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When she first appeared on the political stage, Michelle was dismissed as a slightly awkward, intellectual lawyer: an
angrier, AfricanAmerican version of the young Hillary Clinton. But when Vogue was finished with her, Michelle was
recreated as a softly elegant global fashion icon and role model: a perfect Jackie to her husband’s JFK for a
multiracial age.
The Vogue cover was the culmination of a year of hard work by the ambitious and hardworking Ms. Wintour, a
committed Democratic Party fundraiser who spotted the White House potential of the Obamas when Barack was still
regarded as a rank outsider. As his star began to rise, Michelle appeared in clothes by fresh, exciting young
designers, and political sources say the influence of Ms. Wintour on her choice of wardrobe is unmistakable. ‘Anna
makes Mrs. Obama feel glamorous,’ an administration insider told The Mail on Sunday. So successful has Wintour’s
guidance been that Michelle, rather than Barack, was regarded as the star of this year’s bitterly fought Presidential
election.
Now highly placed diplomatic sources in Washington have revealed Michelle is driving the campaign to reward Ms.
Wintour by making her an ambassador to Paris. The move has been greeted by astonishment on this side of the
Atlantic, particularly because of Ms. Wintour’s reputation as a capricious ice maiden. Indeed her legendary frostiness,
which earned her the soubriquet Nuclear Wintour, seems at odds with the art of international diplomacy.
She once described overweight people in Minneapolis as looking like ‘little houses’, and she is known for frequent
angry outbursts. Her chilly demeanour is made all the more intimidating by her love of dark glasses – even indoors.
British journalist Toby Young – who satirised his fiveyear stint in New York with Conde Nast, the magazine company
that publishes Vogue, in the book and film “How To Lose Friends And Alienate People” – said: ‘She presides over the
fashion business with the imperial hauteur of a Prussian general and expects instant, unquestioning obedience.
‘It’s hard to imagine a personality less suited to the world of international diplomacy. She left school at 16 and has
been working in fashion ever since. Obama’s chauffeur probably knows more about international relations than her.
It’s like Caligula making his horse a senator.’
One fashion editor in London said: “It’s incredible the most powerful nation on Earth should even consider appointing
the least d iplomatic woman on Earth as an envoy. She is joyless and intimidating.”