Michelle Obama Takes Heat for Saying She’s ‘Proud of My Country’ for the First Time

[Woodmonkey]

Michelle Obama Takes Heat for Saying She’s ‘Proud of My Country’ for the First Time


Barack Obama’s wife, Michelle, is under fire for leaving the impression that she hasn’t been proud of her country until now, when Democrats are beginning to rally around her husband’s campaign.

Speaking in Milwaukee, Wis., on Monday, she said, “People in this country are ready for change and hungry for a different kind of politics and … for the first time in my adult life I am proud of my country because it feels like hope is finally making a comeback.”

Greeted with rousing applause after making the comment in Milwaukee, Obama delivered an amended version of the speech later that day in Madison, Wis.

“For the first time in my adult lifetime, I’m really proud of my country … not just because Barack has done well, but because I think people are hungry for change,” she said. “I have been desperate to see our country moving in that direction and just not feeling so alone in my frustration and disappointment.”

Obama was born in 1964, meaning her adult life began in 1982. Critics quickly seized on the newfound national pride.

“I am proud of my country,” John McCain’s wife, Cindy, said at a campaign stop in Brookfield, Wis., Tuesday. “I don’t know if you heard those words earlier … but I am very proud of my country.”

During a follow up press conference, the Arizona senator was asked if they were responding to Michelle Obama and he deferred to his wife.

McCain responded: “I just wanted to make the statement that I have and always will be proud of my country.”

Obama campaign spokeswoman Jen Psaki said the candidate’s wife wasn’t trying to knock her country, only underscore the meaning behind her husband’s campaign.

“The point is that of course Michelle is proud of her country, which is why she and Barack talk constantly about how their story wouldn’t be possible in any other nation on Earth,” she said. “What she meant is that she’s really proud at this moment because for the first time in a long time, thousands of Americans who’ve never participated in politics before are coming out in record numbers to build a grassroots movement for change.”

But conservative outlets aren’t so ready to let her off the hook.

“Can it really be there has not been a moment during that time when she felt proud of her country?” reads an article in Commentary magazine. “Forget matters like the victory in the Cold War; how about only things that have made liberals proud — all the accomplishments of inclusion? How about the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1991? Or Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s elevation to the Supreme Court?”

The article then says Michelle Obama’s comments suggest “the pseudo-messianic nature of the Obama candidacy is very much a part of the way the Obamas themselves are feeling.”

Weekly Standard Editor Bill Kristol said the comment “was sort of revealing.”

“She was an adult when we won the Cold War without firing a shot. She was an adult for the last 25 years of economic progress, social progress,” he told FOX News. “I think the Democrats have to be careful … they’re running against the status quo … You have to be careful not to let that slide into a kind of indictment of America. Because I don’t think the American people think on the whole that the last 25 years of American history is a narrative of despair and nothing to be proud of.”

Democratic strategist Bob Beckel said Obama “shouldn’t have said it the way she said it” but she gets the benefit of his doubt. He added that she most likely was just referring to the grassroots movement that’s swelled to support her husband, but she needs to be more careful.

“The Obama’s have to recognize they are now front-runners, and everything they say, it’s now open hunting season for people,” he said.

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[redtanker]

I saw the sound bite of her saying this....I took it as i think she meant it... She was not Proud of the country

[Woodmonkey]

I took it the same way you did, Phil, especially as she said it twice.

[milmor_1]

A strange statement "For the first time in my life I am proud of my country" .

Why has she NOT been proud before this, we all have issues with our countries but as a NON american I question the actual statement.

What happens if her husband fails to get elected will she once again NOT be proud of her country?

[Woodmonkey]

Good question, Mal.

[Snowden]

I really think she was looking at it and speaking about it, in regard to the racial problems only. She had thought, in most ways rightly, that whites had always looked down on blacks. She had felt that she was here in spite of being black rather than because she is an American, equal with all of the other people from other races, creeds, nationalities, cultures and so on.

It was more of a black statement than one she would have made had she been white.

It was because she felt that she was considered by America as a lesser person because of her color. I doubt it had anything to do with the accomplishments of us as a nation, or because of anything else. Suddenly she was made to see that race is not something we expect her to apologize for. It's not something that means she is not as American as the rest of us.

It was a moment when she felt equal to us all; and proud to be American.

I believe she simply worded it in a clumsy fashion, and that could simply be from the emotion she was having.