Rush Limbaugh recently blasted first lady Michelle Obama about her size and body image. Apparently, according to Limbaugh, Michelle Obama is eating way too much and not looking thin enough. He said:
“It doesn’t look like Michelle Obama follows her own nutrition, dietary advice. I’m trying to say that our first lady does not project the image of women that you might see on the cover of the Sports Illustrated swimsuit issue.”
He further ranted about Michelle Obama eating ribs and her waist size which appears too large to him. Limbaugh believes that first lady Michelle Obama should have a smaller waist size to promote her anti-obesity program, Let’s Move, aimed at preventing childhood obesity and the associated debilitating diseases. He commented that her size is hypocritical to her anti-obesity stance. Now, women have Rush Limbaugh, a poster boy for Weight Watchers, commenting on how they should look and their public body image. If anything is hypocritical, it is Rush’s stance on a woman’s body size. A few years ago, Rush Limbaugh went a diet by the Quick Weight Loss Centers and he lost weight at that time. He made it seem so complicated like he was the only one smart enough to follow it and lose weight. Judging by his size now, the diet failed.
Although, many women strive to be smaller as seen by the infomercials, TV shows, diet gimmicks, diet fads, diet pills and the entire diet industry, many fail at their attempts to lose weight, just like Rush did. The media often perpetrates a size 2 swimsuit model size as the ideal image of beauty for women. And now women have Rush Limbaugh telling them what size they should strive to be. Unlike Limbaugh’s personal attack on Michelle Obama’s body image, the message of Obama’s Let’s Move will undoubtedly save some lives. Michelle Obama is not commenting on anyone’s body image. Instead, she is taking a sensible and healthy approach to eating and life style changes to transform the lives of children and youth. Nine million children and teens between the ages of 6-19 are overweight. And as conservative Republican Mike Huckabee noted with the problems the U.S. Armed Services has in finding recruits who are not obese, “rather than condemn Michelle Obama, I think we ought to be thanking her for what she has done.”
While Republicans want to wipe out health care reform and anti-obesity health efforts aimed at children, meanwhile the American people are getting bigger and sicker from the effects of obesity. The statistics on childhood obesity are staggering. And who does Rush Limbaugh think is paying for the high cost of health care associated with obesity? Instead of attacking Michelle Obama’s effort to reduce obesity and health issues among our youth, perhaps, Rush might want to take her advice to eat less, lose weight and move his body more and his mouth less. It couldn’t but help his waistline and body image.
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