White House, non-profit tussle over poster

WASHINGTON, Aug. 11 (UPI) -- The White House and a Washington physicians groups are at odds over a poster that mentions President Barack Obama's daughters, officials said.

The Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine put up posters in Washington featuring a picture of an 8-year-old girl with the caption: "President Obama's daughters get healthy school lunches. Why don't I?"

The girl in the poster, Jasmine Messiah, is a vegetarian who attends a public school in Florida that does not offer vegetarian or vegan choices for school lunches, The Washington Post reported Tuesday.

PCRM, a non-profit that advocates on nutrition issues, put the posters up Aug. 3. The next day, the White House asked the organization to take them down but PCRM President Neil Barnard said the request would be declined.

"They felt that mentioning the president's children was off-limits," Barnard said.

Bonnie Angelo, the author of "First Families: The Impact of the White House on Their Lives," told the Post the mention of Obama's daughters in the poster "goes beyond what's allowable."

Barnard said he was "open" to further discussion at the request of the Office of the White House Counsel.