Barack with his rising-sun logo.Photo: Getty Images

Glambama strikes again! Barack Obama’s campaign has arranged for twenty fashion designers to create clothing and tote bags to sell on the campaign’s Website next month. The funny thing is the whole project came about in sort of a real-life Project Runway challenge scenario. Robin Givhan reports for the Washington Post that once grassroots supporters convinced the Obama camp to go along with the idea, designers had one week to sign on, come up with a sketch for the campaign to approve, and present a sample. With no strict rules on pricing, designers were allowed to use Barack’s image and his rising-sun logo in their designs. (Runway producers: Are you taking notes?) Diane Von Furstenberg and Isaac Mizrahi designed tote bags. Derek Lam designed a cotton muslin bag with a carnation print from his spring 2004 collection. Tracy Reese made a shirt, and Charles Nolan made a wrap T-shirt. Rumor has it Vera Wang, Russell Simmons, and Beyoncé are also contributing designs.

And remember that “Runway to Change” Obama fund-raiser being held here during Fashion Week, the invites for which misspelled Anna Wintour’s name? The designers who contributed to the clothing project have been asked to attend wearing their designs.

Givhan notes of the new clothes and bags, “The benefit to the candidate is a direct line to the ‘Project Runway’ crowd. The risk, of course, is being perceived as highbrow or shallow.” We say go ahead and sling that mud, Obama haters. It will be hard to make it stick to his supporters when they’re looking so Glambamarous in their new duds.

Fashion Designers Hope to Stitch Up an Obama Win [WP]
Related: Obama’s People Misspell Anna Wintour’s Name in a Bad, Bad Way

There’s a brain behind that headband!Photo: Elle.com

We wish we could say Mary-Kate Olsen really lets herself shine through in her Elle cover profile in the current issue (like all other such cover subjects so often do). But we can’t. The girl seldom, if ever, speaks to reporters these days, and she certainly had no intention of letting the Elle writer in on her deep, dark secrets during the trapeze class they took together (that was Mary-Kate’s idea — isn’t she quirky?). At least the article confirmed what we thought we knew: Mary-Kate is too blasé to be our new best brunch buddy, and if you ask her questions, her answers don’t really make sense. We trimmed the fat from the piece and bring you her best quotes:

On her purported eating disorder, which she has never been quoted on:

“I think it’s important that what anybody goes through — and I’m not saying that it’s true or not true — you realize it’s part of growing up. Everybody is going to go through hard times. It’s a part of life. I think the hardest part to get to is that point of asking for help or reaching out to other people and being honest with yourself. I do not want to go through my life with my eyes shut. And I don’t want to go through it with a closed mind. I want to be aware of things. And I’d rather know than not know.”

On Heath Ledger’s death:

“I’m not going to comment on that. I won’t give you a word about that in the nicest way possible. Let’s move on.”

On if she has ever seen a shrink:

“Yeah. I talk with people. I think it’s important. I wouldn’t call ‘em a shrink, but it’s good to have communication with whomever, whether it’s a mentor or a therapist or a psychiatrist, whether it’s your mom or your dad or your best friend. I think at some point I had to say that I deserve to be happy. As Diane [Von Furstenberg] would say, it was okay to love myself and be my best friend. I think everyone deserves that.”

On what it’s like to work with her twin sister:

“We don’t agree all the time. The way we go about business or designing or making a decision is that we come at it from two completely different angles that at the end of the day, even when we don’t think we’re agreeing with each other, we are agreeing. We’re just getting there in different ways. Unless you’re a twin, you honestly can’t know how close twins can be. There’s such a strength, but that also makes it…” Her voice trails off. “When there’s that much love there’s…” Again she stops…”[T]here’s the opposite of everything, but it stems from love, and it stems from passion. We’re driven people. I do know I can’t work in an office. Ashley, on the other hand, loves going to an office.”

On if it’s harder to date as a “rich” and “famous” person:

“[T]hat’s a weird question. Let’s start with the words rich and famous. Those are weird words … It’s nobody’s business if I am or not. I mean, if you want to have a discussion about fame and what does it really mean to be famous these days, what’s celebrity anymore, what’s media? That’s different. I have a completely different point of view about all this because I was never thrown into it. I grew up in it. It wasn’t something that I aspired to. It’s just something I knew. For me, I just worked. I had a job. I’ve had a job for 21 years.”

On turning the trapeze lesson into something metaphorical about life:

“I think sometimes there’s a certain safety in not feeling safe. I don’t want to ever feel too safe. I mean, with my close friends and family, it’s important to feel safe. But do I feel safe up there on that trapeze? No! I think you just have to feel not safe, exactly, but comfortable. Comfortable enough, like right now at this trapeze school, to let go when somebody says, ‘Jump.’”

If your thirst for inspiration feels as severely unquenched as ours did after reading this, we suggest rocking out to the new Donna Summer album and not giving a damn about what anybody thinks about it.

THE TAO OF MARY-KATE [Elle (only partially online)]