Hillary Clinton didn’t attend Barack Obama’s first State of the Union address last night since she was in London for a conference on Afghanistan and the Middle East. But she was there in spirit, fashion-wise if not in other ways we’re not qualified to discuss. The secretary of State is known for her brightly colored pantsuits, and there seemed to be an explosion of those on the floor last night. In addition to a proliferation of statement red, bright yellow was a disturbingly popular choice. Oh, Washington: Why? We don’t expect this crew to be poring over runway slideshows and reading fashion magazines to keep up with the latest trends, but even that’s not required for most people to look in the mirror and have even a vague notion that the look isn’t flattering for probably anyone (it was questionable on Cher in Clueless), and that many other options would look better. Maybe the women who went in banana-hued getups just wanted to show up on TV. With bright red having attained such popularity on the Hill, a congresswoman can no longer tell her grandkids, “I’ll be the one in the bright-red suit!” and expect them to find her. And perhaps that’s why at least one woman chose bright pink and a few others chose bright turquoise.
But for all the unfortunately hued womenswear in the crowd last night, the men were arguably worse off. We couldn’t find one who didn’t need a tailor in the worst possible way.