Why Malia Obama and boyfriend Rory Farquharson are irresistible tabloid fodder.

Hearts and Stars is Slate’s pop-up blog about celebrity relationships. Revelations about Farquharson’s high-school career included his membership in a chemistry club called the Blue Bunsen Society, and a report that “the girls all thought him ‘quite a catch.’ ” It’s always a bit nerve-wracking to watch a president’s child enter the public eye. When Alice Roosevelt, the rebellious oldest daughter of Teddy Roosevelt, was a teenager in the White House, the press reported on her personal travels, society luncheons in her honor, the details of her “coming-out” ball, her trip to Ohio to visit her future husband’s family, and her eventual White House wedding. When Vice President Richard Nixon’s daughter, Julie, got engaged to David Eisenhower in 1968, the New York Times called them “America’s newest celebrity sweethearts.” His other daughter, Tricia, had her wedding in the Rose Garden in 1971, an event that made the cover of Life magazine and the front page of the New York Times. In a 1993 New York Times article pegged to her 13th birthday, Frank Rich called her “a girl whose gawkiness, frizzy hair and orthodontically transitional smile stand in repeated contrast to the Aryan perfection of Sarah and Kristin Gore.” Compared to the coverage of other presidential kids’ dating lives, the stories about Malia and Rory feel both more breathless and more respectful.