How Marco Rubio rescued his awkward water break moment

The Florida senator's conservative rebuttal to Obama's State of the Union was overshadowed by his thirst

Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), the 41-year-old Cuban-American being billed as the potential savior of the Republican Party, gave a measured, conservative response to President Obama's State of the Union address. His official GOP rebuttal was a Reagan-infused paean to faith, free markets, and small government. But while some conservatives were very impressed with Rubio's performance, the consensus largely validates Jeb Golinkin's warning to Rubio: "Call whomever it is you call about these things, say you have the flu, and stay home."

See more

Rubio didn't look like a cartoonish sitcom character (see Gov. Bobby Jindal, 2009), but about halfway into his televised speech, he apparently got very thirsty. It looked like this:

Twitter, being Twitter, couldn't talk about anything else. First there was shock at Rubio's awkward grab for his bottle of water:

Subscribe to The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE
https://cdn.mos.cms.futurecdn.net/flexiimages/jacafc5zvs1692883516.jpg

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Sign up
See more
See more
See more
See more
See more
See more

Then amusement:

See more
See more
See more
See more

Then came sympathy:

See more
See more
See more

And blaming the victim:

See more
See more

And finally, the the self-referential self-loathing of a group of media types realizing they are all obsessing, en masse, about a single, goofy moment:

See more
See more
See more
See more
See more
See more

Some Rubio supporters tried to defuse the situation:

See more
See more

But it was Rubio himself (or perhaps his social media team) that turned a potentially embarrassing meme into a shared joke, maybe even a political plus:

See more

And that, politicians, is how it's done:

See more
See more
See more
See more
See more

Meme closed.

To continue reading this article...
Continue reading this article and get limited website access each month.
Get unlimited website access, exclusive newsletters plus much more.
Cancel or pause at any time.
Already a subscriber to The Week?
Not sure which email you used for your subscription? Contact us
Peter Weber, The Week US

Peter has worked as a news and culture writer and editor at The Week since the site's launch in 2008. He covers politics, world affairs, religion and cultural currents. His journalism career began as a copy editor at a financial newswire and has included editorial positions at The New York Times Magazine, Facts on File, and Oregon State University.