FLOTUS gave all right *UPDATED*
Michelle Malkin takes Michelle Obama to task for her apparently hypocritical advise to UC Merced graduates to “give.” Malkin took issue with this language:
“You will face tough times. You will certainly have doubts, and let me tell you because I know I did when I was your age,” she said. “Remember that you are blessed. Remember that in exchange for those blessings, you must give something back. You must reach back and pull someone up. You must bend down and let someone else stand on your shoulders so that they can see a brighter future.”
As Malkin pointed out, even when the Obamas started rolling in the green stuff, they were beyond stingy. Nor is there any record of FLOTUS doing significant (or, indeed, any) charity work.
Malkin’s relentlessly logical approach completely fails to understand the Obama outlook. I direct your attention to John 3:16. In the narcissistic, self-aggrandizing, egocentric Obama world, this couple gave the most generous gift of all: They gave a Messiah to America. Isn’t that enough, already?
UPDATE: In a comment to this post, 11B40 mentioned hearing a news snippet about the cost. The New York Times report from a few days ago has more, and it’s well worth reading. It is meant to remind us that the Obamas themselves are the gift that just keeps giving.
What’s amazing is that neither the pro-Obama public institutions, nor the pro-Obama media are at all embarrassed about this kind of news. That is, they don’t think the following is embarrassing, and seem to think it perfectly appropriate that taxpayers should bear these kinds of costs. As a preface, you have to understand that the UC Merced is a brand new UC campus (again, courtesy of California taxpayers):
“It’s going to be huge,” said Zain Memon, a 22-year-old senior. “This puts us on the map.”
Of course, such reputation-making is not cheap. Officials at the university were scrambling on Tuesday to finalize the financing for the event, which is expected to draw more than 10,000 visitors and cost some $700,000, or roughly $600,000 more than had been budgeted before Mrs. Obama committed to speak.
The cost includes a raft of technological upgrades, including an audio-video feed, a Spanish simulcast over cellphone and a concert-size stage set up on the Bowl, the sodded campus lawn where the first lady will speak. Extra security added nearly $100,000 to the cost, including metal detectors on the campus, which sits in a former cattle field surrounded by hay-laden farmland and cows of unknown political leanings.
None of which, university officials said, will be a problem.
“We are going to the office of the president, to the university’s discretionary fund, we’ll borrow if we have to,” said Mary Miller, the vice chancellor for administration. “This is an investment in our future. It is an investment in our community.”
Still all is not taxpayer burden. The local economy is very excited, since it has already given them a short term boost in terms of construction work and they assume they’ll benefit from a weekend’s excitement of visitors:
“It gave me a job,” said Mr. Hobbs, who was working on the set-up crew and said he has a 1982 Camaro longing for a new motor. “It gave all these people out here jobs.”
For residents in this recession-battered city of 76,000 people in the heart of the Central Valley in California, Saturday is also being treated as a local holiday, with a daylong, downtown block party featuring its own Jumbotron for viewing Mrs. Obama’s speech and activities ranging from “human bowling” to sumo wrestling.
“It’s great for the city,” said R. C. Essig, a co-owner of the Partisan, a Main Street bar that is bringing in a disc jockey from Los Angeles. “I mean any community event here is a big event, but this is even bigger.”
Indeed, local old-timers say the only event that measures up — political celebrity-wise — was a whistle-stop tour by one of the Kennedy brothers in the 1960s. (Which one is up for debate.)
So you see, Mrs. Obama is still giving. As a result of her mere presence, California taxpayers are coughing up hundreds of thousands of dollars to benefit the little community of Merced. I feel honored to be the tax paying conduit through which Mrs. Obama’s blessings are channeled.
