Michelle Obama Keeps Focus on Military Families

Would-be first lady reaches traditional GOP constituency
By Matt Cantor,  Newser Staff
Posted Oct 20, 2008 10:20 AM CDT
Michelle Obama Keeps Focus on Military Families
Michelle Obama and daughters Malia, left, and Sasha, assemble care packages for troops serving in Iraq and Afghanistan during the Democratic National Convention's Delegate Service Day.   (AP Photo/The Denver Post, Brian Brainerd)

Michelle Obama has quietly carved out a niche that helps offset concerns about her husband's lack of military background: reaching out to spouses of service members. Rather than just delivering a speech, she's been hosting roundtable discussions, Politico reports. “I am here to listen and to do a lot of learning and then to transfer that information into the heart and mind of my husband,” she told attendees at one gathering.

Michelle Obama has called working with military families one of the “issues closest to my heart.” “If she becomes first lady, this will be her cause,” says a Marine wife who helped organize Blue Star Families for Obama, a “pro-military, pro-Obama” group. Says another: "We like Obama, but we love her. She gets what we are getting."
(More Michelle Obama stories.)

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