Michelle Obama has been upgraded from "regal" to "cool" in the New Yorker's profile of the next First Lady. She says "freaky." She says "Oh shit" about Obama Girl. Basically she's normal, which isn't news except no one else seems willing to come out and say it. In fact screw "which president would you rather get a drink with." I'd rather get a drink with Michelle Obama, and maybe laugh at the slick-hair stripey-shirt guys next to us, and then get in a fight with them in which she'd have to do all the fighting, and then go to another bar to make fun of more people. That's really what it comes down to: Michelle Obama makes fun of people. And that is cool.

I know! I know! She's not really the near-bully that the press makes her so that Obama seems even more charming. But damn, "sarcastic" is a good thing, and she's really got it. I'm not saying every other hopeful first lady was a wilting flower, but they all eventually pretend to be, and even Hillary Clinton really was awkward and not fun. The New Yorker's cute humanizing story about Clinton was that when an aide shouted "Stop! Stop!" in the White House hall, Clinton spun and sang "Stop! In the name of love!" Not funny.

Whereas Michelle has a story about how she and Barack argued over whether marriage mattered, and in the middle of one of those arguments, he proposed to her. And a story about her daughter getting fat. And a story about how voting was never a big deal for her. She's not trying to be funny, so she just is. Like the magazine puts it, she's exciting just by being a regular person. The Onion was kind of right: Electing the Obamas is like some crazy movie, but it's because for once the first lady is wackily likeable.

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