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The First Lady Fake Bake

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The Tampa Tribune

Published: June 20, 2008

Cindy McCain does not look like the kind of would-be first lady who has ever eaten a cookie, much less baked one.

So it should not shock anyone that recipes being passed off under her name are not - brace yourself - actually hers.

In a week when McCain and her challenger for first lady, Michelle Obama, were under intense scrutiny for everything they said and everything they did, the silliest salvo came when it was revealed that the oatmeal-butterscotch cookie recipe published in Family Circle magazine under McCain's name really came from a Hershey's cookbook. Obama offered up a shortbread recipe - how radical - but at least no one has come forward to challenge its authenticity.

Those who chart such first lady foibles will remember that a few months ago, McCain was outed as having pilfered recipes from the Food Network Web site and listing them as "McCain Family Recipes" on the campaign Web site.

The campaign blamed that pasta plagiarism on an intern. Now are voters to worry giving this woman access to the White House kitchen will undermine the nation's home-baked values?

Really, is there a need for family recipes to be a litmus test for being first lady? If the nation expected the first lady to actually cook a state dinner, that might be different. But taxpayers are fully aware that they employ White House chefs for the very purpose of not having the first lady cook.

If the candidates' wives want to be part of the "kitchen cabinet" of advisers, that's fair campaign fodder. Whether they know how to use anything in an actual kitchen cabinet is hardly a concern.

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