'I Can Only Be Who I Can Be'.(The Last Word)(Michelle Obama)(Interview)

Byline: Richard Wolffe

'Sometimes I've been caricatured as this emasculating wife. Do you think anybody could emasculate Barack Obama?'

Michelle Obama, who is married to the democratic presidential front runner, would by some measures make an unconventional First Lady. She admires Hillary Clinton, for example, but says she doesn't want to emulate anyone else in that position. En route to Sheboygan, Wisconsin, before that state's primary, Obama talked with NEWSWEEK's Richard Wolffe about the "pluses and minuses" of her potential role, her joke-telling, Clinton and whether she has time for a "normal" relationship with her husband. Excerpts:

Wolffe: Did you have to tone down some of the honest talk about your husband because there was criticism about it?

Obama: What I concluded was that people didn't get the joke. It's like: "This isn't about my humor. I have to be more direct. This is what I'm trying to say. This is what I meant." So curbing it? No. It was just sort of making sure people understood.

Here's a joke.

Here's a joke. This is what a joke looks like -- Somehow I've been caricatured as this emasculating wife. [Laughs] Barack and I laugh about that. It's just sort of, like, "Do you think anybody could emasculate Barack Obama?" Really now.