Stabitha Wrote:
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> If it's not a vacation than why is the White House
> calling it a vacation and barring the press from
> covering the trip?
The White isn't calling FLOTUS' trip to China a 'vacation':
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On this, her third solo foreign trip abroad, sticky, tricky issues such as human rights and international trade abuses are decidedly not on Mrs. Obama's agenda, at least not in an obvious way. She is not expected to be making dramatic pronouncements about, say, women's rights, as former FLOTUS (and possible future POTUS candidate) Hillary Clinton once did on a trip to China.
That's not Obama's FLOTUS style.
She has turned out to be a skillful blend of first-lady convention and innovation, seamlessly switching from workouts with kids on the White House lawn, to glittery state dinners in couture fashion to "mom-dancing" with Jimmy Fallon on his late-night gab show. But she rarely says or does anything truly controversial or explicitly political, and she isn't planning to start in China.
"I'll be focusing on the power and importance of education, both in my own life and in the lives of young people in both of our countries," she said in her first post on her travel blog of the trip.
Obama will be promoting more subtle "people-to-people relations" on her three-city tour (Beijing, Xi'an and Chengdu), says Ben Rhodes, deputy national security adviser for communications.
"Her agenda sends a message that the relationship between the United States and China is not just between leaders, it's a relationship between peoples," Rhodes said, according to a White House transcript of a conference call with reporters, Rhodes and the first lady's chief of staff, Tina Tchen, on Monday.
"Her focus on education and youth empowerment is one that we believe will resonate in China."
http://www.usatoday.com/story/life/people/2014/03/19/michelle-obama-her-mother-and-daughters-head-to-china/6540019/
Conserva-tards!
LoLz!