When is the president just the warm-up speaker? When Michelle Obama delivers the keynote

Obama plays adoring spouse at Clinton initiative

NEW YORK — Barack Obama knew his role when he took the stage at a global development meeting Thursday, and it was not leader of the free world.

It was adoring spouse.

In New York for meetings at the United Nations, the president hopped in a motorcade and ducked over to a downtown hotel to serve as the warmup act for his wife, who was speaking at a meeting of the Clinton Global Initiative founded by former President Bill Clinton.

Obama laid it on thick.

“I am not just here today to sing President Clinton’s praises or to commend all of you for the terrific work that all of you have done, although I am grateful for that,” Obama began. “I am here to play an even more important role. And that is to introduce my better half, my extraordinary wife and America’s extraordinary first lady, Michele Obama.”

The president was just getting warmed up.

“Bill Clinton understands where I am coming from here,” Obama said to cascades of laughter. “He knows what it is like to be married to someone who is smarter, somebody who is better looking, somebody who is just all around a little more impressive than you are.”

But wait, there was more.

“This is not news to people,” Obama said. “Since Michele and I first started dating 22 years ago, pretty much everybody I know who has met her at some point comes up to me and says, ‘You know, Barack, you’re great and all that. I like you. But your wife, she’s really something’. And, I, of course agree.”

Obama handicapped his wife as the odds-on favorite in a hypothetical Barack-Michelle political smackdown.

“I feel grateful that Michelle — so far at least — has not run for any offices I have been running for,” he said. “She would beat me thoroughly.”