Diana Reese, a freelance journalist based in Kansas, listened to Michelle Obama deliver a speech at a Wal-Mart in Springfield, Mo., yesterday. The speech was about healthy eating and Wal-Mart’s hand in making healthy food available at a low cost, but all Reese could think about was: Why this Wal-Mart?

She writes in the Washington Post:

Of all the Wal-Marts, in all the towns, in all the world, first lady Michelle Obama on Thursday walked into the Wal-Mart Neighborhood Market in this southwest Missouri college town where a battle has raged over whether to allow the chain to build a store in the historic downtown. …

[T]he event felt too much like a commercial for Wal-Mart, which has come under fire nationally for its treatment of workers and locally in Springfield for its plans to build a Neighborhood Market in an historic downtown neighborhood. (No one could answer the question why Springfield got the nod as the Wal-Mart for Obama’s visit.)

Unsolved mystery.

@eScarry