... but I do find it silly in the extreme. Salon loses at least 40% of the respect I had for it on account of this little bit of less-than-frippery.

I can only presume the writer could find no other way of getting the attention of Salon editors - and the editors somehow had managed to totally turn off their critical faculties when they accepted this rubbish for publication. Writer and Editors: Please do let us know something about your thought processes when you put this 'article' together. That exercise at least may provide some useful insights to us readers. (At this point, I've not read all the input from the readers, where you may have done this already: I'm not from the USA, and I've not yet thought through about any racism that may well be implicit in this endeavour of yours).

-- GSC

Thank you for that very useful information about Erin Aubry Kaplan. I for one shall be reading all of that with great interest to try and discover what makes this 'lady' tick.

GSC

What a bunch of mindless horseshit. I am not sure if you are really this useless on the page or whether Salon is becoming the latest e-rag.

Barack's "member" - up close and personal

Salon is jumping the shark, repeatedly...

While I realize that this article is done good-naturedly, it bothers me so much that it is criticizing her under the guise of "accepting" her. Why do people do this? Why do people constantly feel the need to scrutinize a woman's body and appearance? You may think it is liberating to say someone has a big ass in this article, but I am almost certain that no woman would take it as a compliment to be told she has a big ass--no matter what the context. This is exactly what makes women become appearance obsessed themselves--being constantly evaluated and scrutinized and criticized. If you really want to pay Michelle Obama a compliment, don't scrutinize her appearance at all.

C'mon, Salon, surely there is some piece of news somewhere in the world that is more important that Mrs Obama's butt?

There's nothing wrong with pointing out that the new First Lady is fine. There's nothing wrong with exploring the beauty aesthetic she embodies and what it means for women who look up to her.

All of the hand-wringing and pear-clutching in the comments section here is predictably pathetic.

I'm a white, thin woman with an ass made for Juicy Couture, and I *loved* this piece.

Then write a 1,000 word article about them!

Make that 50,000 words.

Mchelle Obama's butt and jackie Kennedy's butt have nothing to do with who they are. If you asked them about their own butt's they'd give you a look like "What butt?".

Mrs. Obamas grace and elegance comes from the fact that she is not self-conscious - she has other things on her mind that are much more important.

I am a middle aged very conservative white guy Republican who voted for McCain and thinks that Obama's policies will be economic and foreign policy disaster for this nation. And I am utterly offended by this article. If it is a joke, it fails. If it is serious, then it is both racist and sexist. Call me a traditionalist, but the offices of the Presidency and First Lady deserve just a tad more distance, respect and propriety than this writer is showing. Clue to writer: Michelle Obama is the wife of the most powerful person in the world, and a not-insignificant person of power in her own right; she is not the tramp-stamp girlfriend that you go bar-trawling with every Saturday night.

Why should anyone give a rat's ass about this?

Wait. Now we don't have to pay attention to civil liberties laying in ruins around us. We can focus on someone's "booty" for the next four fucking years. Thanks, Salon.

Banal, trite and flat-out stupid. Why on earth did you chose to publish this?

Every morning, I get my coffee and sit down to read Salon. I never expected to read anything so crass, tasteless, and celebratory of a stereotype as this article. Of all of the reasons we have to be ecstatic about the election of Barack Obama and to look forward to his lovely family occupying the White House, this is not one. It's irrelevant. Shame on you, Salon.

Ummm, first off, I hope a woman wrote about Mrs. Obama's physical features. Second, again we see the awful burden of journalism to fill empty time and space. This is just the dumbest article on the Presidency I have ever seen. Yes, the new First Lady is stunningly beautiful, but she is also very intelligent, accomplished and gracious. Put these qualities first. And keep a little of your own dignity.

Stop staring at the first lady's ASS you perv!

Salon hits bottom once again.

When I first saw Michelle Obama my first thought: Maybe SHE should be running for president. She's an incredibly impressive woman.

And now I'm thinking about her big black ass...

thanks, Salon!

Once upon a time in this country we had a president who could not walk. He had to be assisted and frequently carried bodily, especially upon entering and exiting cars. His name was Franklin Delano Roosevelt, but many of you may be unaware of this *because the media and so the general public averted their eyes* from his handicap, not out of shame but because he felt that it was beneath the dignity of the office for a man of his stature to be carried about, and might affect his standing among other world leaders. Whether one agrees with this assessment or not is beside the point. That was how he wanted it, and we complied. Nowadays, I fear the media would descend like howling wolves, frantically competing to get a picture of the president at his undignified worst. I would not care to make the point that the race of the Obama family is in anyway a handicap on the nature of FDR’s polio, and certainly both physical disability and race are attributes that we have come to value and celebrate. But there are many many people in this country who will go to great lengths to disgrace and deride the Obamas in these next four years, who will be looking for *any* difference in their behavior, mannerisms, appearance, vocabulary, and habits, to say nothing of their policy-making decisions, to make them look foolish and unfit for their position. Do we really need to help these jackals? If the Obamas wish to humanize the white house and celebrate their racial background, more power to them. But we should afford them all the dignity and gravitas of the office that they deserve and desire. They have a very tough four years ahead of them.