Last night, ABC aired Oprah’s Christmas at the White House special, a piece of holiday fluff so fluffy they should make coats out of it. Not that there’s anything wrong with that there’s a time for Afghanistan and jobs and health care (topics Oprah didn’t entirely ignore, actually), and there’s a time for Bo Obama, holiday decorations, and First Couple banter about gift-giving. The time for the latter is, of course, whenever Oprah damn well says it’s time. For the benefit of the DVR-impaired, here are the top ten bits of valuable (read: not that valuable) insight we learned about the lives of the First Couple.
1. Obama has never swung on the White House swing set.
2. A bowl of apples in the Oval Office has become “hugely popular,” according to Obama.
3. Michelle Obama does not want another dog.
4. Bo Obama can give high-fives, and wears a collar of bells for the holidays.
5. A team of White House pastry chefs spent months planning and building a 390-pound white-chocolate-covered gingerbread White House, according to tradition.
6. 100 volunteers helped to decorate the eighteen-foot Christmas tree in the Blue Room, as well as the rest of the White House for the holidays.
7. Obama gives himself a “good, solid B+” for his performance this year, but an A- if health-care reform gets passed.
8. The last time Obama “lost his temper” — which, he says, entails speaking more crisply and with an “edge” — was a couple of days before the interview, when his economic team failed to resolve an issue that had already been debated three times.
9. Obama claims he gives nicer gifts than he receives, despite damning evidence to the contrary.
10. Obama’s favorite gift as a child was a bike. Michelle Obama’s was a dollhouse.
Here’s Obama grading himself:
