No, not the term-limited former president. The other Obama.

More accurately: Are you ready for another few months of wild-a** speculation about the improbable?

Fox News gives a hearty aye to the latter question, positing that former First Lady Michelle Obama could become a Democrat Deus ex machina in 2024. If Joe Biden stumbles or opts out — the latter highly unlikely, of course — Democrats will need someone spectacular to pull their chestnuts out of the general-election fire. And that someone ain’t Kamala Harris:

Democrats say Michelle Obama has the “it” factor that could maybe beat Donald Trump in 2024.

While Democratic leaders are publicly rallying behind Joe Biden to be their guy for the 2024 presidential election, behind the scenes Democrats are still mulling the best leader for the party who could win a stand-off against former President Donald Trump in 2024. …

Among the names of possible contenders, former first lady Michelle Obama’s name was floated ahead of the last Democratic presidential primary, although she has repeatedly denied any interest in seeking office. At 59, and with her “it” factor (as McKinnon labels it) she could emerge as a top candidate and Democrats could look to push her to run. She has previously denied any desire to seek candidacy.

Spoiler alert: There’s nothing in this report to suggest that Michelle Obama has developed any sudden interest in running for office. In fact, there’s nothing to suggest any change at all in either her status or that of the Democrats. This report is really nothing more than sheer speculation of the same kind we saw in 2016 and 2020 when Democrats were supposedly just as desperate as they supposedly are now.

Granted, it’s a lot easier to suppose that desperation these days, with Bumbling Biden clearly intending to run again. But still, nothing at all has changed, not even the speculation itself. It’s a silly bit of fluff.

With that said, though, who said we can’t have fun occasionally with silly bits of fluff? And it’s not as though Fox News is the only entity that keeps spinning the Michelle Obama fantasy/nightmare. Ever since the Obamas won a second term, Michelle’s ambitions have been a constant subject in political discussions.

So what can we make of the possibility? It seems very unlikely, especially in this cycle. If Mrs. Obama wanted to run for the presidency on the basis of her time as First Lady, the 2020 cycle would have been the optimal entry point. Hillary Clinton had lost the previous election, stopping a woman from becoming the first president. The Democrats’ 2019 field was weak, especially after Harris flamed Biden in the first debate and then flamed out shortly afterward. Democrats clearly wanted an alternative to Biden, and more importantly, an alternative that would promote their obsessions with diversity, equity, and inclusion.

All Mrs. Obama needed to do in late November 2019 was to have cleared her throat, and Democrats would have bodily carried her to every primary caucus and election. Biden and Bernie Sanders would have been pushed offstage so hard it would have looked like a Democrat attack ad against Paul Ryan. And she likely would have won the general election too against Trump as an even greater connection to pre-Trump normality, a clear desire from an exhausted electorate that benefited Biden. (And Michelle Obama likely would have beaten Trump in 2016 too, for that matter, because Hillary Clinton’s a lousy campaigner and the Obamas know how to organize and win elections. Someone should write a book about that.)

And yet … the Obamas sat it out. They made lots of money, cut deals to make movies, and largely avoided the political arena. What does that tell us about Michelle’s ambitions? Or Barack’s, for that matter?

And now, we’re supposed to think that Michelle Obama would consider jumping into a race in which she’d have to carry the carcass of Joe Biden’s performance on her own back, and might end up facing off against a Republican not named Trump? And that she’d stomp on Kamala Harris’ head to get there? I mean, it’s possible in the sense that anything’s possible, but it seems very unlikely.

If Michelle Obama wanted to be president, she’d already be president. It’s really that simple.

But don’t let that stop anyone from having fun with the fluff!

Addendum: As if to emphasize my point, CNN reports on an interview with Mrs. Obama about her anger and despair after Trump’s win in 2016:

Michelle Obama broke down shortly after leaving then-President Donald Trump’s inauguration, the former first lady candidly shared in a new podcast, as the emotions of leaving their family’s home after eight years and resentment over Trump taking office overwhelmed her.

“When those doors shut, I cried for 30 minutes straight, uncontrollable sobbing, because that’s how much we were holding it together for eight years,” Obama said, referring to her final trip aboard the presidential airplane.

Does that sound like someone eager to return to the White House? And if so, why not try and beat Trump in 2020?

The latest episode of The Ed Morrissey Show podcast is now up, our weekly look at media and politics with the Prince of Twitter, Andrew Malcolm! Today’s show features:

• News that the FBI and the Department of Energy both concluded that a lab leak in Wuhan is the likeliest origin for COVID-19 puts bureaucrats and media on the spot.
• Anthony Fauci appears to have engineered a cover-up from the beginning to shield himself and Francis Collins from the blowback of restarting gain-of-function research. Why did the media actively suppress discussion of the lab-leak theory as disinformation and conspiracy theory?
• We also discuss the death of the daily, or at least on a national-coverage basis. And why is California suffering a critical shortage of U-Hauls?

The Ed Morrissey Show is now a fully downloadable and streamable show at  Spotify, Apple Podcasts, the TEMS Podcast YouTube channel, and on Rumble and our own in-house portal at the #TEMS page!