Michelle: The Ultimate First Lady

Traditionally, first ladies come in two varieties, posits Sarah Vine in the Times of London: the “meek, supportive, grin-and-bear-it model”—think Barbara Bush or Nancy Reagan—and “two-for-the-price-of-one” hard-nosed ball-breakers like Eleanor Roosevelt or Hillary Clinton. But now we have Michelle Obama, the perfect synthesis of both types, with a fashion sense to rival Jackie O tossed in for good measure.

“Everything about this woman speaks to the modern, post-feminist woman,” Vine gushes. “She is manifestly clever, independently minded, attractive” and most of all unafraid to point out when Obama is “drinking too much of his own Kool-Aid.” It’s an exciting proposition. “It is not often one can go to sleep safe in the knowledge that there is an intelligent female voice being heard in the corridors of power.” (More Election 2008 stories.)