Candidate's wife says change not emotion

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NEW YORK, Feb. 15 (UPI) -- Michelle Obama, wife of Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Barack Obama, says they view enthusiasm of supporters with a certain degree of concern.

"When you're really trying to make serious change, you don't want people caught up in emotion because change isn't emotion," she told Katie Couric in a "CBS Evening News" interview. "It's real work and organization and strategy. I mean, you pull people in with inspiration, but then you have to roll up your sleeves and you've got to make sacrifices and you have got to have structure."

On the issue of experience, which often comes up with Obama, D-Ill., in his first U.S. Senate term, Michaelle Obama said, "I say that the measure of leadership is the choices that people made over a lifetime, not when everybody's looking.

"Now, when was the last time we've had a president of the United States who spent years working on the streets in a major city, for years working with people who never had a voice and advocating for better streets, cleaner streets, safer communities?"

Asked if she and her husband look at one another and ask, "Can you believe this?'' Michelle Obama said, "Yeah. It's probably once a week now. Yeah, absolutely. This is a trip."