get in.

She was introduced first by St. Paul mayor Chris Coleman, then Senator Klobuchar, and then a 16 year old volunteer from Northfield. Al Franken was at the door, and got to shake all 4,000 hands as well as get props from every speaker.

Michelle's speech was completely positive. I don't think I heard "McCain" or "Palin" once the entire time. Her theme was, "Barack gets it" and tied her and his life story into the economy, heath care, and education. Her father worked for the fire department at a desk because of a degenerative medical condition. His mother had Barack at 18, and they lived on food stamps for a time. They both made it to the best schools and have so much to be thankful for, and she used that to tie everyone into the campaign, and send the responsibility back to the audience. 'Barack has carried it this far and built this political campaign, now you have to finish it.'

She was also able to be more folksy than a politician could be, refering to Barack as "honey" when recalling a story, and made a very passionate personal appeal to his character. She also got to talk about the future in the frame of her two daughters, and driving them back from the hospital and saying, 'they are the future.' To everyone who doesn't have kids, she said, "you don't even know" with a laugh.

Overall she came off as unvarnished, honest, and very well convected to reality. The crowed was "fired up and ready to go" - very reminiscent of Iowa 10 months ago...

Here is a little slide show of the line, and some of the other speakers.