Originally posted at The Clash Daily
The first lady, Grandma Marian, a 70-person entourage, and two hormonal teenagers who’d rather have spent their spring break anywhere else but participating in Great Wall photo ops with Mom, spent approximately $3 million just to fly to Beijing China for a non-political visit with a distinctly political undercurrent.
Despite 24-hour butler service and seven days in the $8,400-a-night, 3,445 square foot, Jinmao Presidential Suite in the Bejing Westin, the Asian getaway got off to a rocky start when Grandma Marian began “barking” orders at the hotel staff.
After calming Granny down, Mrs. Obama took time to meet with China’s fetching steel drum-playing first lady Peng Liyuan and her husband Xi Jinping who, when not showering Michelle Obama with compliments, is busy amassing a huge army and aligning himself with Barack’s arch-nemesis Vladimir Putin.
The Obama contingent visited and brought their unique brand of abnormal to Beijing’s Normal School, toured the Forbidden City, took in a performance, and dined with Peng Liyun.
The first lady went all the way to China to participate in a virtual discussion with American youth about connecting with students around the world – except students in China, where Internet access and social media sites are censored.
Michelle got to visit Beijing’s Summer Place. Not her annual Martha’s Vineyard “summer place”, but Yuan Ming Yuan (the Gardens of Perfect Brightness). Then she met with American staff and family and kissed drooling babies at the U.S. Embassy in Beijing and the United States Consulate in Chengdu.
Reigning as supreme first lady of a nation that ranks #36 in academic achievement, Michelle felt qualified to participate in an educational roundtable where she lectured Chinese school children, who are #1 in the world in reading, math, and science, about the importance of getting a good education.
Michelle, first lady of a nation whose husband, the president, flouts the Constitution and crushes the First Amendment, also felt qualified to lecture an audience at Peking University. Those students would be thrown in prison or shot if they took Michelle’s message to heart and protested for the “universal right” to freedom of speech, religion, and access to the Internet, all of which are gradually fading away in the U.S.
Michelle also found time to complain about her tough childhood to children who often have only rice to eat and whose parents are lucky to be earning $10,000 in American dollars per year.
Then Mrs. Obama attempted to convince No. 7 High School children who live under Communist oppression that if they excel in their studies, which they already do, they could grow up to be another Lebron James, Janelle Monáe Robinson (no relation to Michelle LaVaughn Robinson), or President of the United States!
Taxpayers should be glad to spend millions of dollars for Mrs. Obama to jump rope, play Ping-Pong, practice tai chi in a dress and kitten heels, and wave red ribbons around. Not to mention footing the bill for the girls to visit ancient tourist sites like the Xi’an City Wall and the Museum of Qin Terracotta Warriors and Horses.
At the museum Sasha Obama looked bored to death and Michelle grimaced a lot too, probably because the first lady was disappointed to learn that terra cotta is not some kind of exotic Chinese dessert.
On her last day in China, Mrs. Obama, Grandma, Sasha, and Malia stood up for Tibetan minorities by watching pandas eat bamboo at the Chengdu Panda Base and by drinking yak butter tea and eating boiled yak ribs in Zangxiang Teahouse in Chengdu, China. For that event, there were no close-up pictures of Sasha’s expression or reports that anyone yakked during the yak luncheon.
After lunch, Mrs. Obama, her entourage, Grandma, Malia, and a very relieved Sasha went straight to the airport, climbed aboard the same plane that ferried them to China, and blew another $3 million flying home.
