An Open Letter to Michelle Obama
April 29, 2008
Dear Michelle,
Can Barack please have a cigarette?
No, stop right there, maybe you don't get it: the future of the free world depends on it. Barack looks tired, and he's been awful on TV. I think he's bitter, bitter about not being able to have a cigarette. Cigarettes got him this far...can he please just have one? (It's like the year Tiger Woods changed his swing and was quickly superseded by Vijay Singh.)
Maybe he could have one this weekend? He really needs to win Indiana. Also, keep in mind: tobacco and North Carolina, they kind of go together, you know. Sure, he'll probably win there anyway, but a larger margin is always good. At least he should be able to have one while Rev. Jeremiah Wright is doing his Johnny Appleseed-best to to sow seeds of damaging sound bites around the country.
How unseemly will it be for you to have to pretend to support a race-baiting candidacy when the DNC takes the nomination away from Barack? How unfortunate will it be for ME to thus support McCain?
One little cigarette might even help Barack with white working-class voters! Think about the pure gold of "Barack outside smoking with the boys," like he surely used to do, talking sports with the friendly janitors who were having a smoke outside the University of Chicago Law School. If Hillary had stopped smoking, believe me, she'd have started again (and denied she ever stopped), and then reminisced about her smoking breaks with the gals back when she worked as a hair-netted cafeteria lady in a Terre Haute elementary school.
Can Barack please have a cigarette?
Thanks very much,
Paul Devlin
graduate student and writer
Long 'more Obama country than you think' Island, NY
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An Open Letter to Michelle Obama
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View All Comments »ac at 08/28/2008 10:48:46 AM
Comment:
Like we can control what a person does? Sure smoking has been proven to shorten life, so too does stress shorten our lives and at times scar our bodies through surgery. I pray for my loved ones that smoke, that the power of God as I understand God, will strengthen them all the while as I realize that it is I who am judging their actions as if Nature herself gave me that honor. Re-think that one dude...
noelsnana at 06/18/2008 6:48:43 PM
Comment:
dear mrs. obama
i am a north carolina democrat of a certain age. i have voted for not democrats in the past - ed brook among them - i live in mass. now since 1962 -
and i vote my mind, not my pocketbook.
i want to speak to you about a speech pattern rather than your thoughts. they are good. forget the guy who wants your husband to smoke a cigarette. encourage him to picture himself with half his lower lip cut away due to cancer. worked for me. i quit smoking after most of 40 years.
rather i want to ask you to get rid of "you know" from your speech patterns. i noted in the quotes from you tonight on excite.com a heavy sprinkling of "you knows" and that is a 1980s teenage verbalization. drop it.
it is as charming as, when discussing a conversation, the then teen group speaking: and then he goes i told you so, and then kit goes, well why not? and then i goes well, i don't like it.
no one wants to listen for 4-8 years to a woman who speaks like a teenager.
i recognize that you are brilliant and that you are the glue in the marriage, but it is important for the rest of the world to hear you as exactly that person, not sounding like a prattling latent teenager.
Olron316 at 06/06/2008 11:17:18 AM
Comment:
I have not found a way to reach the Obama's. I will say one thing and that is if Hillary Clinton becomes his VP I will vote for McCain. I have mineral rights from my Grandfathers Homestead near Casper Wyo. I was told by the courthouse in Douglas that the wells remain closed because Bill Clinton had the Refinery dismantled rather than do some repairs. Go on line and you will find he shut down nine refineries which is why the Saudi Oil Minister said they could send us more oil but we can't refine it. Also I like the fact that Obama will raise the Cap on Soc. Sec. $97,000 is too low when you have 20 million dollar NBA players to 40 million oil tycoons only having to pay S.S. taxes on the first $97,000. McCain won't raise them because it raises the taxes on the middle class. A family of four is middle income at $80 to $90 thousand. Edwards says to have a bubble in S.S. taxes. From the cap of $97 thousand to $200 thousand no increase but after $200 thousand on let the rich pay. This country cannot let the middle class and lower go without S.S. with the cost of living heading where it is. The fact about the war is before all troops come home some have to be left to protect the civilian workers over there that are rebuilding Schools, Roads, Housing etc. There are several contract workers there and an Embassy to protect. We also need to rebuild the military as this country should be prepared to fight a war on two fronts such as WWII and the Nat. Guard to take care of the interior. What if Israel blows up or what if China says we are going to take Taiwan back which they want. What if North Korea uses the bomb or Iran which will have it soon. What if this country gets hit with a WMD Terrorist hit in the next ten years. Here in Oregon the mouth of the Columbia hit would hit shipping. What if the Wind Farms were hit or food supply. If Edwards becomes the VP then I will vote for Obama but if the Clinton bunch become part of the VP choice then I plus as I understand many Independent voters will switch to McCain. Ron Jennings Portland Ore.