Michelle’s Machine

[Geee]

Weekly Standard:

Sometimes the most important message of a speech is communicated by the atmospherics—timing, audience, venue. So it’s worth noting that, to mark the first anniversary of her Let’s Move! campaign against childhood obesity in February, First Lady Michelle Obama spoke not at a school or a kids’ recreational facility but at the North Point Community Church in Alpharetta, Georgia.

At first glance, celebrating with an evangelical Christian congregation might not be the obvious way to highlight the White House’s anti-obesity efforts. But the choice is part of a broader push by the Obama administration to get churches on board with the first lady’s health agenda.

Working through the White House Office of Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships and its satellites at various cabinet agencies, the administration launched the “Let’s Move Faith and Communities” initiative in November. Since then, the administration’s faith-based offices have been busily recruiting converts for the nutrition crusade. The executive director of the White House Office of Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships, Joshua DuBois, has been a cheerleader for Let’s Move! on the office’s blog. The director of the Center for Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships at the U.S. Department of Agriculture, Max Finberg, has joined with John Kelly—the strategic adviser for faith-based and neighborhood partnerships at the Corporation for National and Community Service (a federal agency)—to launch the National Anti-Hunger and Opportunity Corps. The organization is sending new AmeriCorps volunteers to urban and rural areas across the country, where they will work with churches and community groups to sign people up for food stamps.