Obamas Choose First Pooch

Thankfully, I have lighter news to relay to the readership today. The First Family have chosen that highly anticipated puppy dog.

It's a Portuguese Water Dog. Behold.



Cute. But he looks like a shedder. Peggy Gero DaValt will weigh in about this, hopefully.

First Lady Recipe

Take one pose in a White House sitting room.



Add two shakes of shantung strawberry colour.



Subtract genuine charm and star quality.



And stir.



Related

Laura Bush's Disco Pants

Yikes!

Poor First Lady Michelle Obama. Now, I'm hardly a fan or anything, but it strikes me that this pre-wax sculpture by Madame Tussaud's top man, Colin Jackson, has a Goya-esque flavour to it.

It errs, perhaps, a little too close to truth than to flattery.



Mrs. Obama is a woman whose face in repose hovers between "grim" and "aggressive". As such, a photographer or plastic artist must be careful to show her when her face is more relaxed lest a portrait become a caricature.

In this clay rendition, which will serve as a basis for the figurine, her massive underbite and chiclet-sized front teeth are overly apparent, not to mention the lack of subtlety around the mannish jaw area. As depicted here, she looks like a truck driver, or PE instructor, yeesh. All she needs is a whistle...

And is it me, or do they have her looking like Greta Van Susteren?

Either way, it's not a good likeness. Hopefully, the Washington Museum (which has only showcased Democratic First Ladies, Jacqueline Kennedy and Hillary Clinton) might have time to rectify their artistic license.

She needs to look good next to her hubby, in March, after all. Mighty fine, mmm-mmm.

Ugly Hillary - Beautiful Hillary

This is Hillary Rodham Clinton in the 1970s, back when she made herself to be bizarrely ugly, and badly-dressed. Unsurprisingly, it was during her aggressively feminist years.



This, on the other hand, is beautiful Hillary photographed by Vogue magazine (by orders of good chum, Anna Wintour, to boost the First Lady's image after the Lewinsky scandal).

Same woman. Same staunch feminist, no doubt. But two very different kinds of images being conveyed.



Observing physical qualities of women is not inherently sexist. It is sexist when that's all you notice.

Visiting The In-Laws

Just thought you might be interested in seeing Jenna and Henry Hager in one of the first newlywed photographs since their wedding. The happy couple on the White House lawn on Saturday.

I am struck by just how wonderful that girl has turned out, and actually, how much she looks like her father. It's uncanny.



(Love how she went the traditional route, and took her husband's name -- just like I will)