AFP – Wednesday, 6 Nov, 2008

WASHINGTON (AFP) — Unpaid, with no official duties, the wife of the US president can exert enormous influence, since she has both the ear of the president and a powerful bully pulpit all her own.

With Barack Obama’s victory in the US election Tuesday, Michelle Obama is set to become the first African-American first lady in US history, in a year that also saw former first lady Hillary Clinton shatter barriers with her formidable run for the White House.

Since Martha Washington reluctantly debuted the role in 1789 — despite a marked preference for private life — a varied parade of American women has passed through the role, transforming it along the way in its many guises: national hostess, White House manager, behind-the-scenes policy advisor, public advocate of favorite causes. . .

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Democratic Presidential candidate Barack Obama took a much needed break from his campaign to order ice cream with his wife Michelle and daughters Malia(R) and Sasha(L).Meanwhile,in an interview aired yesterday on Good Morning America,the presidential hopeful warned critics to refrain from taking jabs at his wife and family:

“The GOP[Republican Party], should I be the nominee, can say whatever they want to say about me, my track record. If they think that they’re going to try to make Michelle an issue in this campaign, they should be careful because that I find unacceptable, the notion that you start attacking my wife or my family.”

Obama called his wife the best person he knows and said she “loves this country. For them to try to distort or to play snippets of her remarks in ways that are unflattering to her is, I think, just low class. I think that most of the American people would think that as well.”SOURCE