As soon as Senator Katie Britt started speaking, I knew exactly who she is. She is so many of the pastor's wives and Sunday School teachers I knew growing up in an Evangelical church. Be sweet. Obey.
It was so infuriating how she blatantly lied about the issuesto blame Biden for problems the Republicans intentionally engineered. She helped put together the bipartisan border bill and then when Trump ordered them to not "let Biden have a win" she voted against it!
The first lie was that it was a "response". It was pre-taped. Then more to follow. Lies are the "alternate facts" of the current GOP. TFFG has made lying very fashionable.
BTW: I'll bet she and hubby are Swingers. In order to be a true bible thumping conservative doesn't one have to be a true hypocrite?
But “sweet and soft-spoken”, so she doesn’t come across as threatening. That’s almost more scary. Schlafly was nasty and condescending in her rhetoric. Everyone knew where she was coming from.
I also remember Anita Bryant, that woman who did the Minute Maid orange juice commercials. She hated LGBTQ and spoke out publicly. In 1977 she got a pie in the face.
Good point connecting the green dress to the wives in The Handmaid’s Tale! I hadn’t thought of that, but you are so right! I wanted to see the GOP rebuttal, but the way she spoke creeped me out. I had to turn it off,
Someone is going to get fired over this. She has "handlers" or whatever they call themselves. Listen Katie, Honey-child, shouldn't you be making decisions about something SO important as YOU representing the fools in the GOP?......or was it some man telling you how you should be? ............. Two fools: him AND you. ............ I can NOT wait for tonight's SNL!
"do as I say, not as I do" because of course, she will insist being a Senator is how she "serves her husband and children". They must avoid claiming independent personhood at all costs, because violently enforcing all social hierarchies is their MO.
Maybe you're not MAGAscum - maybe you're just another failed member of the MoronLeft, the idiots who never have and never will amount to anything. In that case, your Volvo's parked outside and here are your Earthshoes. Now go away. I stopped thinking any of you were of any use 50 years ago.
And, we now have to build a pier to get food to the starving homeless Palestinians. Does anyone find this crazy? Why can't food come from Israel? Oh, that's right: they are filthy rats to be Exterminated...or, wait, Israel owns that word because of the Holocaust...substitute: Eliminated..
Somebody should be asking the question, why is Israel bombing the Gazans to the tune of 30,000 dead yet it still claims it's killing Hamas fighters? Good grief, isn't Hamas all dead by now? Who does Israel think it's fooling other than the Biden administration? And why haven't they found the source of Hamas' weapons but simply insist it's Iran, even though Iran no longer has a way to get them into Gaza?
Excellent insight, Jess. I turned off the volume and watched her, and it was equally creepy. Sen.Britt looked like she was auditioning for a part in a dramatic play. The hand motions, the facial expressions…all over the top. I’m sure she is governing just like she is instructed to do by her pastor and her husband. She looks like a kettle about ready to boil over.
I couldn’t listen to her either and turned down the sound. I definitely understand the kitchen setting, you womenfolk best stay in the kitchen where you belong.
i guess I totally missed the point. My reaction was why in the world did a woman who has risen to be a US Senator speak from her kitchen! Like so many other women who have not been able to get out of the kitchen and make a place for themselves in business, society, government---and my takeaway was that she failed to speak up for the Republican party ideas like past politicians who have made speeches after the State of the Union.
The irony of where she gave this speech was not lost on us. Republicans want women barefoot, pregnant, in the kitchen, NOT voting or working and SILENT.
Martha Stewart, imho, is the most powerful and directed woman in the history of capitalism. She instinctively KNOWS the pulse of the heart, the beating core of a female who desires aesthetic, beauty and serenity. In our capitalist society, one may buy this elixir for the heat's content.
Martha encapsulates the foibles of capitalism, to reach the pinnacle of monetary success - alone.
Right, Martha from the Bible was overly devoted to cooking and cleaning. When Jesus came to visit her and her sister Mary, Mary sat down and listened to his teachings while Martha continued to clean in a frenzy. She got rebuked by Jesus for that, which seemed a little unfair but was one I used in arguments about housecleaning. I haven't read it yet, but I assume that where the Marthas in The Handmaid's Tale came from.
My mother named my older sister Martha, and myself, Mary. She said it was from the bible story, but get this - she never actually read it. She was a religious Catholic but never actually read the bible.
Tis a chuckle to me, for your reference to this classic literary critique of gender roles ; and I misunderstood you were referencing the world's foremost female entrepreneur ....
Several on Heather's site said they could only watch a few minutes. I get it. It was hard.
I wanted to turn it off but HAD to watch it to the "Godly" bitter end; it's a classic piece of shit. Everyone who didn't see it should go back and put up with it. You NEED to know.
Wait until tonight : SNL will have a picnic with it.
SNL could have done a better job with this. I find SNL not as funny/clever as it was years ago. And, I hate that they make fun of my President. One thing he's not and that's THE DEVIL.
Thank you for validating my automatic turning off of the sound as soon as I heard her voice. I knew she wasn’t going to say anything I would agree with, or even respect. And then the stupid NYT feels that Biden’s speech “needed context” while not calling out Britt’s LIES 🙄🙄🙄🙄
I ended up at your Substack from the link on Heather Cox Richardson’s “Letters from an America”. So glad to have discovered you. This post is very good.
They say in Iran that if you give the mullahs a fingertip, they take your whole hand. It was a bitter lesson they learned when they traded the devil they knew - the Shah- for a much worse one, the Ayatollah.
As in Iran, once these fundies, the religious fanatics like Johnson and Britt, get real power they never relinquish it. We would do well to remember this.
A vote against Republicans is a vote against a US Ayatollah and the destruction of what remains of our civil society.
During the Iranian revolution, the people did not willingly trade the Shah for the Ayatollah. So many of the progressive leaders of the movement had been killed, imprisoned or forced into exile by the brutal Shah (which the US supported) that the religious fundamentalists seized the opportunity to step into the vacuum, forcing many leftists to flee for their lives.
Yep. We would do well not to forget that we "made that bed and now" have to live with the consequences. The wE being the power of the USA and more so. Big Oil that over-reacted to Iran nationalizing their oil fields. Kind of a bad case of, "how do like us now"? some 50 years later.
Yes. However a great many of the revolutionaries sheepishly admitted they were better off under the Shah, especially post -Iran/Iraq War. Our mistake was continuing to support him through his worst excesses, as we are doing now with Bibi.
What Iranian women must feel about their lot post-Shah I'm sure would be unprintable- were anyone to ask them.
Those women have been protesting loudly and getting killed. Wow, what a contrast to the cowardly "gals" in the US who just shut their mouths until they're told what to say, and when.
Britt's performance seemed surreal to me as a purported SOTU response. Agree completely with your characterization of "the fundie baby voice" but also with her choice of affect generally. Indeed, many of the descriptions here in the comments are the same phrases my wife and I used as well while she was speaking last night, including one commenter's observation that she sounded like the voiceovers on SPCA commercials and the like. At one point, I expected that she would fake a tear or two to go along with the mildly quavering voice. After a policy-specific SOTU, her response was simply to double down on over the top culture war generalizations (e.g., stressing a few instances of immigrant violence while conveniently ignoring the substantial evidence of the law abidingness of most immigrants and their financial contributions to our economy) and vague, fleeting references to kitchen table issues (ignoring everything Biden laid out with respect to those problems and their remedies). Almost no specifics, no plan, no vision for the future, just "Biden bad." Ultimately, I suspect that her delivery will be the only thing remembered from her speech, right there with Marco Rubio's water bottle.
“…no specifics, no plan, no vision for the future…” Don’t forget that in 2020 the Republican Party literally had no platform. Don’t forget that when Biden entered office, his team was quite literally forbidden entry into the White House to start preparing for the transition to a new administration. For instance, in the midst of an actual pandemic, there were stockpiles of vaccine without a plan for distribution, etc. And they still have no platform, no plan, no vision, just a return to the white male-dominated past.
No, now they have the 2025 blueprint for dismantling democracy and turning this country into a white Christian Nationalist theocratic pseudo-democracy. What she said and they intend are not the same thing.
DJT needs $$$ so being dictator is a cash grab just like his pal Putin. That meeting last week with the Hungry Dictator was a check on how is he doing. Giving him the pointers to become doctor on day one & NEVER return to a Democracy!!!!
I suspect that is true, which makes her opening "orientation statement" that 'she and her husband just finished watching the SOTU in her living room' just another casual lie - like her lies of omission concerning the time (actually 2004-08, not recently), place (Mexico, not the US or even close to the border), and administration (GWBush, not Biden) under which the sex trafficking incident she related occurred (hat tip to Jonathan Katz).
Someone actually put out a Facebook post with that ‘Angels’ song from the ASPCA ad over her speaking. It’s even more chilling. And boy did I recognize that ‘voice’ but hadn’t realized yet where I knew it from. SBC/church. Wow.
Thank you for identifying the thing that made the speech so creepy. The voice. As a 75 year old who escaped Fundamentalism 55 years ago I’d forgotten about the way women were taught to speak and act.
In fact I was waiting for the moment she turned to the stove and pulled a sheet of chocolate chip cookies out of the oven to prove her bonafides. If this is the best Alabama has no wonder they have the judges they do.
If she thinks, as you said, women belong in their home with their children, baking cookies, having supper when their sweet baboo comes home from a long, hard day from working harder than ever to have enough money to ensure they can buy chicken and dumplings for a Sunday dinner, then why the heck is she in Congress?
I'd say she views herself as one of the few women who should be working. She signals this by starting off with her mom schtick and by sitting at the kitchen table.
Because they know they're losing suburban women in droves. Women who are married to Republican men but secretly vote Democrat. Educated women with kids who want to protect their medical rights to do what they want with their bodies. That's why. This isn't going to help them, however. Women are the best a spotting a fake crazy beeyotch when they see one.
Yup. We're adept at sniffing out shady people, as our safety frequently depends on it.
This is the same crap McCain tried to pull when he nominated the sanctimonious but smiling, y'all-slinging Alaskan dingbat. We weren't interested then, either, because we knew it was the most cynical pandering and neither of them actually gave a crap about us, just what we could do for THEM.
And the guys were all titillated over Sarah Palin and her tight skirts and boots! And big hair! Such pandering bullshit....Elizabeth Warren is the Senator from my state..... I’ll listen to her any day of the week 👍😂🇺🇸🙏
Right? Give me a brilliant, principled, empathetic, energetic, no-nonsense wonk over basically anyone else. LOVE her. I was devastated when she didn't become the nominee, and the crap about her not being "electable" (if there was ever a self-fulfilling prophecy) was crazymaking. She's, what, too sensible? OMG. I'm so glad we have her. (I'm from NH and she is my adopted Senator. :D <3)
Those stiletto heels and how, during her speeches, some of the cameramen would pan down to her legs in those shoes... I had an elderly male friend back then who just about had a heart attack whenever he watched her on TV.
Google Phyllis Schlafly. She was a lawyer who traveled the nation, railing against the Equal Rights Amendment. A lawyer. Traveling the nation. She advocated for women’s traditional roles, all the while away from home full time. The usual hypocrisy.
I remember Phyllis Schlafly and her desire to have women return to the "traditional" role of women, meaning only there to support her husband... while not having a traditional role herself. She was a piece of... work.
Why can’t we have a public conversation about the importance of caregiving without it having to be a women’s role issue? I see so many millennial males sharing the traditional tasks (grocery shopping with toddlers in tow) and the idea that this is a men’s vs women’s issue keeps us from making progress on the real problem: that capitalism AND the participation of women in the workforce has created an incentive for everyone to “earn” and we have lost sight of the importance and value of investment in humans - education and life balance and family. But we can have that AND women can be allowed to share power and participate in business. We just need to be more imaginative with our policies to support families, not by regressing on women’s rights, or narrowly defining marriage/partnership.
Are you old enough to remember Phyllis Schlafly? Because that is precisely the way SHE defined the proper role of women vis a vis men, and frankly, at a time when the Vietnam was was still raging on, she may have feared that WOMEN might be called to be drafted and serve in the armed forces. [That's how she scared a lot of women from signing off on the Equal Rights Amendment, anyway]. You state:
"we can have that AND women can be *allowed* -interesting choice of words here- to share power and participate in business.
I am not sure that we should be "allowed" But the very reason that we can have that, Shawna, is precisely because many women came long before you and DEMANDED to be 'allowed" an equal place in the sun and started taking jobs that paid a lot more. Women were allowed to be nannies and teachers and secretaries.
That change didn't happen by itself. At my local papermill men had been working there without any special test that they needed to pass in order to be "allowed". But as soon as women demanded to competed for these jobs, then a test was created to exclude *women* who could not lift 100 Lbs.
There were a number of men who had been there for a while and could not lift 100 Lbs. They were just "grandfathered in".
I am glad that you see millennial men taking their proper place and helping with house chores. That is more recent too, and again, women had to demand that change.
I totally agree with you that we need to invest in humans., a lot more than in machineries that take the place of humans and relegate these humans to the unemployment lines.. And remember how folks who don't have a job are thought of in conservative circles.
Indeed, we need to be more imaginative to support families, and it is an absolute scandal that we are one of only 5 countries in the world that do not allow family leave, paid or not. Most countries allow paid maternal and paternal leave, even countries like Muslim countries. Have a look at this map:
I lived in Egypt for several years and was pleased to see young Egyptian fathers sharing in child care, cooking, cleaning, etc. They have a long way to go, but they're a country that values families over everything.
I would draw a comparison to the “token Black” shtick that Repuglicans regularly trot out as evidence of their “multi-cultural” bona fides, like Tim Scott or, now the truly cringe-worthy misogynist and antisemite Mark Robinson. Reminds me of my wack-job Texan neighbor in rural Colorado who prided himself on giving a Black man a ride to their Sunday church brunch as evidence of, “See what I did? No way I’m a racist!”
For the same reason the male GOP Senators can call out the ELITES when Hawley, Cotton, Cruz and that version of FogHorn Leghorn, Kennedy (La) and a few more I am missing with their Elite educations from undergrad thru Law School from Ivy League institutions, including Oxford & Cambridge of course. Hippo-crites.
By speaking from our kitchen, she's signaling that she is a homemaker first. She hasn't. Congress is to help restore women to their rightful role in society.
I only caught the last half of her response and it made my blood run cold. I can understand playing a role as survival, but I didn't see anyone twisting her arm in her perfect kitchen. She stands with evil and that is all I need to know.
I was determined to listen…but I couldn’t. Kept jumping up and leaving the room…going back in…then just muted it for good. Too creepy and odd like a horror movie or skit. How did they think this would impress anyone?
Did anyone see the article about the sect ACB belongs to? The men control the money of all the women in their homes, even if an adult woman is living in a home as a guest? It's a man deferring weird cult like thing and if this had been common knowledge there would have been objections, that's why her confirmation was so fast.
All my friends were nauseated by this performance. A hallmark movie one reported. And a high school play audition another texted. It was insulting and addressed nothing of substance just insinuated that democrats are devils. I was particularly offended by the cross. Oh. And she didn’t even refer to that paragon of virtue the former guy whose morality is such an inspiration to the world. The hypocrisy is beyond belief.
What’s crazy to me is the contrast w her normal speaking voice and how she slipped into character. What does that character say about her voters and herself? I always think about Liz Cheney saying there are a handful of true believers and the rest are faking it.
OMG. Man, they REALLY think everyone is as stupid as the Alabamians who voted for these fools. Her delivery was cartoonish -- like a slow, creepy reading to little kids by someone who hasn't actually interacted with little kids (i.e. doesn't know that they're people and you can just...talk to them). What a bunch of weird, out-of-touch (LOL @ her describing Biden that way, as if the Drumpenführer has ever personally bought groceries in his life) freaks. Just goes to show that if you have absolutely no scruples, lying and fearmongering is a GREAT way to acquire and consolidate power. (And then they talk about how OTHERS are going to have trouble with St. Peter or whatever. They really believe that they can acquire power by any means necessary, no matter how craven, and as long as they say it's for Jesus, they have "total immunity." If I weren't atheist, I'd be looking forward to said Jesus informing them of what He ACTUALLY meant [what He said].)
I read this to my husband and he thought I wrote it, that’s how identical you & I agree.
I wasn’t planning on watching the rebuttal at first, then I heard her speak and, like you, “wtf, I know that tone…” that breathy sexy baby but good moral woman - wink wink, unless you piss me off” BS you KNOW is an affectation. Arrrrgha.
Then you read her credentials- even though I question “one of 19 Valedictorians”?
>A graduate of Enterprise High School, Britt was a cheerleader there and one of 19 valedictorians upon graduation in 2000.< wickipedia
The rest reads fantastic and you’d think “SO accomplished!” Then, she speaks.
WTF did we do WRONG!!!
And the republicans are setting up all of society by their playbook having infiltrated everywhere! They do not even understand that it is THEIR LIBERTIES AS WELL THAT THEY ARE GUTTING.
That's what's so hilarious and terrible about the Alabama/IVF thing. They obviously spent zero time thinking that one through (logistically -- I imagine they spent plenty of time patting themselves on the back for being sooo clever). Just legislate away other people's rights, with no concern for the actual consequences, then freak out when the leopards don't discriminate when they're hungry and there are people's faces everywhere.
"The breathless speech, the incongruent facial movements and smiles. The cadence of condescension. I am better than you, and here are the ways. I have children. They are perfect. I have a marriage. It is perfect. I am pretty and well-educated. I am a Christian—I am god fearing and I prove it by holding hands with my family and praying for the rest of you. I am better than you."
I think you've nailed it here, Jess. I'm in the process of writing a response to the article on Aaron Rupar's Public Notice post about Planned Parenthood in Missouri. This is in part what I written (but not posted yet) so far:
All women must accept God’s will, according to believers. Women must subjugate themselves to God’s will in all things. Because they were born Woman, which was also God’s will, all Women must accept without question their only role as Women in God’s eyes—to give birth to every seed that is implanted in their womb.
Katie Britt has complied with God's will. Therefore, she has the authority to judge and pity and destroy anyone else who does not accept God's will. That's what I saw in her eyes. That's what I heard in the sudden change in the tone of her voice.
She is out to destroy anyone who does not adhere to her world view. And she's willing to do anything to do so. The change in tone from sweet to pissed is for the purpose of getting your attention, so she can then lie to you about the seriousness of the situation at the southern border. She gets your attention by changing her tone of voice, and shooting of darts of hatred from her eyes and you start to pay attention to see what could possibly justify such a shift in tone, so much contempt. She has to lie about what's really going on, though: 1) follow a GIGANTIC LIE (about Biden inheriting the most secure border ever) 2) with a partial truth (Biden took 94 executive actions in his first 100 days) 3) sandwiched in between another lie ( that destroyed the secure border he inherited) because the truth, the reality, the facts, DO NOT SUPPORT HER LEVEL OF ANGER. Only a complete rewriting of reality, of history, destruction of facts, can accomplish that. So that's what she does.
A truly dangerous woman showed all Republican women how it's done. From the kitchen of her lovely home that was most likely paid for mostly by her husband, a former professional football player for the New England Patriots.
All the religions were created by men, as were all the laws, all which subjugated women, minorities, and the weak. I started rejecting the concept of God when I was 12 because of the horrible conditions of my home life, and even thinking that there might not be a god terrified me that I would be 'smote down', which of course, never happened. People who believe this stuff are terrified into even questioning it.
Thank you for explaining what I could not comprehend when I saw this Senator, posed at her kitchen table, speaking as though she was in a trance. Her tone of voice upset me to my core. Being from Maine I have never heard anyone speak that way. I was a child of the sixties, coming of age in the seventies and I am shocked and saddened that all the hard work of the women of that time is slipping away. Are we going back to barefoot and pregnant in the kitchen?
I thought it was creepy too that she wore green like the wives in The Handmaid’s Tale. Shivers…
I turned to my wife in the middle of her speech and exclaimed "I figured it out! She's Serena Joy!"
I’m in my late sixties, so I immediately thought Stepford Wife😬🤬
Yep. The word “fembot” came to mind too. But also condescending and entitled.
Not to mention so much of what she complained about (childcare) was part of a bill the democrats tried to pass in 2021.
Very robotic!
It was so infuriating how she blatantly lied about the issuesto blame Biden for problems the Republicans intentionally engineered. She helped put together the bipartisan border bill and then when Trump ordered them to not "let Biden have a win" she voted against it!
Yes. I am tired of the lies.
The first lie was that it was a "response". It was pre-taped. Then more to follow. Lies are the "alternate facts" of the current GOP. TFFG has made lying very fashionable.
BTW: I'll bet she and hubby are Swingers. In order to be a true bible thumping conservative doesn't one have to be a true hypocrite?
The back ground is AI. back of a bench at a round table and she is sitting on a chair... why am I the only one who can see this...?? I am 84!
Lapdogs for Trump.
Yes, this one was on my generational radar as well.
It was my immediate thought as well.
Yes!!! I was thinking of how Katharine Ross' character looked at the end of the movie. instead of ruffles, Katie Britt wore that conspicuous cross.
An excellent piece on the Stepford Men, aka SACR:
https://talkingpointsmemo.com/news/inside-a-secret-society-of-prominent-right-wing-christian-men-prepping-for-a-national-divorce?utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email
Me too!! They were on to something
The latest Phyllis Schaffly.
No, that’s Josh Hawley;s wife, Erin Hawley; she is the one.
Unfortunately there is always someone, or several someones, vying for that crown.
ANd Ginni Thomas enjoyed to the the hilt when she was playing Queen Bee to the coup.
But “sweet and soft-spoken”, so she doesn’t come across as threatening. That’s almost more scary. Schlafly was nasty and condescending in her rhetoric. Everyone knew where she was coming from.
I also remember Anita Bryant, that woman who did the Minute Maid orange juice commercials. She hated LGBTQ and spoke out publicly. In 1977 she got a pie in the face.
I saw a meme that had their photos side by side! Both wearing green!! lol
Phyllis never read anything that might challenge her preconceived beliefs.
You're welcome. :-)
On point. Terrifying.
Good point connecting the green dress to the wives in The Handmaid’s Tale! I hadn’t thought of that, but you are so right! I wanted to see the GOP rebuttal, but the way she spoke creeped me out. I had to turn it off,
Oooh. I didn’t make that connection. Love it that you did.
Someone is going to get fired over this. She has "handlers" or whatever they call themselves. Listen Katie, Honey-child, shouldn't you be making decisions about something SO important as YOU representing the fools in the GOP?......or was it some man telling you how you should be? ............. Two fools: him AND you. ............ I can NOT wait for tonight's SNL!
Nice of you to say that, but, I am sure it's a bit of sarcasm, right?
My understanding is “bless your heart” in a sweet southern voice means “F-you.”
Yup. it's a put down.
They wore shades of blue or teal, though, quite different from the color the senator wore. Still, yes, the resemblance is there.
Yes, green is worn by the servant class.
Ew, that makes it even worse!
There seems to be a group of Americans who think “The Handmaid’s Tale” is an Instruction manual.
Holy heck, I hadn't made the correlation. Well spotted!
You gotta wonder if that was intentional.
"do as I say, not as I do" because of course, she will insist being a Senator is how she "serves her husband and children". They must avoid claiming independent personhood at all costs, because violently enforcing all social hierarchies is their MO.
Oh good for you! Shove their hypocrisy right in their lying faces!!
Shouldn't her husband be the Junior Senator from Alabama?
Brilliant!!! Nice work. 💪🏻
Hah, nice.
Kudos to you, that’s epic
That would be "cliques." Otherwise I'm not sure what you're saying.
Maybe you're not MAGAscum - maybe you're just another failed member of the MoronLeft, the idiots who never have and never will amount to anything. In that case, your Volvo's parked outside and here are your Earthshoes. Now go away. I stopped thinking any of you were of any use 50 years ago.
Such a sad post, TCinLA. Says way more about you than others, really.
I don’t recall any of your comments in HCRs substack being so nasty.
Must be a sad existence.
The sheer level of overacting in this comment is sad.
**yawn**
And, we now have to build a pier to get food to the starving homeless Palestinians. Does anyone find this crazy? Why can't food come from Israel? Oh, that's right: they are filthy rats to be Exterminated...or, wait, Israel owns that word because of the Holocaust...substitute: Eliminated..
Somebody should be asking the question, why is Israel bombing the Gazans to the tune of 30,000 dead yet it still claims it's killing Hamas fighters? Good grief, isn't Hamas all dead by now? Who does Israel think it's fooling other than the Biden administration? And why haven't they found the source of Hamas' weapons but simply insist it's Iran, even though Iran no longer has a way to get them into Gaza?
Huh ?
No clue
“Its” not “it’s”
What a persistent piece of condescending shit you are, moron. Truly a legend in your own mind, like all the other Lifetime Losers.
Sir, are you having a stroke?
Wow, you sound like an angry white guy. Why are you raging at this guy?
Excellent insight, Jess. I turned off the volume and watched her, and it was equally creepy. Sen.Britt looked like she was auditioning for a part in a dramatic play. The hand motions, the facial expressions…all over the top. I’m sure she is governing just like she is instructed to do by her pastor and her husband. She looks like a kettle about ready to boil over.
I turned off the sound too. Jess is right; it was the fundie voice. But it was her message too that was repulsive.
I couldn't figure out how she could speak with such a big grin always on her face. I tried it but couldn't do it. I guess I'm unworthy./s
All you need is a little practice, MBSchnell, you’ll catch on, honey doll. /s
I couldn’t listen to her either and turned down the sound. I definitely understand the kitchen setting, you womenfolk best stay in the kitchen where you belong.
i guess I totally missed the point. My reaction was why in the world did a woman who has risen to be a US Senator speak from her kitchen! Like so many other women who have not been able to get out of the kitchen and make a place for themselves in business, society, government---and my takeaway was that she failed to speak up for the Republican party ideas like past politicians who have made speeches after the State of the Union.
Barbara,,,she 'failed to speak up for the Republican Party ideas' because they don't have any ideas. Just lies and anti democracy obstruction.
You must've missed her senior senator Tubs explanation - she was picked as a housewife.
https://www.al.com/news/2024/03/tommy-tuberville-sen-katie-britt-was-picked-as-a-housewife-to-give-state-of-the-union-response.html
She doesn't have an office in that house? I don't think that was her kitchen. It was a set.
It was a background put in place by technology. If you watch the Scarlet Johannsson version, you'll see the same background.
The irony of where she gave this speech was not lost on us. Republicans want women barefoot, pregnant, in the kitchen, NOT voting or working and SILENT.
Martha Stewart, imho, is the most powerful and directed woman in the history of capitalism. She instinctively KNOWS the pulse of the heart, the beating core of a female who desires aesthetic, beauty and serenity. In our capitalist society, one may buy this elixir for the heat's content.
Martha encapsulates the foibles of capitalism, to reach the pinnacle of monetary success - alone.
I was SO jealous! Here she was making money on being a bloody housewife! I was a housewife and I'm an entrepreneur; why didn't I think of that??
Martha shape-shifted fabrics, design elements, color, shapes, living spaces and voila ...
... dollars flowed from mana.
She's a smart cookie. Did some jail time and even turned THAT into a project.
Right, Martha from the Bible was overly devoted to cooking and cleaning. When Jesus came to visit her and her sister Mary, Mary sat down and listened to his teachings while Martha continued to clean in a frenzy. She got rebuked by Jesus for that, which seemed a little unfair but was one I used in arguments about housecleaning. I haven't read it yet, but I assume that where the Marthas in The Handmaid's Tale came from.
Also see Kipling's poem "The Sons of Martha". It's a nice comment on class and who's Chosen versus who will never be.
My mother named my older sister Martha, and myself, Mary. She said it was from the bible story, but get this - she never actually read it. She was a religious Catholic but never actually read the bible.
I can’t unhear “Martha” from that Batman V Superman scene.
... I'd never heard of the Handmaid's Tale ....
Very good and well understood.
Tis a chuckle to me, for your reference to this classic literary critique of gender roles ; and I misunderstood you were referencing the world's foremost female entrepreneur ....
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/38447.The_Handmaid_s_Tale
Several on Heather's site said they could only watch a few minutes. I get it. It was hard.
I wanted to turn it off but HAD to watch it to the "Godly" bitter end; it's a classic piece of shit. Everyone who didn't see it should go back and put up with it. You NEED to know.
Wait until tonight : SNL will have a picnic with it.
SNL could have done a better job with this. I find SNL not as funny/clever as it was years ago. And, I hate that they make fun of my President. One thing he's not and that's THE DEVIL.
Thank you for validating my automatic turning off of the sound as soon as I heard her voice. I knew she wasn’t going to say anything I would agree with, or even respect. And then the stupid NYT feels that Biden’s speech “needed context” while not calling out Britt’s LIES 🙄🙄🙄🙄
I ended up at your Substack from the link on Heather Cox Richardson’s “Letters from an America”. So glad to have discovered you. This post is very good.
Me, too!
Hey, me too! Sorry, I'm so late ...
Me too!👍🇺🇸
Me too!! 👍
Same here!
I also arrived via Heather Cox Richardson and I've subscribed, too. I'm really pleased to have found you!
Same. I appreciate your explanation. I feel lucky to be unfamiliar with their submissive lifestyle.
Me, too! Now I subscribe to you also. Thanks for the great insight.
Me too!
Same!
Me too!
Yup
Yah, same. Totally subscribing. I grew up next door in rural Oklahoma, and 💯 recognized fundie baby voice.
Likewise and delighted to be a subscriber here, now.
Me too! Great to read and meet Jess. I may have to watch the video...Haven’t had the desire for a buzz kill since SOTU address.
Me too!
Same!
They say in Iran that if you give the mullahs a fingertip, they take your whole hand. It was a bitter lesson they learned when they traded the devil they knew - the Shah- for a much worse one, the Ayatollah.
As in Iran, once these fundies, the religious fanatics like Johnson and Britt, get real power they never relinquish it. We would do well to remember this.
A vote against Republicans is a vote against a US Ayatollah and the destruction of what remains of our civil society.
You hit the nail on the head! Vote Blue!!
During the Iranian revolution, the people did not willingly trade the Shah for the Ayatollah. So many of the progressive leaders of the movement had been killed, imprisoned or forced into exile by the brutal Shah (which the US supported) that the religious fundamentalists seized the opportunity to step into the vacuum, forcing many leftists to flee for their lives.
Yep. We would do well not to forget that we "made that bed and now" have to live with the consequences. The wE being the power of the USA and more so. Big Oil that over-reacted to Iran nationalizing their oil fields. Kind of a bad case of, "how do like us now"? some 50 years later.
Yes. However a great many of the revolutionaries sheepishly admitted they were better off under the Shah, especially post -Iran/Iraq War. Our mistake was continuing to support him through his worst excesses, as we are doing now with Bibi.
What Iranian women must feel about their lot post-Shah I'm sure would be unprintable- were anyone to ask them.
Those women have been protesting loudly and getting killed. Wow, what a contrast to the cowardly "gals" in the US who just shut their mouths until they're told what to say, and when.
💙👏💯💙👏💯
Never looked at it that way. You have a poit!
Britt's performance seemed surreal to me as a purported SOTU response. Agree completely with your characterization of "the fundie baby voice" but also with her choice of affect generally. Indeed, many of the descriptions here in the comments are the same phrases my wife and I used as well while she was speaking last night, including one commenter's observation that she sounded like the voiceovers on SPCA commercials and the like. At one point, I expected that she would fake a tear or two to go along with the mildly quavering voice. After a policy-specific SOTU, her response was simply to double down on over the top culture war generalizations (e.g., stressing a few instances of immigrant violence while conveniently ignoring the substantial evidence of the law abidingness of most immigrants and their financial contributions to our economy) and vague, fleeting references to kitchen table issues (ignoring everything Biden laid out with respect to those problems and their remedies). Almost no specifics, no plan, no vision for the future, just "Biden bad." Ultimately, I suspect that her delivery will be the only thing remembered from her speech, right there with Marco Rubio's water bottle.
“…no specifics, no plan, no vision for the future…” Don’t forget that in 2020 the Republican Party literally had no platform. Don’t forget that when Biden entered office, his team was quite literally forbidden entry into the White House to start preparing for the transition to a new administration. For instance, in the midst of an actual pandemic, there were stockpiles of vaccine without a plan for distribution, etc. And they still have no platform, no plan, no vision, just a return to the white male-dominated past.
No, now they have the 2025 blueprint for dismantling democracy and turning this country into a white Christian Nationalist theocratic pseudo-democracy. What she said and they intend are not the same thing.
And the scumbag Trump got on board simply because he knows how powerful they are, and that he needs their votes desperately.
DJT needs $$$ so being dictator is a cash grab just like his pal Putin. That meeting last week with the Hungry Dictator was a check on how is he doing. Giving him the pointers to become doctor on day one & NEVER return to a Democracy!!!!
So true.
It was like watching a soap opera!
Or a very mediocre audition for a soap opera.
That was not live. It was taped before Biden's speech. Maybe last weekend.
I suspect that is true, which makes her opening "orientation statement" that 'she and her husband just finished watching the SOTU in her living room' just another casual lie - like her lies of omission concerning the time (actually 2004-08, not recently), place (Mexico, not the US or even close to the border), and administration (GWBush, not Biden) under which the sex trafficking incident she related occurred (hat tip to Jonathan Katz).
BAHAHAHA. Thank you for the reminder of Marco Rubio's water bottle grabbing moment. I needed to laugh this morning. :)
ASPCA makes those horrible commercials, not the SPCA. Other than my nitpicking that one thing, your comment is spot-on! 💚
Someone actually put out a Facebook post with that ‘Angels’ song from the ASPCA ad over her speaking. It’s even more chilling. And boy did I recognize that ‘voice’ but hadn’t realized yet where I knew it from. SBC/church. Wow.
Thanks for the correction and the comnent! Always want to be accurate!
Of course! You nailed it with your thoughts, for real. 🙌🏼
Thank you for identifying the thing that made the speech so creepy. The voice. As a 75 year old who escaped Fundamentalism 55 years ago I’d forgotten about the way women were taught to speak and act.
In fact I was waiting for the moment she turned to the stove and pulled a sheet of chocolate chip cookies out of the oven to prove her bonafides. If this is the best Alabama has no wonder they have the judges they do.
And Tommy Tuberville.
Whom a friend of mine refers to as "Tuber the Goober."
If she thinks, as you said, women belong in their home with their children, baking cookies, having supper when their sweet baboo comes home from a long, hard day from working harder than ever to have enough money to ensure they can buy chicken and dumplings for a Sunday dinner, then why the heck is she in Congress?
I'd say she views herself as one of the few women who should be working. She signals this by starting off with her mom schtick and by sitting at the kitchen table.
Because they know they're losing suburban women in droves. Women who are married to Republican men but secretly vote Democrat. Educated women with kids who want to protect their medical rights to do what they want with their bodies. That's why. This isn't going to help them, however. Women are the best a spotting a fake crazy beeyotch when they see one.
Yup. We're adept at sniffing out shady people, as our safety frequently depends on it.
This is the same crap McCain tried to pull when he nominated the sanctimonious but smiling, y'all-slinging Alaskan dingbat. We weren't interested then, either, because we knew it was the most cynical pandering and neither of them actually gave a crap about us, just what we could do for THEM.
And the guys were all titillated over Sarah Palin and her tight skirts and boots! And big hair! Such pandering bullshit....Elizabeth Warren is the Senator from my state..... I’ll listen to her any day of the week 👍😂🇺🇸🙏
Right? Give me a brilliant, principled, empathetic, energetic, no-nonsense wonk over basically anyone else. LOVE her. I was devastated when she didn't become the nominee, and the crap about her not being "electable" (if there was ever a self-fulfilling prophecy) was crazymaking. She's, what, too sensible? OMG. I'm so glad we have her. (I'm from NH and she is my adopted Senator. :D <3)
Those stiletto heels and how, during her speeches, some of the cameramen would pan down to her legs in those shoes... I had an elderly male friend back then who just about had a heart attack whenever he watched her on TV.
I think Britt is actually going to cost them votes.
Let’s hope so!
And “Senator” Tuberville said the quiet part out loud when he called his colleague a housewife. 🤬 https://thehill.com/homenews/senate/4520058-tuberville-says-britt-picked-as-a-housewife-not-just-a-senator/
The woman is a lawyer and a former CEO. So I'd say that's the real quiet part. She isn't a housewife at all, she just plays one on TV.
Exactly, "just" a housewife, and that was by design, he admitted.
And they will come to us to lose them over reproductive rights, gun violence, and environmental Justice.
Thank you!!
Google Phyllis Schlafly. She was a lawyer who traveled the nation, railing against the Equal Rights Amendment. A lawyer. Traveling the nation. She advocated for women’s traditional roles, all the while away from home full time. The usual hypocrisy.
I remember Phyllis Schlafly and her desire to have women return to the "traditional" role of women, meaning only there to support her husband... while not having a traditional role herself. She was a piece of... work.
Why can’t we have a public conversation about the importance of caregiving without it having to be a women’s role issue? I see so many millennial males sharing the traditional tasks (grocery shopping with toddlers in tow) and the idea that this is a men’s vs women’s issue keeps us from making progress on the real problem: that capitalism AND the participation of women in the workforce has created an incentive for everyone to “earn” and we have lost sight of the importance and value of investment in humans - education and life balance and family. But we can have that AND women can be allowed to share power and participate in business. We just need to be more imaginative with our policies to support families, not by regressing on women’s rights, or narrowly defining marriage/partnership.
Are you old enough to remember Phyllis Schlafly? Because that is precisely the way SHE defined the proper role of women vis a vis men, and frankly, at a time when the Vietnam was was still raging on, she may have feared that WOMEN might be called to be drafted and serve in the armed forces. [That's how she scared a lot of women from signing off on the Equal Rights Amendment, anyway]. You state:
"we can have that AND women can be *allowed* -interesting choice of words here- to share power and participate in business.
I am not sure that we should be "allowed" But the very reason that we can have that, Shawna, is precisely because many women came long before you and DEMANDED to be 'allowed" an equal place in the sun and started taking jobs that paid a lot more. Women were allowed to be nannies and teachers and secretaries.
That change didn't happen by itself. At my local papermill men had been working there without any special test that they needed to pass in order to be "allowed". But as soon as women demanded to competed for these jobs, then a test was created to exclude *women* who could not lift 100 Lbs.
There were a number of men who had been there for a while and could not lift 100 Lbs. They were just "grandfathered in".
I am glad that you see millennial men taking their proper place and helping with house chores. That is more recent too, and again, women had to demand that change.
I totally agree with you that we need to invest in humans., a lot more than in machineries that take the place of humans and relegate these humans to the unemployment lines.. And remember how folks who don't have a job are thought of in conservative circles.
Indeed, we need to be more imaginative to support families, and it is an absolute scandal that we are one of only 5 countries in the world that do not allow family leave, paid or not. Most countries allow paid maternal and paternal leave, even countries like Muslim countries. Have a look at this map:
https://www.npr.org/2016/10/06/495839588/countries-around-the-world-beat-the-u-s-on-paid-parental-leave
I lived in Egypt for several years and was pleased to see young Egyptian fathers sharing in child care, cooking, cleaning, etc. They have a long way to go, but they're a country that values families over everything.
I only felt relief the day i heard she died. Not very Xtian, but at least it’s an honest reaction.
You are being kind.
Schlafly was a nasty human.
Power. She helps the men appear less dangerous.
🎯💯
You meant "Peril!" She helps the men appear less dangerous.
She's the new Phyllis Schlafly. That woman was a piece. of. work.
I would draw a comparison to the “token Black” shtick that Repuglicans regularly trot out as evidence of their “multi-cultural” bona fides, like Tim Scott or, now the truly cringe-worthy misogynist and antisemite Mark Robinson. Reminds me of my wack-job Texan neighbor in rural Colorado who prided himself on giving a Black man a ride to their Sunday church brunch as evidence of, “See what I did? No way I’m a racist!”
She worked for Senator Shelby who has since retired. An easy in, I’d say.
For the same reason the male GOP Senators can call out the ELITES when Hawley, Cotton, Cruz and that version of FogHorn Leghorn, Kennedy (La) and a few more I am missing with their Elite educations from undergrad thru Law School from Ivy League institutions, including Oxford & Cambridge of course. Hippo-crites.
Power. She probably hates housework.
By speaking from our kitchen, she's signaling that she is a homemaker first. She hasn't. Congress is to help restore women to their rightful role in society.
I only caught the last half of her response and it made my blood run cold. I can understand playing a role as survival, but I didn't see anyone twisting her arm in her perfect kitchen. She stands with evil and that is all I need to know.
I was determined to listen…but I couldn’t. Kept jumping up and leaving the room…going back in…then just muted it for good. Too creepy and odd like a horror movie or skit. How did they think this would impress anyone?
Did anyone think of Amy Coney Barrett?
Yes!! She comes off as such a mealy-mouthed simp, it’s outrageous that this brainwashed fembot wields so much power — and for her entire life.
Imagine- she could squat on that bench 50 YEARS from now.
But, her emails! Pantsuits1!
Vote blue for Supreme Court reform!
Did anyone see the article about the sect ACB belongs to? The men control the money of all the women in their homes, even if an adult woman is living in a home as a guest? It's a man deferring weird cult like thing and if this had been common knowledge there would have been objections, that's why her confirmation was so fast.
All my friends were nauseated by this performance. A hallmark movie one reported. And a high school play audition another texted. It was insulting and addressed nothing of substance just insinuated that democrats are devils. I was particularly offended by the cross. Oh. And she didn’t even refer to that paragon of virtue the former guy whose morality is such an inspiration to the world. The hypocrisy is beyond belief.
What’s crazy to me is the contrast w her normal speaking voice and how she slipped into character. What does that character say about her voters and herself? I always think about Liz Cheney saying there are a handful of true believers and the rest are faking it.
https://x.com/SenKatieBritt/status/1765944735154274774?s=20
OMG. Man, they REALLY think everyone is as stupid as the Alabamians who voted for these fools. Her delivery was cartoonish -- like a slow, creepy reading to little kids by someone who hasn't actually interacted with little kids (i.e. doesn't know that they're people and you can just...talk to them). What a bunch of weird, out-of-touch (LOL @ her describing Biden that way, as if the Drumpenführer has ever personally bought groceries in his life) freaks. Just goes to show that if you have absolutely no scruples, lying and fearmongering is a GREAT way to acquire and consolidate power. (And then they talk about how OTHERS are going to have trouble with St. Peter or whatever. They really believe that they can acquire power by any means necessary, no matter how craven, and as long as they say it's for Jesus, they have "total immunity." If I weren't atheist, I'd be looking forward to said Jesus informing them of what He ACTUALLY meant [what He said].)
My first thought was I was listening to a commercial for SPCA.
I read this to my husband and he thought I wrote it, that’s how identical you & I agree.
I wasn’t planning on watching the rebuttal at first, then I heard her speak and, like you, “wtf, I know that tone…” that breathy sexy baby but good moral woman - wink wink, unless you piss me off” BS you KNOW is an affectation. Arrrrgha.
Then you read her credentials- even though I question “one of 19 Valedictorians”?
>A graduate of Enterprise High School, Britt was a cheerleader there and one of 19 valedictorians upon graduation in 2000.< wickipedia
The rest reads fantastic and you’d think “SO accomplished!” Then, she speaks.
WTF did we do WRONG!!!
And the republicans are setting up all of society by their playbook having infiltrated everywhere! They do not even understand that it is THEIR LIBERTIES AS WELL THAT THEY ARE GUTTING.
That's what's so hilarious and terrible about the Alabama/IVF thing. They obviously spent zero time thinking that one through (logistically -- I imagine they spent plenty of time patting themselves on the back for being sooo clever). Just legislate away other people's rights, with no concern for the actual consequences, then freak out when the leopards don't discriminate when they're hungry and there are people's faces everywhere.
"The breathless speech, the incongruent facial movements and smiles. The cadence of condescension. I am better than you, and here are the ways. I have children. They are perfect. I have a marriage. It is perfect. I am pretty and well-educated. I am a Christian—I am god fearing and I prove it by holding hands with my family and praying for the rest of you. I am better than you."
I think you've nailed it here, Jess. I'm in the process of writing a response to the article on Aaron Rupar's Public Notice post about Planned Parenthood in Missouri. This is in part what I written (but not posted yet) so far:
All women must accept God’s will, according to believers. Women must subjugate themselves to God’s will in all things. Because they were born Woman, which was also God’s will, all Women must accept without question their only role as Women in God’s eyes—to give birth to every seed that is implanted in their womb.
Katie Britt has complied with God's will. Therefore, she has the authority to judge and pity and destroy anyone else who does not accept God's will. That's what I saw in her eyes. That's what I heard in the sudden change in the tone of her voice.
She is out to destroy anyone who does not adhere to her world view. And she's willing to do anything to do so. The change in tone from sweet to pissed is for the purpose of getting your attention, so she can then lie to you about the seriousness of the situation at the southern border. She gets your attention by changing her tone of voice, and shooting of darts of hatred from her eyes and you start to pay attention to see what could possibly justify such a shift in tone, so much contempt. She has to lie about what's really going on, though: 1) follow a GIGANTIC LIE (about Biden inheriting the most secure border ever) 2) with a partial truth (Biden took 94 executive actions in his first 100 days) 3) sandwiched in between another lie ( that destroyed the secure border he inherited) because the truth, the reality, the facts, DO NOT SUPPORT HER LEVEL OF ANGER. Only a complete rewriting of reality, of history, destruction of facts, can accomplish that. So that's what she does.
A truly dangerous woman showed all Republican women how it's done. From the kitchen of her lovely home that was most likely paid for mostly by her husband, a former professional football player for the New England Patriots.
All the religions were created by men, as were all the laws, all which subjugated women, minorities, and the weak. I started rejecting the concept of God when I was 12 because of the horrible conditions of my home life, and even thinking that there might not be a god terrified me that I would be 'smote down', which of course, never happened. People who believe this stuff are terrified into even questioning it.
Good point. But these women-oriented groups were often violently crushed.
Yes!
Thank you for explaining what I could not comprehend when I saw this Senator, posed at her kitchen table, speaking as though she was in a trance. Her tone of voice upset me to my core. Being from Maine I have never heard anyone speak that way. I was a child of the sixties, coming of age in the seventies and I am shocked and saddened that all the hard work of the women of that time is slipping away. Are we going back to barefoot and pregnant in the kitchen?
We older women need to step up, dammit, and call these traitor women out, traitors to our bodies and our rights!