Michelle Obama's got buff arms, but can she do this?

Our colleague, Jeannine Stein, has drawn considerable international attention in recent days with her examination elsewhere on this site of how new First Lady Michelle Obama strongly favors sleeveless garments.

This is either A) because it's so hot in Washington given the season and the onset of global warming, or B) because she's got buff arms and wants to show them off. Which is great. If you've got the guns, let the world see what they're in for. Sweaty guys have been ripping off their sweatshirt sleeves and trying this at the gym and beach for years.

And then we saw this amazing photo below by another colleague, Christine Cotter, from the weekend's World Figure Skating Championships at Los Angeles' Staples Center. And we got to wondering if Michelle Obama could do this with the newly elected commander in chief. What do you think?

-- Andrew Malcolm

Click here to register for automatic Twitter alerts on new Ticket items. Or we'll get Sinead "Outta My Way" Kerr to flip you around.

Photo (top): Michelle Obama. Credit: Pete Souza / The White House

Photo (bottom): Sinead Kerr tosses her brother, John, around during the World Figure Skating Championships in Los Angeles. Credit: Christine Cotter / Los Angeles Times

Comments

[LaMiaVerita]

I think she can but I'm not sure abut on skates. The real question is, would he let her?

[Richard]

Yes. As folks who do different kinds of partner dancing know, it's actually not that hard to support someone who weighs as much as 40 or 50 pounds more than you if you use the structure of your body to support their weight. The woman in the photo is essentially carrying the man on her hips, she's not holding him above her head. Women who do contact improvisation dance, for example, do this sort of thing all the time.

Michelle could definitely carry Barack -- I bet they weigh close to the same weight. She may even weigh a little more.

[Johanna Lapp]

I suspect she's been carrying him for a long, long time.