The Democratic response to Donald Trump's marathon State Of The Union speech was fractured, but not quite as fractured as last year. Perhaps that is faint praise, but we are speaking about Democrats here....

Was that too snarky? Sorry, let me start over.... Democrats faced with the problem of how to counter Trump's speech Tuesday night came up with several ideas for the best way to do so. Should they just not attend? Should they protest in the chamber itself, either visually (with signs and buttons), audibly (by shouting at Trump), or by silently standing up and walking out at some point? Should they hold an alternative event (or two) to counterprogram what was going on inside the Capitol? Should they just hold a snowball fight on the National Mall? Well, they decided "all of the above!" (except for that last one -- there was no snowball fight, I just had to throw that in there for amusement).

Before we get to all of that, though, Democrats did respond to Trump formally and traditionally with their "Response To The State Of The Union Speech." Newly-sworn-in Virginia Governor Abigail Spanberger was chosen to give the official Democratic response, and she did a serviceable job. There were strengths and weaknesses in her speech, but at least she didn't fall flat on her face or provide a "Marco Rubio drinking a tiny bottle of water" moment. The speech was competent, but without being noticeably memorable.

The weakness I saw wasn't in the words Spanberger spoke, which were well-written and very focused. Instead, it was in her delivery. Spanberger is not a natural orator (like Bill Clinton or Barack Obama), but instead someone who lived a very impressive life before she entered politics. She did her best in the speech, but for some reason the emphasis and flow of her words didn't really land as well as they could have (I should mention that this is all a purely subjective and personal take).

But as I said, that's really a minor complaint. She didn't do a bad job of speaking, and she only made one gaffe (that the media thankfully didn't pick up on). And the speech itself was indeed impressive. It concentrated on a few themes, most prominently affordability and how Donald Trump is making things worse for average American families. This was a winning message for Spanberger in Virginia, and Democrats everywhere are planning to run similar midterm campaigns nationwide -- which made Spanberger an excellent choice for this year's response speech. She also denounced the brutalities of ICE and Trump's inhumane treatment of immigrants. But her main message was contained in three questions. She asked these questions at the very start of the speech, and then returned to them in detail later on. Her questions were:

Is the president working to make life more affordable for you and your family?

Is the president working to keep Americans safe both at home and abroad?

Is the president working for you?

Later, she responded to all three of these questions with a sort of call-and-response answer: "We all know the answer is 'No'." Not only was this a renunciation of the entire Trump agenda, it was also a subtle taunt, since one of Trump's favorite rhetorical excesses is using the phrase: "Everybody knows that..." before following it with some outrageously false assertion. Spanberger was flipping this around and using it against Trump, which I thought worked pretty well. Spanberger also did not mince her words when speaking of Trump. She referred to the speech he just gave with a withering: "He lied, he scapegoated, and he distracted. And he offered no real solutions to our nation's pressing challenges." To me, that was the best line of the entire speech.

As I mentioned, Spanberger did have one verbal stumble, when she mixed up two adversaries. She caught herself immediately and tried to fix it, but it all kind of got lost in the shuffle. Speaking of Trump on the world stage, she said: "He continues to cede economic power and technological strength to Russia... bow down to... to China... bow down to a Russian dictator...." But as I said, nobody seemed to notice this stumble, so it didn't become a big huge media deal (thankfully).

The best thing about Spanberger's speech was that it clocked in at just under 13 minutes. That was a huge relief, after spending almost two solid hours listening to Trump flap his gums. Spanberger gave her speech in a historic location: the Williamsburg House of Burgesses chamber, where in 1776 the Virginia Declaration of Rights was passed (which later became the blueprint for the national Bill of Rights). However, her speaking to a very small crowd of supporters was distracting, as they burst into pre-planned applause at certain points during the speech. It probably would have been better to just speak in an empty chamber, surrounded by just the history of the room.

Overall, I would have to rate the speech as a solid 7 out of 10. The text of the speech was excellent, the delivery wasn't all that impressive, but Spanberger did a reasonable job of it all. And as mentioned, there was no embarrassing moment that will live forever as a gag reel (Marco and his tiny bottle...), which is the biggest danger of these speeches in modern times.

Within the Capitol, Democrats who attended chose their own various ways to protest Trump's speech. First up was Representative Al Green, who got escorted out of the chamber for holding up a sign which said: "BLACK PEOPLE AREN'T APES!", in reference to a disgustingly racist video Donald Trump posted on his social media site. There were other messages from Democrats, mostly worn as little buttons on their clothing (instead of the paddles they held up last year, which were not very effective). One seen on multiple Democrats had the words: "Stand With Survivors -- Release The [redacted black rectangle] Files." Even Nancy Pelosi wore one of those. I did see one button which was a little more forceful, saying simply: "FUCK ICE" -- which was admirably concise.

A number of Democrats couldn't stomach watching the whole speech, so they stood up and walked out at various points. This was not coordinated in any way, it was just kind of a trickle of people leaving throughout the speech, so it wasn't really noticeable in any way in the television coverage.

What was more noticeable were the times when Democrats couldn't take Trump's lies and started yelling at him. Representatives Ilhan Omar and Rashida Tlaib were both prominent in this vocal pushback effort.

Some Democrats -- dozens of them -- didn't even bother to show up. They protested by their absence. Many of these spoke at one of the two alternative events, which weren't largely covered by the media. The first was put on by MoveOn and MeidasTouch, billed as the "People's State Of The Union." It was held outside in the frigid cold on the National Mall, timed to happen while Trump was speaking. A few hundred hardy souls attended, where they heard speeches from representatives and senators who were boycotting Trump's speech.

A second event was held indoors, hosted by the activist networks Defiance and the Portland Frog Brigade. This event got a little bit more media attention (probably because it was held indoors), but not all of it was good. The once-respectable Washington Post continued its slide towards irrelevancy and tabloid-paper status by flat-out ridiculing the event. Here's how their report started:

Where should we begin, the frogs or the dildos?

"People juggle them, they attach them to their foreheads --"

Fine, we'll start with the dildos.

It was State of the Union night at the National Press Club, where a who's-who of anti-Trump luminaries had convened for an anti-SOTU event, called State of the Swamp. Robert De Niro was on the schedule, and many congressional Democrats were in attendance. So were an array of Resistance types -- including Rook T. Winchester, who had suctioned his own 10-or-so-inch rebuttal to the bar outside the ballroom, its violet silicone glistening under recessed lights. He had several dozen more in a suitcase that he'd brought with him from Minneapolis. "I just hand them out, and they bring people joy," he said.

Also: "Some people throw them at ICE agents." (Not him, he's quick to add: "I'm purely distribution.") Winchester's plan was to hand them out on the streets of Washington after the event.

They later quoted "Slurmit The Frog" as saying: "Washington's become a swamp and we're here as the frogs to take it back." More-serious coverage of the event (which featured Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey and Robert De Niro) was tacked on to the very end of the article.

All in all, the Democratic response to Trump's State Of The Union was not very cohesive, but Democrats did manage to express their feelings without "becoming the story" in an intensely negative way. The Democratic Party is largely leaderless at this point -- their two congressional leaders, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer -- were complete non-entities Tuesday night (they were the ones cautioning other Democrats to not make a fuss). This will likely remain the case until the presidential primary season truly heats up after the midterms. Handicapped by not having a forceful voice for their resistance, the Democrats still managed to do an adequate job of pushing back on Trump's lies. Spanberger's speech showed her focus on affordability and the cost of living, which is all going to be front and center during the midterm campaign season. And that campaign season has already begun -- the first primaries are going to be held next week, in fact. Donald Trump's job approval is nearing all-time lows for him, and the Democrats have the wind at their back right now. Presidents normally get a little bump in the polls after giving State Of The Union speeches, but that may not even happen this time around. All in all, Democrats find themselves in a very good place after the big speech, which is one measure of who will win this battle for public opinion.

-- Chris Weigant

Follow Chris on Twitter: @ChrisWeigant