The race for First Lady

A new Rasmussen Reports poll released Wednesday says Michelle Obama is viewed unfavorably by 48 percent of white voters and Cindy McCain is viewed unfavorably by 48 percent of black voters.

The cable networks should be happy. The only thing better for ratings than a cat fight is a race war.

Fortunately for Michelle Obama, she's acquainted with somebody who has a warehouse of focus-group research that can help her.

Did you know that Oprah Winfrey's show began as a local daytime talk show in Chicago?

Did you know that her local show replaced (and obliterated) a local daytime talk show that had been hosted by a Regis-style white guy and a succession of blondes who all looked a lot like Cindy McCain?

Did you know that Oprah was so successful at winning over the daytime TV viewers of Chicago -- a city that for all its Land-of-Lincoln rhetoric is more than a little bit segregated -- that she was able to negotiate for ownership of her syndicated show, eventually making her one of the wealthiest women in the world?

Oprah Winfrey has mastered the art of convincing her audience that she's just like them, even though she's smarter, more ambitious, more determined and more focused than any of them will ever be.

It probably helps that she gives away cars.

Somebody at the Obama campaign should call the FEC and check into that.


Copyright 2008

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