Right-Wing Media Accuse “Angry” Michelle Obama Of “Race Baiting” In Tuskegee Commencement Address
Written by Lis Power
Published
Right-wing media accused First Lady Michelle Obama of “wasting an opportunity,” “playing the race card,” and reciting a “litany of victimization” after the first lady's commencement address at Tuskegee University in Alabama.
Michelle Obama Gave The Commencement Address At Tuskegee University
Bloomberg: Michelle Obama “Spoke Frankly” About The Role Of Race During Her Commencement Address. During Michelle Obama's commencement address at Tuskegee University on May 9, Obama spoke about the role her racial identity played in the 2008 campaign, slights African-Americans face everyday, and the fact that those experiences were “not an excuse” to “lose hope.” [Bloomberg, 5/10/15]
Right-Wing Media Accuse “Angry” Obama Of “Race Baiting”, “Playing The Race Card”
Daily Caller: Luxurious Life As First Lady Takes Toll On Michelle Obama Because She Is Black, She Complains. A May 10 Daily Caller article accused First Lady Obama of complaining about the “trials and tribulations she believes she has faced as the first black first lady in American history”:
Globetrotting, Ivy League-educated, Marchesa gown-wearing first lady Michelle Obama's commencement address at Tuskegee University on Saturday described the trials and tribulations she believes she has faced as the first black first lady in American history.
The intense media scrutiny, occasional critical and disparaging remarks -- it's all too much and she said it has led to sleepless nights either in the White House or in posh, five-star hotels where she and her retinue stay, according to The Hill. [Daily Caller, 5/10/15]
Rush Limbaugh: Michelle Obama Has “A Giant Chip On [Her] Shoulder,” Perhaps Because People Don't “Fawn Enough” Over Her. During the May 11 edition of Premiere Radio Networks' The Rush Limbaugh Show, Limbaugh claimed that Michelle Obama was “doubling down” on “playing the race card,” saying she has “a giant chip on [her] shoulder” that's “getting worse.” Limbaugh later claimed that Obama is “even angrier” than President Obama and suggested that maybe she “just thought” she's been treated poorly because people “didn't fawn enough” concluding that this is all “continuing to roil the culture, rile up people who ought to have a different approach being made to them.” [Premiere Radio Networks, The Rush Limbaugh Show, 5/11/15]
Ingraham: First Lady Recited “A Litany Of Victimization.” During the May 11 edition of Courtside Entertainment Group's The Laura Ingraham Show, Ingraham mocked Obama's comments, saying she was just “angry”:
INGRAHAM: Race certainly kept her out of the wonderful Chicago whiteshoe law firm known as Sidley & Austin. The woman has struggled.
[...]
Now was that experience frustrating when you didn't get into all the Ivys when you applied? Or was it frustrating when you got your first acceptance letter from Princeton? I mean, when exactly was it frustrating?
[...]
I don't believe that story, never did. A lot of people are raising questions about that very convenient anecdote at Target, that she only mentioned, I believe, when she was on Letterman and People Magazine had written about this. But there's lots of questions. I went back and looked at the way she was dressed when she went into Target about two years ago now. No one would have mistaken her for a clerk. She was wearing a floral print button-down shirt with a yellow t-shirt underneath with a baseball cap. Since when do the employees at Target wear any of that? That just wasn't true. But this is the First Lady of the United States who has reached the pinnacle of success in our country, her husband has, and this was a litany of victimization which is exactly what we want young African-American graduates of a terrific university to take away with. [Courtside Entertainment Group, The Laura Ingraham Show, 5/11/15]
Sean Hannity: Speech Revealed A “Deep Rooted Anger,” “Bitterness,” And “Lack Of Appreciation” By The First Lady. After playing a compilation of speeches made by Michelle Obama during the May 11 edition of Premiere Radio Networks' The Sean Hannity Show, Hannity claimed that Obama's recent speech is “a culmination of anger, deep rooted anger, that has built up in Michelle Obama.” Hannity went on, “It's kind of sad. There's a bitterness here to the whole experience of being first lady, a lack of appreciation for the opportunities that they've had.” [Premiere Radio Networks, The Sean Hannity Show, 5/11/15]
Fox News Contributor: Obama's Commencement Speech Was “Very Divisive” Because Of Its “Race Baiting.” On the May 11 edition of Fox News' America's Newsroom, Fox contributor Deneen Borelli called the speech by Obama “a wasted opportunity.” She went on to assert that Obama was “being very divisive” and accused the first lady of “race baiting.” [Fox News, America's Newsroom, 5/11/15]
Breitbart.com: Michelle Obama Complained During Commencement Speech. In a May 11 post, Breitbart.com claimed the First Lady complained during her remarks and “accused the media of giving her unique attention”:
With less than two years left in the White House, Michelle Obama is taking time to respond to her critics, accusing them of treating her differently because she is the first African-American First Lady.
She made her remarks during a commencement speech at Tuskegee University over the weekend, comparing her experience as the wife of the first African-American president to the experiences of historical civil-rights leaders.
The First Lady recalled her experience on the campaign trail, accusing the media of giving her unique attention thanks to the “fears and misperceptions of others” who questioned whether she was “too loud, or too angry, or too emasculating.”
She alluded to Fox News personalities discussing her “terrorist fist jab” and referring to her on-screen as “Obama's baby mama” as well as Rush Limbaugh suggesting that she had “a little bit of uppityism” thanks to her nanny state food polices. [Breitbart.com, 5/11/15]