Michelle Obama

Stephen dedicated the majority of the show to talking about the military, talking with a military guy, and interviewing First Lady Michelle Obama.

Today is the one-year anniversary of Joining Forces. Most of us would agree that supporting our military members and their families is important. It takes more than just saying that you support them to really make a difference. Joining Forces works in many different ways to make those differences in people's lives. It can be just as simple as neighbors helping neighbors. Is there a family with Dad or Mom serving overseas in your neighborhood? How can you help out? Maybe cutting the grass, shoveling snow in winter, picking up some groceries when you are at the store, or helping out with the kids occasionally.

It can sometimes be difficult to realize that those families are military families, so Stephen came up with the excellent idea of family members wearing military uniforms so that we easily recognize them. That Stephen. Always with those good ideas.

Another good idea - training a Marine to be a pundit. Stephen had Bryan Escobedo, a Marine, in the studio to learn all the ins and outs of being a pundit. Bryan got to sit, briefly, at Stephen's desk. He learned some of Stephen's talking points and learned that talking points don't necessarily have to make sense. Stephen asked Bryan to show fear. "I'm incapable of showing fear." A true Marine! Also they went over the use of statistics, mainly how to make up statistics that are close enough to what people would expect so that they seem believable.

First Lady Michelle Obama was actually on The Colbert Report before she was the First Lady, back when she was campaigning for Barack Obama. Stephen humbly pointed out that she had received the Colbert Bump.

Everyone can do something is the motto of Joining Forces. The First Lady told Stephen some of the reasons why she picked helping our military, along with focusing attention on childhood obesity, as something she wanted to do. She got to meet many military families while campaigning. They move more often than most families. Sometimes families move so often that children change schools ten to twelve times during a parent's military career. Jobs are also a real issue for the spouse of a military individual. Moving as often as they do makes it hard to hold down a job and to get a job in the first place.

Stephen did manage to remind Michelle Obama that he himself had served in Iraq for almost a week and thus considers himself to be military. He also asked if she was going to endorse Barack Obama, and yes she did endorse him for President.

So, go on over to Joining Forces and spend some time looking over the website. There's a lot of information there. You can watch a video of First Lady Michelle Obama talking with one military spouse and saying thanks.