Writes Vanessa Friedman, in "Usha Vance and the Iconography of the Trump Women/The potential second lady models a new kind of Republican image-making" (NYT).
When I started reading this essay, I thought Friedman would go negative, but I don't think she did... other than in a part I didn't include above, about how "Trump women" all have "a certain kind of look... a defining gender trope" with "a lot of hair, often left to cascade in glossy, carefully controlled Breck girl waves" and a ton of makeup. I've never liked that look and wish it would go away, so I liked Friedman's appreciation of Usha Vance's relatively natural look.
Here's video of Usha Vance introducing her husband at the convention last night. The hair over the eye in the beginning was a huge distraction, and I was quite relieved when, after a cut to the audience, it had moved behind her ear.
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65 comments:
The Trump aesthetic? Who just appeared on the cover of Vogue in expensive couture?
Uh, I think most guys like long hair on women. Usha looks fine to me. I'm having trouble figuring out exactly what you are talking about.
Nixon got a lot of mileage out of Pat's plain cloth coat.
Key take away: relatively. Let the hair fall where it may. That said, Nature's secular nature favors a juxtaposition of the sexes that engenders fitness. Humans have, by and large, tempered their secular mores with moral moderation.
I seem to remember Althouse posts about the look of Fox News women, with the big hair and makeup. Catherine Herridge was the counter-example.
I thought Usha looked wonderful and spoke well. (I, too, was glad when the Veronica Lake hair went behind an ear.)
Totally OT but I lost my iPhone link to this blog so I did a Google or Safari search. Go to AlthouseandMeade.com. It is just too much of a coincidence that pairing of names. Wait until you see who is whom. I thought our Ann and Meade had a side business going on.
Some women can have the long hair, the aesthetic highlights, and a relatively natural look, too. It's not something to celebrate, but rather to be appreciated in context where context matters.
The hair over her eye bothered my wife, I was thinking Veronica Lake or Jessica Rabbit…
Someone has to pay attention to fashion and makeup, but it does seem like women put inordinate attention on the issue. Especially the ones who were never in the game, or have long since stopped playing.
I thought Mrs. Vance easily upgraded herself on the looks scale. If women disagree, they should apply their magic to themselves first.
Women are the worst…
She's an ultra-smartie -- Yale law, then clerked for Kavanaugh and for Roberts. Big law job until a few days ago. Hooked into the elite DC power structure, but seems normal. She is gracious, grateful for her opportunities as an immigrant, and seems to love being a mom.
Usha Vance looked like a "Trump Woman?"
These people do not even listen to themselves.
They cannot deal with intellectual or emotional diversity. At all. They are all muppets and drones.
She's brilliant and beautiful. I'm sure she'll make a fine target for our media.
I thought her introduction speech was nice! Well done!
Leftist liars like Inga - seethe with rage and run to dark a-hole leftist reaches of the interweb like joke "proPublica" for more lies, half-truths and taken out of context BS.
The left are scrambling right now to find dirt - or create dirt. Fuckheads that they are.
"Uh, I think most guys like long hair on women."
The referenced look is not long hair in general. It's this ridiculous artificial heavy wavy stuff. It's done with extensions and heating irons and gelatinous products.
I've noticed that with a lot of the women who are coming out on the stage with this hair look — notably Sarah Huckabee Sanders — the hair is split in the back and pulled forward in front of the shoulders. It's absurdly heavy in front and there's nothing or almost nothing in the back.
Mrs. Vance is a woman, a wife, and a mother, with a career that is a mile wide. She can enjoy her cake and eat it, too, with frosting when the mood should strike her.
First Lady, Second Lady, i guess the wife of the speaker of the house is the Third Lady? We have no titles of nobility.
All a bunch of poofting bullshit nonsense. I value people by important factors, like how many feet of blasthole can you drill in a day, or how many tons did you scrape into the ore chute this shift.
"Usha Vance looked like a "Trump Woman?" These people do not even listen to themselves."
Do you listen to yourself? The point of the article was that she didn't.
I propose that to save democracy we start calling the wife of the president the first cunt.
Hey any of you NYT regular readers (YKWIM). When is the NYT's Swim Suit edition coming out? I can't wait to see how Maureen Dowd and the fashions writers look in bikinis. Ought to be a real howler no? Especially given the stuff they've written about other people's looks and apparel.
Party in the front, church in the back, Prof. Althouse!
I appreciate Mrs. Vance’s style as well, so far. She seems to be a practical woman, which a lot of us can identify with.
Except the hair over the eye. The maternal me yelled at her for that. Maybe she heard me.
I’ve always found Indian women to be very beautiful.
What?? She doesn't dress like an old couch?? How appalling. She will NEVER make the cover of Vogue like Dr. Jill.
Me (thinking to myself), and I'd wager, with the agreement of a lot of men: "She's smart, successful, a mom, professional, poised, lovely. Seems to genuinely like her husband. The hair slipping over her eye without immediately fussing about suggests she's not too vain or self-conscious. I like her a lot. JD was able to convince her to marry him, so he must be doing something right."
The gal sitting next to me, out loud, who happens to be a professor of political science and philosophy, and, apparently, with the agreement of a lot of women: "I do not like that hair over her eye!!! So annoying!!!!!"
Me: "Huh?"
Her: Glares at me like I fell off the turnip truck.
“The male gaze” is so 1992. Today American professional women dress themselves to ward off “the mean girl gaze.”
I was quite impressed, and despite her impressive credentials, she seems very down to earth. Besides I read she has become a quite a fan of Skyline Chili since she moved to Cincinnati, so she has that going for her.
To be fair, I do think the "Fox News Barbie" look has become a cliché. It has become a uniform, in the same way that the short/shortish hair on MSNBC women says "We're not deplorable!" It's all so tedious.
She has a very pleasant voice. Best wishes to both of them. I’m not a big fan of marriages and families on display. But it is what it is.
A woman, a wife, a mother, and a career, Mrs. Vance's life is a mile wide and a mile deep that she can have her cake and eat it, too, with frosting when the mood should strike her.
BarrySanders20 said...
"She's an ultra-smartie -- Yale law, then clerked for Kavanaugh and for Roberts. Big law job until a few days ago. Hooked into the elite DC power structure, but seems normal. She is gracious, grateful for her opportunities as an immigrant, and seems to love being a mom."
I agree with most of this, except she's not an immigrant. She was born in San Diego.
If there was a (D) after her husband's name the fashionistas would swoon. The feminists would begin planing the statues. And the talk of her running for office after JD would be buzzing.
She's terrific in that video. Comes across as very real and very likable.
The referenced look is not long hair in general. It's this ridiculous artificial heavy wavy stuff. It's done with extensions and heating irons and gelatinous products.
This isn't just a Trump thing. If I could give myself a blowout as good as Kate Middleton's I would die happy.
Sounds like the kind of woman that an intelligent man would marry.
The smartest medical student I ever had was a very dark but very pretty Indian woman. She said her parents met on an Indian dating site and her mother chose her father because he was the only man to upload a color photo of himself. She was a graduate Engineer already. I wonder where she is now.
Also Karen Pence never got the Trump girl mold either.
I too was relieved when she moved her hair over, thank God.
I’m really impressed by this couple that Trump has brought to his ticket. They’re fantastic people.
The first time I saw Usha was when JD was being nominated to be vice president and I thought she was slightly put off by the hoopla and fakery of it all. But then, when she came on the stage to introduce her husband, she was totally poised and visibly touched by the reception she received. Talk about a quick study. The people were really warm and totally accepting. It’s amazing to see such a high-powered ambitious person in such an environment and how well she handled herself, really impressive.
I’d say her style is elegant and understated but highly sophisticated. Every picture I’ve seen of her she looks stunning.
It's pretty funny that all the women were bothered by the hair. Do we share a feminine OCD compunction?
I did feel a squee girl crush. I can't wait to see her and Melania together.
Usha Vance is a serious lawyer and her parents are college academics. They dress differently than the average political wife.
And until this month, Usha worked at Charlie Munger's old firm.
I agree with Kate. I think she's very attractive.
I liked her. In most really successful marriages the wife is smart enough to be the "brains of the outfit" and smart husbands realize that. Both J.D. and his wife are very smart folks.
She was truthful last week when she said that she was not really ready to have her life and her family's life turned upside down. And yet at the end, she said she respected and admired J.D. and that she loved him.
J.D. shades off into Harrison Butker territory (I'll do my Joe Biden imitation here--The Idea!) when he talks about how important this marriage and children are to him. These two people are as "normal" as you can expect a politician and a politician's wife to be.
I'll confess that her hair was not the first thing I checked. Nor was it the second thing I checked. When I attempted to check her face I finally noticed her hair blocked my view.
I don't see how Mrs. Vance is dramatically different in her choices than the other women who have spoken at the Republican convention. Given her skin tone, she's not likely to need the makeup pale skin Trump women use. I thought Usha Vance looked very nice on both occasions. Fashion, hair, and makeup are all a matter of taste. Speaking of taste, has anyone gotten a good look at Vanessa Friedman? To each their own, but she is the fashion director and chief fashion critic for the New York Times? I'd take any fashion criticism she gives with a grain of salt.
The Trump aesthetic is similar to the Kardashian-Jenner look IMO.
I think Usha Vance probably has more in common with someone like Michelle Obama when Barack Obama ran for the Senate, rather than Melania Trump, not necessarily in terms of political view but just having a career of her own and being a wife and mother.
If she wants to campaign, I think she could help the ticket.
Usha was just a hair clip away from perfection.
She rocked that dress.
Usha Vance looked lovely and natural. When her hair was over her eye, I thought isn’t that driving her crazy? I was glad when she tucked it behind her ear, much better!
one in which her husband’s political consistency is under scrutiny
As near as I can tell, J.D> Vance has been very consistent, policy-wise, and only expressed concern about whether Trump, when he was a newly-minted republican with no political track record whatsoever, would actually follow through with his policy promises or whether they were all just lies made to get elected (you know, like all other politicians do). Now that he has seen Trump's follow-through, he is heartily on board.
The problem is that Dems only see cult of personality - you are either with Dear Leader or you are against, and there is not coming back from ever having been against.
I read the article. The writer pointed to Gavin Newsom's ex-wife as the personification of the "Trump women" look...Usha Vance looked poised and gracious. I don't think she's got anything against high fashion and would be willing to make the sacrifice and wear such clothes if the occasion warrants. But really, why bother. If you're a Republican, you'll never get touted as a style maker or stylish. You're no big deal. No diversity points either. She claims to be a vegetarian. I bet she's the first vegetarian wife on a national ticket.
Backhanded compliments are probably the best a Republican woman can expect from a NYT writer who believes Michelle Obama is the gold standard when it comes to fashion sense.
The hair-in-the-face thing, and brushing it back, might just be a bit of shtick she has developed to disarm people. Other women have been known to hate a woman who is too perfect.
Big Mike couldn’t rock much of anything.
Summary: Usha is plain, not like those showy bitches in the rest of the Republican Party.
Iman said...
“The hair over her eye bothered my wife, I was thinking Veronica Lake or Jessica Rabbit…”
Usha Rabbit replied….
“I’m not a ‘Trump Woman’, I’m just drawn that way.
Blogger Kate said...
“I thought Usha looked wonderful and spoke well. (I, too, was glad when the Veronica Lake hair went behind an ear.)”
So her speech was a little hairy at first, but then got better.
Good grief, how petty.
+1 Rocco!
You know, I hate it when some women, especially attorneys, put more emphasis on their brains than their fashion. Did anyone note as revealed by JD that the kids were back at the hotel? It's like she's a working mother or something.
I missed out on the Breck Girl thing. My only recollection of Breck was the lead in to a commercial break on Laugh-in, when Joanne Worley popped out to say, "I love Breck! It's delicious!"
The everyman is a stock character of fiction. An ordinary and humble character, the everyman is generally a protagonist whose benign conduct fosters the audience's identification with them.
Everyman
And by extension, the everywoman.
"a lot of hair, often left to cascade in glossy, carefully controlled Breck girl waves" and a ton of makeup"
_________________________________
It's not just a Republican thing. Certain Democrats, Mario Cuomo demanded that the girls in his office wear makeup:
____________________________________
(From the investigation of Mario Cuomo)
"commented on her
appearance on a number of occasions, including saying that an outfit she wore made
her look like a “lumberjack” and commenting on her not being “ready” for work if
she was not wearing makeup or was not dressed nicely;"
Mario Cuomo---Page 5 https://ag.ny.gov/sites/default/files/2021.08.03_nyag_-_investigative_report.pdf
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