Contrasting First Ladies-to-be
With the 2008 U.S. presidential race in full swing, presidential candidates wives are also making headlines.
As Barack Obama does with John McCain, Michelle Obama contrasts sharply with Cindy Hensley McCain in many respects.
Michelle Obama was born into a poor family. Her father worked at the city water department and her mother was a secretary of a small catalogue producing company. Though suffering from poverty, her family members cared for and communicated with each other. After graduating from top universities, she worked for a law firm where she was the only African-American lawyer. Michelle played a role of a mentor for another black lawyer, who joined the firm shortly after her. He was none other than Barack Obama, and they soon got married.
She was an active, eloquent orator and has a flair for fashion. She is also considered as an equal partner to Obama. All this made the Associated Press place her in the category of untraditional first ladies along with Sen. Hillary Clinton and Rosalynn Carter, the wife of former U.S. President Jimmy Carter. Hillary led a task force for health care policies right after her husbands inauguration and Rosalynn would attend cabinet meetings with her husband.
On the contrary, Cindy McCain was born with a silver spoon in her mouth. Her father is the owner of Hensley & Co., one of the largest Anheuser-Busch distributors in the United States. While working as a teacher specializing in rehabilitation for the disabled, Cindy met John McCain, a liaison officer 18 years older than her, at a party for officers in Hawaii in 1979. After divorcing his wife, McCain remarried Cindy. It is not exaggerating to say that the support from Cindys parents made todays John McCain. Cindys family has helped him from the time he first went into politics in Arizona until he became a senator.
A rodeo queen in her school years, she also was a cheerleader. But due to her introvert personality and reluctance to join politics, she is categorized as a traditional first lady, together with Nancy Reagan, the widow of former U.S. President Ronald Reagan, and Laura Bush, the incumbent first lady.
However, when Michelle stirred controversy during her husbands campaign rally by saying, For the first time in my adult life, I am really proud of my country, Cindy showed aggressiveness characteristic of politicians wives, reiterating the following day that she is proud of America and American people.
The Weekly Standard, the mouthpiece of American neo-conservatives, and equally conservative biweekly magazine National Review are pouring out pieces lambasting Michelle Obama. National Review put an eagle-eyed Michelles photo on the cover of its April 21 issue under the title Mrs. Grievance. By contrast, Cindy gets little attention from the media. But after being lashed for refusing to reveal her assets, she belatedly made public that she earns an annual income of $6 million (as of 2006).
sechepa@donga.com
About Dong-A Ilbo