The Obama Family in September '08 Essence

One of my favorite cover stories of the Obama family this year was the September 2008 Essence magazine story on the family. The pictures they took were vibrant and colorful, and sometimes it's just good to see positive stories profiled when so much of the news we hear these days is negative or mindless gossip. It's hard to fake being a real close-knit family with good family values, so it seems to me that the Obama's are the real deal when it comes to raising their family. Picture credits to blackcelebkids.com. Here is the word from Essence explaining how they finally got the entire Obama family as the September cover story.

The September issue of Essence magazine features an interview with Sen. Barack Obama and his family inside their Chicago home.

Essence editor-in-chief Angela Burt-Murray said it took a year for the magazine to gain access to the Obama's Illinois home for an intimate interview with the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee, his wife, Michelle, and their daughters, Sasha and Malia.

Burt-Murray talked Thursday with CNN "American Morning" anchor Kiran Chetry about the interview and the Obama family.

Chetry: You are the first African-American media outlet to get this inside look. Did your team get a chance to see the real Obamas?

Burt-Murray: I think we did. We went to their home on the South Side of Chicago and it was wonderful to see them as a family interacting with each other, and see the girls skipping around the house, just acting like it's a normal, everyday occurrence to have a camera crew in their home and Secret Service at different points throughout the house and around the yard. But it didn't really seem to impact the girls in any way.

Link to Michelle Obama Magazine Covers
Link to Obama Endorsed by Esquire Magazine & More Obama Covers

Barack & Michelle Obama Newsbriefs

Courtesy of The McClatchy Company, the third-largest newspaper company in the United States and a leading newspaper and internet publisher, are a couple of bio's of Barack Obama and his wife, Michelle Obama presented side by side. These graphic bio's below were printed in 2007 and 2008 with and inserted in articles, "For Obama, a tale of 2 speeches" and "Michelle Obama launches her husband's new narrative". They provide an interesting summary of both person's lives along the way to becoming the next First Family of the United States.

Michelle Obama Magazine Covers

Earlier in October, I made a post which revealed the dozens of Barack Obama magazine cover issues to date from Rolling Stone to Esquire to Ebony to The New Republic, Time, Vanity Fair & Der Spiegel to name a few. I promised that I would soon follow-up with a Michelle Obama magazine cover post. So here they are including the Harper's Bazaar September 2008 issue in which model Tyra Banks plays Michelle Obama. My favorite cover of her is the classic September 2008 Ebony cover while my favorite cover of the Obama family is the September 2008 Essence Collectors Edition. Of course Michelle Obama is one of my wife, Shirre's favorite people. Shirre describes her as "half of an awesome Power Couple."

Pictures from 2nd Presidential Debate by NPR

NPR did an amazing job capturing various images of the 2nd Presidential Debate between Sens. Barack Obama and John McCain on October 8, 2008. I've included a few of those pictures below.

Paul J. Richards: John McCain makes a point to the audience as Barack Obama listens during their second presidential debate. AFP/Getty Images

Charles Dharapak: John McCain and his wife, Cindy, join Barack Obama and his wife, Michelle, in talking to audience members after the debate. AP

Anthony Jacobs: Barack Obama responds to a question during the town-hall presidential debate. The two candidates have sparred over the economy and renewable energy. Getty Images

Obama-McCain II (Impressions & Outtakes)

First, I must say that this second of the three 2008 Presidential Debates between Sens. Barack Obama and John McCain was one of the most boring political events that I have witnessed in quite a while. I think much of this was due to the debate being a town hall format. However, Obama still won the debate, showing he can not only flourish in multiple arenas--I mean come on, he DID graduate from Harvard, didn't he? I don't think too much could impress or intimidate him--but he can also more than hold his own against John McCain in an area that is supposed to be McCain's strongest suit, the townhall. To sum up, Obama won, but I didn't learn anything new from this 2nd debate that I didn't already know from the first debate.

OUTTAKES & IMPRESSIONS:

Did anyone besides me and Paul Reiser notice the size of the townhall? Tom Brokaw announced 80 uncommitted voters in attendance at the debate. Certainly with that much advance notice and with the debate being held on a college campus, I assumed that there would have been at least 300 or more people there, independent/uncommitted or otherwise.

The major reaction groups (surveying partisan and independent viewers of the debate) say that Obama won the debate hands down (NBC: 60-40, SurveyUSA: 54-29, Fox News: 61-39% as of 12:45pm 10-8/08, CNN: 54-30, CBS: 40-26).

For the second debate in a row, John McCain didn't once mention the middle class.

McCain still has a problem with Obama. At least he looked at him at times during the debate but this time, but he had a hard time hiding his disdain by referring to Obama as "that one" while not looking at Obama. Personally, if anyone referred to me as "that one" during a mutual dialog, that matter would have been redressed very pointedly because it shows a profound lack of professionalism and disrespect.

McCain used the term, "my friends" 19 times during the debate. Meanwhile, Obama's recurring conversation centered around the topics of economic issues, the middle class, health care, change, energy, and foreign policy. At least McCain didn't once mention, "Maverick." Boy that term is so played out at this point that it actually has a negative connotation to the voters. Huffington Post has a nice rundown of each debater's word frequency.

My favorite newsrag, the NY Times has the best and most interactive post-debate experience. Check out their interactive debate page for the full transcript and video footage of last night's Second Presidential Debate of 2008.

QUOTABLES

The best lines of the debate belonged to Obama. "Senator McCain, in the last debate and again today suggested that I don't understand. It's true. There are some things I don't understand. I don't understand how we ended up invading a country that had nothing to do with 9/11."

"I've got to correct a little bit of Sen. McCain's history, not surprisingly. ... In fact, Sen. McCain's campaign chairman's firm was a lobbyist on behalf of Fannie Mae, not me."

The funniest line of the debate, without a doubt belongs to McCain who said that figuring out which tax policy Obama was in favor of was like "nailing Jell-O to a wall."

For the nth time, McCain told us that he knows how to "win wars" and "capture bin Laden". Somehow, though he hasn't shared any of this knowledge through 5 years of war in Iraq. How selfish.

AND TAKE THAT...

So much for the "Straight Talk Express". Obama hit McCain on his truthfulness by stating, "You know, Sen. McCain, I think the Straight Talk Express lost a wheel on that one."