The Two Americas of the State of the Union

Joe Biden offered a vision of a freer future for American women. Republicans put their woman in the kitchen.

On Thursday night, President Joe Biden gave his third annual State of the Union address and if you didn’t watch it, you missed quite a show. Biden is not often the most compelling speaker; he has many political talents, but wowing a crowd has not historically been one of them. Republicans, led by Donald Trump, have spent the past four years lambasting “Sleepy Joe” and casting Biden as a doddering and possibly demented old man. Even those of us who support Biden’s candidacy have watched him slow down in recent years. To hear conservatives tell it, Democrats were going to basically prop Biden up, Weekend at Bernie’s-style, as the president inevitably stumbled through an incoherent and gaffe-filled diatribe.

The Biden who spoke on Thursday was no Sleepy Joe. He was dynamic, funny (often bitingly so), and determined. He smacked down Republican hecklers, and laughed at the GOP’s stunning hypocrisies. It was a great speech, and it’s very clear that Republicans are regretting setting the bar so slow. Now, they’re complaining that Biden was too animated — he raised his voice, he wasn’t unifying enough. It’s honestly all delicious to watch.

What struck me most about Biden’s State of the Union, though, was how it contrasted with the GOP response, which was given by Sen. Katie Britt of Alabama. Britt is a young “rising star” in the Republican Party, a designation she seems to have earned by virtue of being under 60, female, and not obviously insane. Or at least, that was the case before Thursday. There is so much to say about Britt’s bizarre and frankly creepy speech, but the most salient point is this: Joe Biden set out a popular, common-sense agenda for women’s rights, one that positions women as masters of our own fates and decision-makers in our own lives. Katie Britt and her Republican Party painted a very different future for women: Afraid, valued only for being mothers, and in the kitchen.