Aaargh! I'm So Forgetful!

I was certain I was going to wrap up something from "Post Hoc, Ergo Propter Hoc" in my talk about A Proportional Response. I had it toted up in my notes, all ready for placement ...

And then, boom. Forgot. Left out. Again.

It can't be just because I'm nearing my mid-50s, can it? I mean, sure, I forgot my wallet when I went to work last week. Twice. I end up going back to the grocery store because I don't get everything I meant to get. I thought the cats had taken my car keys and hid them someplace, when I had actually put them in a suitcase before a trip. But no, there's no pattern or anything.

Anyhoo ... I wanted to go back to some background information about President Bartlet that we learned in "Post Hoc, Ergo Propter Hoc". When Josh goes to hire Mandy (and Daisy, who then disappears, never to be seen again) he relates some biographical information about Jed; that he's a Nobel Laureate in Economics, he was a three-term Congressman and a two-term governor (we learn from Bartlet himself elsewhere in the episode that it was New Hampshire where he served as Congressman and governor).

Interesting fact about that economics Nobel ... that's not one of the original Nobel prizes established by Alfred Nobel. The prizes for physics, chemistry, literature, peace, and medicine are the ones created by Nobel's will in 1895, and first granted in 1901. There is a prize in economics awarded "in honor" of Alfred Nobel, but that was established in 1969 by Sweden's national bank. True, it is awarded under the auspices of the Nobel Foundation, and can be considered part of the Nobel Prize family ... but there are those who look askance at that particular award. Not least of which, the Nobel family themselves, who are not in favor of the economics award and are on record as asking the Foundation to stop awarding it. It's also seen as favoring mainstream free-market economic theories, instead of honoring new ways of thinking about economics or breaking ground in any way, so the award itself isn't very well regarded in certain fields of economics.

So, okay. Calling Bartlet a "Nobel Laureate in Economics" is technically correct, but it kind of creates more answers than questions. He is a well-regarded economist, okay? Which makes him an interesting choice for President in the first place, but in this universe they have Presidential elections in 1998, 2002 and 2006, so maybe the rules are different there.

In addition, we see CJ make a remark about the President's jokes really knocking them dead at the Whiffenpoof dinners. The Whiffenpoofs are a social club at Yale, so CJ's comment seems to imply Bartlet attended Yale at some point. I don't think there's ever any indication that this was the case - we will find out he did his undergraduate work at Notre Dame, and earned graduate degrees at the London School of Economics. No Yale, though.

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I also intended to draw a parallel from the world of A Proportional Response to the world of President Donald Trump. The entire notion of responding in a proportional way - as Bartlet puts it, "they hit an airplane, we hit a transmitter - they hit a barracks, we hit two transmitters" - was kind of reflected in Trump's first use of military force, sending cruise missiles to attack an airbase in response to Syria's use of chemical weapons on civilians.

The comparison is almost too apt. The target is Syria in both cases, fictional and actual. The talk of doing just what the enemy expects is spot on, as reports indicate the Syrians moved most aircraft and other equipment away from the targeted airbase before the American missiles hit. Now, we have no idea how President Trump might have reacted originally as far as what kind of attack scenarios he might have considered - the fact he lamented the deaths of "beautiful, innocent babies" in the chemical attacks might indicate he would have favored a much stronger retaliatory strike. But in the end, 50-some cruise missiles were sent to blow up areas around a runway, a runway which was back in use a day or so later.

It's crazy, isn't it, to consider that a work of television fiction from 1999 would still resonate down the years, to an actual use of military force now in 2017? Trust me, this isn't the first The West Wing story that we're going to see reflected in a current administration.

A Proportional Response - TWW S1E3

Original airdate: October 6, 1999

Written by: Aaron Sorkin (3)

Directed by: Marc Buckland (1)

Synopsis

• It's three days after the final events of "Post Hoc, Ergo Propter Hoc", and President Bartlet continues to call for a devastating military response against Syria, even as his generals and advisers recommend a more proportional retaliation. The West Wing staff is concerned about the President's rather personal response to the loss of his physician, as well as how the first use of military force by this administration will play with the American public. Charlie Young, who applied for a job as a messenger, is selected to be the President's new personal aide. And CJ has to cope with the revelation of Sam's relationship with Laurie, especially once she discovers a reporter has the story as well.

"What is the virtue of a proportional response?"

That's the question pointedly asked by President Bartlet to his generals in this top-notch, juicy episode that's one of the highlights of Season 1. He never gets a satisfactory answer, which is part of the point, but the theme of proportionality and levels of response runs through this entire episode. Interestingly enough, Aaron Sorkin pulled that theme wholesale out of his 1995 movie The American President, where the President (played by Michael Douglas) asks almost the very same question ("Someday you'll have to explain the virtue of a proportional response.").

(Not for nothing, but Martin Sheen - Jed Bartlet himself - plays the Chief of Staff in The American President, and one of the main plotlines of the film involves the administration pursuing a gun control bill - which is also coming up in the very next episode of The West Wing. Can a screenwriter be accused of stealing from himself?)

The idea of responding, proportionally or disproportionally, can be seen a whole bunch in this episode. The primary story, of course, is the administration's retaliation for Syria's shootdown of the military transport that occurred at the end of "Post Hoc, Ergo Propter Hoc". It's just three days later, and President Bartlet (who famously told Leo he was going to blow the Syrians off the face of the earth with the fury of God's own thunder) is angrily disappointed with the response options being given him. He's ranting at his advisers, he's storming around the White House, even snapping at the First Lady.

There's a couple of issues at play for Jed here. First off, he did have a personal relationship with Morris Tolliver, and having him be one of those killed in this attack spurred thoughts of revenge and strong retaliation. Also at play is the President's standing with the military - this will be the Bartlet administration's first use of military force, and he already feels as if the generals don't really have respect for him as a commander. His notion of striking hard, while paying the Syrians back for the loss of his friend, might also show he's no "candy ass" (as he describes the military options being laid out for him) to those in the armed forces.

So we get to see the Situation Room. Remember, in the last episode, all the military brass were just handing out information and intel in the Roosevelt Room, with Sam and Toby and Josh and who knows who else looking on. This time, we have a windowless, fluorescent-lit cubby hole with a weak little projector to throw visual aids up on the wall.

Don't worry - just like what happened to the press briefing room between Pilot and "Post Hoc, Ergo Propter Hoc", the Situation Room will improve in later episodes. In actuality, this Situation Room isn't all that far off from the real White House Situation Room meeting area, as seen in this photo from 2000.

The entire Situation Room complex in the White House is some 5000 square feet, so this room is just a part of it. At least The West Wing isn't showing it like some vaulted Bond-villian lair, like they do in Designated Survivor.

I mean, really - is that going to fit in the basement of the White House? I expect to see Blofeld petting a white cat somewhere.

Back to the plot ...

We find the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Admiral Fitzwallace (John Amos), presenting three options which would limit civilian casualties and provide maximum protection for American personnel. The President is not happy - "What is the virtue of a proportional response?" - and demands to have a stronger retaliatory plan within an hour. When the generals come back with that option, an attack on a major Syrian airport that could result in thousands of civilian casualties and disruptions to water and medical supplies, Bartlet realizes he's trapped. This response would be seen worldwide as a wild overreaction by a first-time Commander in Chief, and would have a negative impact on America's standing. The President reluctantly approves the original plan, an attack on two ammunition dumps, a railroad bridge, and the Syrian intelligence service.

This forced choice continues to grate on Jed, even up to the point where he's going to go on TV to address the country about the attack. Just before air time, Leo takes him aside and basically reads him the riot act. While Jed refers to the right of Roman citizens to walk anywhere in the world without fear, due to the swift and mightly retaliation of the Empire, Leo reminds him that the Roman Empire isn't really a worthy example for American democracy to emulate, and superpowers shouldn't act that way.

 Leo: "So, my friend, if you want to start using American military strength as the arm of the Lord - you can do that. We're the only superpower left. You can conquer the world like Charlemagne. But you better be prepared to kill everyone. And you'd better start with me, cause I will raise up an army and I will beat you."

When Leo tells Jed, "It's what our fathers taught us" (referring specifically to proportional responses), the President finally comes to terms with it. Just in time before going on TV to inform the nation of his administration's first military adventure!

As far as other examples of the episode's theme, you've got Josh blowing up at CJ, who responds in kind.

Josh: "You know what, CJ, I really think I'm the best judge of what I mean, you paranoid, Berkeley, shiksa feminista! (beat) Well, that was way too far."
CJ: "No, no. Well, I've got a staff meeting to go to and so do you, you elitist, Harvard, fascist, missed-the-deans-list-two-semesters-in-a-row, Yankee jackass!"

CJ also comes down hard on Sam about not telling her about his relationship with Laurie, and Sam really responds overly harshly - he's defensive about the idea that he's really not doing anything wrong, and the White House is too worried about "looking good" rather than "being good." Sam also rather meanly accuses CJ of not being brave enough or strong enough to do what's right, which definitely hurts CJ (a great acting moment from Allison Janney). On the other hand, the entire notion that Sam's upright and noble influence is somehow going to "save" Laurie from her "tawdry" life as a $3000-per-night call girl isn't exactly honorable from a feminist/equal rights/liberal point of view.

The discussion does make Sam pound the wall as he leaves CJ's office, so we get that visual.

Those two patch things up later in the episode, and CJ goes on to show that Sam's virtuous defense did have some effect on her thinking.

There's also the Bertram Coles subplot. Coles is a Democratic congressman (it appears from the South, although it's not expressly stated) who, in a radio interview, took issue with the Bartlet administration's decision to cut funding for a military program, and said if the President chose to visit the Air Force base in his district, he may not get out alive. Toby goes ballistic, wanting to haul Coles in for questioning and starts yelling about treason and threats against the President - a quite disproportional response! Toby later implies to the press that there may be a Secret Service investigation going on, which makes him feel better - much later in the episode, when Leo tells Jed about the quote, they have a good laugh about it (again, showing the difference in proper levels of responding).

When CJ finds out a reporter has the Sam/Laurie scoop (it's the first appearance of Danny Concannon, played by an uncredited Timothy Busfield), she comes down hard on him, with an epic defense of Sam that shows she's reconsidered her position.

 CJ: "Sam is a grownup and I don't get to choose his friends and your readers don't get to judge them. And I'll tell you what else, there's something commendable about Sam's behavior here, don't ask me what, but there is. And I'm sticking by him until the President orders me otherwise and I'm going to look very unfavorably on those who seek to make us look like fools."

And then we get Charlie. Charles Young appears for the first time (played by Dule Hill, who actually appears in the opening credits before he's even mentioned in the series), as a young man who applied for a messenger job but was picked out to replace "Ted Miller" as the President's personal aide. Charlie's response to the entire thing is bafflement; he wonders if he comes back later, might the messenger job be available then? Proportionally, he tries to fight off the job - but when he's in the Oval Office as President Bartlet prepares to speak to the nation, and Jed speaks to him personally about the loss of his mother and how he wants to try to get some of those weapons off the streets, Charlie is swept away by the experience.

Charlie: "I've never felt like this before."
Josh: "It doesn't go away."

(Stand by for a callback to this at the beginning of Season 4.)

In addition, the fact that Charlie is African-American causes a bit of second-thinking amongst the staff. Since the President's personal aide will be attending the President, carrying his suits, opening doors, etc, Josh is a little concerned about the optics of it all. Leo reassures him, sort of.

Leo: "This is serious business, this isn't casting. We get the guy for the job and we take it from there."
Josh: "Good."
Leo: "And I'm fairly sure I'm right about this."

Leo then brings up the issue with Fitzwallace, who dismisses it in the most efficient way possible.

 Fitzwallace: "I got some real honest-to-God battles to fight, Leo. I don't have time for the cosmetic ones."

(Background: Charlie's character was originally written to appear in Pilot, but eventual rewrites left the character out. After The West Wing premiered, there was some criticism from the NAACP and others about the uniform whiteness of the cast - valid, although it's interesting to note that Sidney Poitier was one of the top choices to play President Bartlet, and CCH Pounder was considered for the role of CJ.)

This is the first episode not directed by Thomas Schlamme, but Marc Buckland does a great job here. I particularly like the lighting - lots of intense light sources, creating a lot of light and shadow. And the ending scene in the Oval Office, as they're setting up the cameras and Charlie gathers his courage to mention where the President's glasses might be? That gives us a most interesting two-shot, where Jed and Charlie are having a conversation and we see them both, but one is on a TV screen.

Just to wrap things up, this is a crackling-good episode of The West Wing, in my view, one of the top episodes of the first season. It's just so good thematically, it all holds together just right, it introduces Charlie in a great way - even if Sorkin was recycling his own ideas, it doesn't matter. It's just top notch.

Quick notes:

• We see the press just hanging around in the hallways, not once, but twice (Toby drops the "Secret Service investigation" tidbit, then CJ runs into them again as the staff is trying not to look like there's a military attack going on). Why are reporters just hanging out in the hallways? Is that normal?

• I do love the give-and-take CJ has with the press, which is an ongoing lovable trait of hers. It shows she's really good and comfortable with her job - and contrasts nicely with the rare occasions when she screws up or misplays a situation (those are coming).

• There's a shot from the north side of the White House showing cars driving past on Pennsylvania Avenue. Ah, those were the days, pre-9/11 - the street is now blocked to vehicle traffic, and even pedestrians are moved back from the fence along the White House grounds.

• CNN is apparently still reporting on the Bosnian peace treaty story that first appeared in the background of Pilot. Yeah, I'm guessing the producers just had a limited amount of CNN tape that they kept using (you really don't see the graphics unless you pause the DVD/playback). We do see CNN Headline News a couple of times as well, reporting on flooding, apparently.

• Mandy drops by! For no plot-related reason at all, just because the second-billed actress on the show has to have a scene. She does leave Josh a token of affection, a picture of the two from the night they met.

• It's so sweet that Mandy used a marker to scribble over Josh's face. We also find out her name is Madeline (which makes sense, I guess).

• Remember the light, cheery music that played under the opening credits for Pilot? That same music appears here under the closing credits (which run over a still shot of Mandy, for some reason that escapes me). This is the closing credits music we know and love and will continue for the rest of the run of The West Wing ... and yes, it will sometimes seem really off-kilter when an episode ends on an emotional or dark note, only to hear this poppy, light, jaunty tune immediately afterward. It's part of what we love about the show, right?

• CJ uses a Gateway laptop. Admittedly, probably state of the art for 1999.

Quotes    

• CJ (to Sam, about his Laurie situation): "Anytime you're into something and you don't know what, you don't keep it from me. I'm your first phone call. I'm your first line of defense. You have to let me protect you, and you have to let me protect the President."

• President Bartlet (to the generals): "Let the word ring forth from this time and this place, gentlemen - you kill an American, any American, we don't come back with a proportional response, we come back with total disaster!"

• Chris (reporter): "CJ, what's all the activity?
CJ: "What activity?"
Chris: "CJ, come on."
Reporter: "Fitzwallace was in Leo's office."
CJ: "Fitzwallace is Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, Leo McGarry is White House Chief of Staff, I'm your host, CJ, let's play our game."
Chris: "Is it happening?"
CJ: "No."
Chris: "Would you know if it was?"
CJ: "Guys ..."
Reporter: "Why all the activity?"
CJ: "Menudo's in the building, I gotta go."

Bread crumbs and familiar faces (Hey, it's that guy!)

• We see Ginger, who develops into Toby's assistant. Played by Kim Webster, she's actually credited as "Kim" in this episode. She's the one holding the stack of papers that Toby takes before he talks to the press about Bertram Coles and the pending "investigation." Bobbi is one of the reporters - she's appeared in all three episodes so far.

• Debby DiLaguardia is mentioned as the person who first interviewed Charlie for the messenger job, then sent him on to Josh for the President's aide position. We will see more from Ms. DiLaguardia in later seasons.

• President Bartlet bums a cigarette from a general and lights up in the Situation Room. This is the first time we've seen him smoke - but Captain Tolliver didn't even mention smoking during his exam in "Post Hoc, Ergo Propter Hoc". He told the President to cut back on dairy, red meat, and Scotch, but no mention of smoking. Hmmm.

• There's an "Adamle" mentioned at the Pentagon. He will be seen in the person of Gerald McRaney in a couple of seasons.

• As Josh shows Charlie around the West Wing he mentions the area used to be the White House Counsel's office before Toby and the Communications department took it over.

• President Bartlet mentions the loss of soldiers in Beirut and attacks in Somalia and Nairobi when he's arguing with Leo about retaliation. These refer to real historical events - a bombing of a Marine barracks in Beirut in 1983, the Battle of Mogadishu (Black Hawk Down) in Somalia in 1993, and the bombing of the US Embassy in Nairobi in August, 1998 (which in The West Wing universe would have occurred during Barlet's presidential campaign, on his predecessor's watch).

• Nancy (Renee Estevez) is in quite a few Oval Office shots, with four or five lines this episode.

• We see a CNN news anchor introducing President Bartlet's address onscreen. The anchor is played by Ivan Allen, who you definitely have seen in a variety of movies and TV shows, most often playing a news anchor (Sicario, Apollo 13, many, many TV shows). For some reason, his IMDB page does not include The West Wing as a credit.

"Post Hoc, Ergo Propter Hoc" - TWW S1E2

Original airdate: September 29, 1999

Written by: Aaron Sorkin (2)

Directed by: Thomas Schlamme (2)

Synopsis

• Sam jeopardizes his political future when he decides to pursue a relationship with Laurie. C.J. attempts to arbitrate tension between the President and the Vice President. After a string of gaffes that found traction with news outlets, the White House hires Mandy as a media consultant, much to Josh's chagrin. President Bartlet connects with his new physician, Captain Morris Tolliver, whose first child was born 10 days ago. The episode ends when Leo informs the President that Tolliver and others were killed when their military aircraft enroute to Jordan was shot down on the orders of the Syrian Defense Ministry. 

Two episodes out of the box, and already Sorkin is throwing Latin phrases at us. Typical eggheaded liberal elitism! No wonder some critics of the show referred to it as The Left Wing.

Kidding, kidding! "Post hoc, ergo propter hoc" is a fairly well-known example of a logical fallacy, which - if you've ever spent much time arguing with random strangers on the Internet - you've probably come across before, along with those like "No True Scotsman," "ad hominem," or "tu quoque." Lots of Latin in logical fallacies, apparently. Most of our friends in the Bartlet West Wing, though, aren't too hip on the phrase either (see Josh's quote below). As President Bartlet explains it, "It means, one thing follows the other, therefore it was caused by the other. But it's not always true, in fact it's hardly ever true."

The staff is specifically talking about President Bartlet's sense of humor, as a (never explained) joke about golfers has apparently caused the Ryder Cup team to turn down an invitation to the White House, and a joke about hats (funny hats or big hats, it depends on who tells it) is blamed by some for Bartlet losing Texas in both the Democratic primary and the general election. But it's an important tenet for leaders and those involved in politics to remember - you must be very careful about which prior events you consider as causation for following events, because simply the order in which things happen isn't always the explanation. Does this Latin phrase tie in to every plot point of the episode? Well, not really, I think.

We are once again in the full-on rush of events at the highest levels of government, which is part of what makes The West Wing so engrossing. Pilot was a great introduction to these characters, and "Post Hoc, Ergo Propter Hoc" just jumps right in and adds more to what we know about these people, while at the same time we're carried along in the ever-moving stream of happenings. Thomas Schlamme's camera work is again a key part of the energy and movement - just watch the scene between Captain Tolliver and President Bartlet in the Oval Office. It's just a quiet scene between the two, but the camera is always moving just a little bit, even on single shots of each as they speak, changing perspective and adding life and energy. And the best part is, it does it without the "shaky cam" hand-held kind of verite thing we see a lot of these days. Also, keep an eye on what's going on in the background. While there's always a ton of activity going on around what we're watching, Schlamme also uses the primary actors in the background hubbub. Check out the scene where Leo is saying goodbye to Tolliver as he heads to the Oval with Margaret; that's Toby and CJ we see in the background coming out of a door and disappearing stage right. Or when Sam and Josh are watching CJ's press briefing; Donna appears in the background, looking for a file on top of a cabinet. Little things you won't notice unless you're paying close attention, but it makes the world so much more real.

Let's take a look at the plotlines. First off, Mandy. She's infuriated by Senator Russell, because he's made a deal with the White House to hold off a vote on a controversial topic ("443" is all we know about it, but the actual subject of the bill doesn't matter) in exchange for a prime speaking spot at the Democratic convention. This riles up Mandy in two ways - she wanted to use the controversial bill as a way to build up Russell and stake his positions out on a national level; and it also ensures Russell won't be running for President at all. Which is the entire reason Mandy had quit her consulting job and gone to work for the Senator in the first place. With that motivation gone, she's pretty much out of business before it even starts.

We then find out it was Josh who was behind the offer to Senator Russell, as he celebrates throughout the West Wing (kegs of glory, muffins, bagels, etc.). He's happy for a couple of reasons as well - he's removed a possible challenger for re-election, and (if you remember his background line to Sam in the previous episode about "putting a stop" to Mandy and Russell) he's essentially ended the relationship between his former girlfriend and the Senator.

As it turns out, the White House has recently found itself wrapped up in relatively minor gaffes about a variety of things (those mentioned by Josh and Toby include the aforementioned Ryder Cup team, New Jersey, the G-8, and the President's bike accident from Pilot), and the staffers are agreed that hiring a media consultant would be worthwhile to help tamp down such occurrences before they take over the news cycle. Josh is adamant that it be anyone but Mandy - so of course the decision is to hire Mandy (to a position paid by the DNC). Mandy and her assistant/lone employee Daisy spend the episode racking their brains trying to think of prospects for new clients, until Josh arrives with the offer to work at the White House (which, as we'll find out in the next episode, apparently doesn't include Daisy, as she is never seen again. Oops. Better pay attention to that, Mandy). Post hoc connection: Was it Josh's jealousy over Mandy and Russell that directly resulted in her hiring by the White House? Eh, you could make an argument that it was ... but if we buy Russell saying "It was never going to happen," Mandy was eventually going to lose him as a client anyway, and the White House needed a media consultant in any event, so ...

During the morning press briefing, CJ is asked about a quote from Vice President Hoynes which rather tepidly indicates his support for the President's position on "A3C3." CJ diverts the media's attention away from that topic by swerving to the Ryder Cup team and the golf joke, but she, Toby and Josh realize this is becoming a pattern with the VP (Josh says something about "the third one in five weeks").

And speaking of the morning press briefing, the White House has unveiled a terrific new press briefing room just since last week [and yes, we know (by Sam's recounting of his meeting Laurie) the events of this episode occur about a week after the events of Pilot). The first shot of the room rather lovingly lingers on the set, so you can tell the producers and crew are pretty proud of this addition.

Quite a change from the last episode, huh?

Josh insists CJ needs to speak to the Vice President, and that he doesn't want this disagreement to get to Leo. This could be motivated by Josh's previous position working on Hoyne's presidential campaign, which he did prior to moving to the Bartlet campaign, as we will find out about in a couple of episodes. We'll have to figure out the timeline eventually; there's more information about how the Bartlet campaign came together at the start of Season 2.

CJ does catch the Vice President between events, brings up the A3C3 comment (or as the too-cool-for-school Hoynes/Tim Matheson calls it, "AC cubed") in an apologetic manner, but finds herself pretty much blown off by an unrepentant Hoynes ("I have my own press secretary"). The look she gives him as he leaves is full of daggers. 

(And again, just like Josh's motivation as a former member of his campaign, might CJ's reaction here be relevant considering the past events told in Season 5's Full Disclosure? I'm gonna say no, because the entire CJ/Hoynes storyline mentioned in Season 5 was cooked up by an entirely new creative staff. I'm pretty sure Sorkin had no such thought in his mind when writing the second episode of the entire series ... but hey, we have the benefit of retrospect to look back at Season 1 and fit the stories of Season 5 over that, and ... uh, post hoc, ergo propter hoc? I forced a theme together!)

Leo eventually figures things out, because he's smart, and when he asks CJ if she took care of the Vice President's comment, her reaction makes it clear to him that she didn't and she just wanted it to go away. He ends up calling in Hoynes and basically chewing him out, saying nothing less than full support of the President was going to be tolerated. We do find out that Hoynes is chafing in his role as VP, and we get the feeling he thinks he deserved to have the top spot all along, and that he perhaps doesn't really respect Bartlet as the President. Post hoc connection: It's not just Hoynes' weak statement of support for the President on A3C3 that's causing the tension here. There's something much deeper between Bartlet and Hoynes, and we're going to explore that in upcoming episodes.

Sam decides he needs to talk to somebody about the whole Laurie/hooking up with a call girl thing. At the end of Pilot, Laurie was resigned to dropping any idea of a relationship, and Sam kind of appeared to feel the same way. But now, he's reconsidering. He tells Josh, who is incredulous (when Sam says something about how Josh would feel different about Laurie if he met her, Josh says "You gotta promise me that's never gonna happen."). Josh says Sam has to talk to Toby about it, and he does, with much the same reaction from Toby (the "accidentally slept with a prostitute" conversation is priceless). Both Josh and Toby key in on the fact that Sam wants to "reform" Laurie, that he thinks he can save her from her life walking the streets and make her a respectable woman. Hmm.

So Sam goes to the same bar where he met her originally (we're told it's the Farnsworth; I couldn't find a bar by that name in DC, although the architect of the US Capitol building was Philo Farnsworth), tracks her down while she's with a "client," and casually threatens to bring in the Assistant US Attorney General to visit with these fine folks. Laurie, naturally, freaks out and leaves the bar, whereupon Sam follows her and straight-out admits Josh and Toby are right; he does want to "save" Laurie. Their scene ends with them coming to some sort of agreement that yes, perhaps they can be friends, even if Sam is risking a lot of career trouble by hanging out with a call girl. Post hoc connection: I don't think this plot line ties into the title theme. I'm open to interpretations, though.

Poor Captain Morris Tolliver. Here we have to go to the theatrical concept of "Chekov's Gun," created by  Pavel Chekov of Star Trek's USS Enterprise -- Nope! It's by Russian playwright Anton Chekov, who famously said if you have a loaded gun on stage in the first act, you darn well better use it in the third act. In other words, don't make a point about something that isn't going to matter later on.

Well, here we have "Chekov's Baby Picture." Tolliver is a US Navy medical officer who is a temporary replacement as President Bartlet's personal physician, giving the President a quick medical exam every week. He and Bartlet get along so well that Leo asks if he could take over the role permanently, which he agrees to do after his week-long trip to a teaching hospital in Jordan. During the course of this episode, Tolliver's picture of his 10-day-old baby is mentioned six times during this episode:

1. Leo asks if he has a picture of the baby
2. Leo shows the picture to Margaret to distract her
3. Leo tells Margaret to give the picture back to Tolliver
4. Jed asks if he has a picture of the baby
5. Jed reminds Tolliver to take the picture as he leaves
6. Jed tells Tolliver to take another look at the picture before he goes out the door

You think maybe something bad is going to happen to Tolliver? What do you think Chekov might say about that?

RIP, Captain Tolliver.

Anyway, the Tolliver-Bartlet relationship is key here. They do show an easy camaraderie, and the President is obviously very comfortable with Tolliver. He tells the doctor about his unease with the military officers under his command, how he feels as if he's not respected and the Joint Chiefs doubt his resolve. He admits he's not comfortable with violence, and that doesn't necessarily jibe with the mindset of the military. Tolliver reassures the President, saying he needs to give the generals time to get to know him, and they'll eventually grow to respect his leadership, even as they are sure to follow his commands at the present. It's a nice little scene -

Which grows in importance at the end of the episode, when we discover Tolliver's plane was shot down over Syria with the loss of all 60 people aboard. Leo tells President Bartlet that intelligence shows the Syrian Defense Ministry ordered the missile launch (why Syria would want to shoot down an American military transport full of medical personnel is never answered). Bartlet's previously voiced concern about military options and use of violence quickly disappears in the face of the death of his medical officer, and he resolves to "blow them off the face of the earth." To be continued! (As many things on The West Wing are, which again makes this series feel so realistic. Issues and events aren't always wrapped up neatly in an hour, sometimes they carry over to the next episode, oftentimes they carry over for years.) Post hoc connection: Was it really Tolliver's death that brings the President up against the realities of military command? Was it getting to know the father of a 10-day-old baby, then having him shot down, that stiffened the Presidential spine? It's certainly played that way, and I believe it's meant to be true in the context of the episode - but President Bartlet was going to have to come to terms with using military force at some time during his term. Was Tolliver the "hoc" that brought on the "other thing"? At this point in time, I think, yeah.

I also really like the expression on Leo's face when President Bartlet asserts his revenge against the Syrians. Leo knows the real foreign policy impacts at play here. He knows a full-blown assault on Syria might feel right, but can't be the right thing to do in reality (as we will see in the next episode). It all plays out in his face right here.

Some random items:

- Mandy has pretty terrible taste in music. In Pilot, her first appearance (driving recklessly along the National Mall and getting pulled over by a cop) "Moment Of Weakness" by Bif Naked is playing on her car radio. Yeah, I don't know anything about that song, either. In the opening of this episode, as she drives her BMW up on a curb in pursuit of Sen. Russell, there's some pretty bad generic pop/rock playing on her radio. My suspicion is that the producers weren't able to get the rights for whatever was used in the original broadcast for DVD/Netflix, as a bit of research online seems to indicate "She's Out Of Control" by Joy Division was the song there. That's definitely not the song on the DVD or Netflix versions of this episode. The music playing in the office while she and Daisy are trying to think up prospects is pretty bad, as well.

- We finally get the Snuffy Walden West Wing theme music! But wait ... it's kind of a temporary version, all electronic and synth-y. We'll get the real orchestral version in a few weeks. Meanwhile, while the opening drum riff debuts under the opening graphics, the music under the "Previously" scenes is something, a little different. And the end credits music hasn't settled on anything yet, either.

- We get to see Ed (Peter James Smith) as he's coming out of Toby's office, and he even gets his character named in the end credits! And he's not with Larry, which is weird. Larry (Bill Duffy) is still only credited as "Staffer," though. Hang in there, Larry!

- Likewise, Carol (Melissa Fitzgerald) gets a name, as she brings a folder to President Bartlet. She's obviously not working for CJ yet - we see two other staffers (Janet and Suzanne) helping CJ prepare for the press briefing.

- Background TVs are still mostly CNN and C-SPAN. There's at least one Wolf Blitzer sighting, and one CNN screen graphic again mentions the Bosnia peace treaty. An interesting aside: no text crawls on the bottom of the screens of the news channels. That got started after 9/11, which is still over a year in the future.

- Opening credits order remains the same (although somehow I forgot John Spencer in my previous post about stuff I missed on Pilot - and I love John Spencer, so that was a terrible oversight). It appears Lowe and Kelly get top billing. Sheen gets to finish with the "and Martin Sheen," and the rest are in alphabetical order.

- How good a doctor is Tolliver, anyway? After he takes the President's blood pressure, he just leaves the cuff on his arm while he takes his temperature and writes a few notes. Jed just sits there playing with the pump bulb thingy. That's not how it's done, is it?

- Finally, one last thing I forgot about Pilot. In The West Wing universe, it's rare for an actual contemporary real-life person to be named. You just don't hear names of real people that might pull you out of the episode. It does happen a few times, the first one in the opening episode when Leo is upset with the New York Times crossword for misspelling the name of Libya's Prime Minister, Muammar Gaddafi. It's kind of funny anyway for Leo to get upset, because there's no standard, proper English spelling of "Gaddafi" anyway.

Quotes    

• Josh (celebrating his maneuver that ended the possibility of Sen. Russell running for President); "I drink from the keg of glory, Donna! Bring me the finest muffins and bagels in all the land."

• Toby: "Sarcasm's a disturbing thing coming from a woman of your age, Mrs. Landingham."
Mrs. Landingham: "What age would that be, Toby?"
Toby: "Late twenties."
Mrs. Landingham: "Attaboy."
Toby: "Can I have a cookie?"
Mrs. Landingham: "No."

• President Bartlet: "Twenty-seven lawyers in the room, anybody know 'post hoc, ergo propter hoc'? Josh?"
Josh: "Uh, post, after, after hoc, ergo, therefore ... after hoc, therefore something else hoc."

• Tolliver: "You cut back on red meat?"
  President Bartlet: "Yeah."
Tolliver: "Dairy?"
President Bartlet: "Yeah."
Tolliver: "How about booze?"
President Bartlet: "Yeah, why not. Two Dewars on the rocks, Mrs. Landingham."

• President Bartlet (as Tolliver gives him a flu shot): "How do I know this isn't the start of a military coup?"
Tolliver: "Sir ..."
President Bartlet: "I want the Secret Service in here right away."
Tolliver: "In the event of a military coup, sir, what makes you think the Secret Service is going to be on your side?"
President Bartlet: (beat) "Now that's a thought that's going to fester."

• Toby: "You accidentally slept with a prostitute."
Sam: "Call girl."
Toby: "Accidentally."
Sam: "Yes."
Toby: "I don't understand. Did you trip over something?"

• Leo: "Don't do what you're doing, John."
Hoynes: "You're a world-class political operative, Leo. Why the hell shouldn't I keep on doing what I've been doing?"
Leo: "Cause I'll win and you'll end up playing celebrity golf for the rest of your life."

• President Bartlet (after learning of Tolliver's death): "I am not frightened. I am going to blow them off the face of the earth with the fury of God's own thunder."

Bread crumbs and familiar faces (Hey, it's that guy!)

• "Previously on The West Wing" voiced by Moira Kelly (1 of 1)

• John Bedford Lloyd (Sen. Russell) is one of those character actors that you see all the time, and you recognize the face, but never know the name (Remember WENN, LA Law, The Equalizer, The Abyss, of course several episodes of Law and Order).

• Merrin Dungey (Daisy) was supposed to be a recurring character after Mandy went to work in the White House, but she never appeared again (Malcolm's teacher on Malcolm In The Middle, Alias, Ursula in Once Upon A Time, Brooklyn Nine-Nine).

• President Bartlet remarks that sitting with the Joint Chiefs makes him feel like he's back at his father's dinner table. We'll learn more about the relationship with his father in Season 2 (Two Cathedrals).

• This is the first time we see Renee Estevez appear, as Nancy (she first greets Tolliver in Mrs. Landingham's office, then steps into the Oval to tell the President about someone arriving in DC). She is the daughter of Martin Sheen, and appeared in 44 episodes of The West Wing, with perhaps a couple of dozen lines of dialogue, total. It's not total nepotism, as Estevez has TV and movie acting credits going back to 1986, but she's only had two credits listed since The West Wing went off the air.

• The first appearance of Martin Sheen's jacket flip! Sheen suffered an injury during birth, which limits the use of his left hand. He developed a unique way to put on a suit coat, flipping it over his head as he puts his arms into the sleeves. It became a hallmark of President Bartlet as well.
• 
  

• The Situation Room is mentioned, but not shown. Instead, for the final scene when military officers are gathering to discuss the shootdown over Syria and the initial military readiness response, they're all gathered in the Roosevelt Room. Oddly, this includes Sam, Toby and Josh - political operatives who (with the possible exception of Josh, as Deputy Chief of Staff) would almost certainly never be directly involved in these types of discussions with the generals about military response options. Of course, these types of meetings would never be held in the Roosevelt Room, either. I'm guessing the producers hadn't built the Situation Room set yet.
  

More Stuff From "Pilot"

...cause I'm finding out this is kinda hard! Keeping up with all the notes and info and comments I want to do with this rewatch of The West Wing. Hopefully, in the future, I can get everything I want in my first post.

So I was going through Pilot again, just to try to catch any tidbits I might have missed, and there was a bunch of stuff I'd love to tell you about. So consider this an addendum to my first post on Pilot. Trust me, there's good stuff here. With added pictures!

For those of you who may be watching on Netflix, you probably scoffed at my comment about the sound at the very opening of the episode. "I heard the drums over the flag graphics," you probably said. "This guy is a low-energy loser!" Well, it's true, those drums are there in the Netflix version. I'm rewatching the series on DVD, from the complete series box set (which I'm pretty sure are more reflective of the original broadcast), and believe me, there are no drums there. Simply underlying piano bar music that leads into the scene with Sam and Billy the reporter. I was going to try to post the clip, but I can't figure out how. Low energy loser, you know.

Also, Sam makes a comment in that scene that's kind of an Easter egg for history buffs. His line "Alger Hiss just walked in with my secret pumpkin" refers to a spy case from the late 1940s when Hiss, a former State Department official, was accused of giving government secrets to the Soviet Union. One of the elements of the case involved film being stashed in a hollowed-out pumpkin. So that's what that line is a reference to, if you didn't know (that spy case is also where Richard Nixon first gained prominence, as one of the prosecutors, so there's that).

Let's mention the order in which the cast is listed in the opening credits. The credits for Pilot are different from ongoing episodes - here the credits are simply shown over the scene with Leo coming to work, stopping by Josh's office, then cruising through the Oval Office on his way to his desk. The cast is listed in this order:

1. Rob Lowe
2. Moira Kelly
3. Allison Janney
4. Richard Schiff
5. Bradley Whitford
6. "and Martin Sheen"

Given that the original concept of the series was to focus on the West Wing staffers, and that Lowe was supposed to be the focus/"star" of the show, his name being first makes sense. We'll keep track of this as we go, but I believe Lowe stays in the first position of cast credits throughout his run on the show. Kelly was probably the next best-known name at the time (other than Sheen, of course) given her roles in The Cutting Edge, Chaplin, and The Lion King (yes, she was the voice of the adult Nala). Looking back from almost 20 years in the future, though, and knowing how the character of Mandy ended up developing, it's kind of amusing to see her listed second in the credits.

I want to also mention the direction by Thomas Schlamme. He worked closely with Aaron Sorkin in the early seasons of The West Wing, and his work was uniformly excellent. His visual style - the "walking and talking," the movement of the camera (sometimes circling the characters) - added a lot of energy and tension and flow, and really establishes the look of the series as a whole. Leo's entrance in the White House (mentioned above) is a nice introduction to the "walking and talking" vibe. It's not one long continuous take, although there are some long takes within the scene (Leo walking away from Josh down the hall, into Mrs. Landingham's office, through the Oval is one long take). And for long takes, stand by for the opening of Five Votes Down.

I'm particularly enamored of the final scene. As the President and Mrs. Landingham go over the day's schedule, the camera pulls back, then moves up to look down directly at the President's desk and the Oval Office. It's a neat shot.

A little quibble, just about timelines here. Obviously, in the world of Presidential staff and the leader of the free world and all that, any strikingly newsworthy/important/medical event would be out almost instantly to those in the West Wing, from the Chief of Staff to the Press Secretary. I mean, that's how it would have to work - those within the President's inner circle need to know these things before they get out to the public, right?

Bear with me here. The opening scenes show Leo, CJ, Josh, Toby, and Sam being informed of the President's bicycle accident. In the real world, they'd be getting told this news almost the instant it actually occurred. We find out later this accident happened during the President's vacation in Jackson Hole, Wyoming. Now ... these staffers are being paged about this accident in the early morning, DC time (CJ is saying how "this hour, 5 to 6 am," is her time; Laurie tells Sam it's 5:30 in the morning when he gets his page). Well, Wyoming is two time zones earlier than DC. Was the President out riding his bike in the wee hours of the morning? No wonder he rode into a tree - it was probably too dark out to see (although CJ does tell the press there's photographs of the President "resisting the help of a Secret Service agent and then falling down again").

Speaking of CJ and the press - the briefing room is really small.

Later in the series we'll see a more spacious briefing room with windows and a raised area at the back. I don't know which is more true to the actual White House briefing room. I do know the first season of The West Wing essentially used the set built for the movie The American President, then the set was rebuilt/redesigned for following seasons. (Edit: This may not be true. The DVD commentary track reveals the producers spent a lot of money building the sets, way more than was typically spent for a pilot episode. And they ran out of money before building the press briefing room, which they did get to after being picked up.)

Also, while the closed captioning and most articles I've seen about the show-within-a-show where Josh makes his snarky comment to Mary Marsh calls it "Capital Beat," the clip of the show that Josh is watching makes it quite clear it's called "Capitol Beat" with an "o."

(Love the typewriter-style font on that, by the way.) That program will make a return, most obviously for In This White House and Bartlet's Third State of the Union in Season 2, so we'll see if that spelling remains or if the closed caption folks were just ahead of the game.

And a final quibble of sorts. Rev. Caldwell, Mary Marsh and John Van Dyke are represented as conservative Christian activists of national renown. They need to know their religious basics, in other words. So when Van Dyke spouts off about how the First Commandment needs to be promoted as much as the First Amendment, then calls "Honor your father" the first commandment - wow. That's a pretty big mistake, if you're making that a hallmark of your argument. I may not know off the top of my head the order of the commandments, and even a religious activist might mix it up in the midst of a conversation ... but he's making a point of comparing the first commandment with the First Amendment, so he's thought this through ahead of time and really doesn't have any excuse.

Then Toby, of course, comes back at Van Dyke to tell him he's wrong, then gets it wrong himself (it's not the third commandment, either - depending on your source "Honor your father and mother" is either the fourth or fifth commandment). It's a bit more understandable to think the White House Director of Communications might not have the order of the commandments right in his mind, but he seems really sure about what he says.

Naturally this is all to set up President Bartlet's great entrance ("I am the Lord your God, thou shalt worship no other god before me. Boy, those were the days, huh?"). So it's worth it.

Quotes    

• Laurie to Sam (who, as a White House employee, is wise to turn down her offer to share a joint): "I'm not a drug person. I just love pot."

• Leo: "He was swerving to avoid a tree."
Donna: "And what happened?"
Leo: "He was unsuccessful."

• Van Dyke: "Show the average American teenage male a condom and his mind will turn to thoughts of lust."
Toby: "Show the average American teenage male a lug wrench and his mind will turn -"
CJ: "Toby..."

• Van Dyke: "If our children can buy pornography on any street corner for five dollars, isn't that too high a price to pay for free speech?"
President: "No."
Van Dyke: "Really?"
President: "On the other hand, I do think that five dollars is too high a price to pay for pornography."

Bread crumbs and familiar faces (Hey, it's that guy!)

• I don't know if I mentioned in my original post that when Josh and Mandy meet, we first find out they were an item while working together on the President's campaign, and now we find out that Mandy is dating Senator Lloyd Russell (while also working for him). At the tail end of this episode, we hear (in kind of an aside) Sam saying to Josh "Mandy and Lloyd Russell?" to which Josh replies, "I'll be putting an end to that." Well ... stand by.

• Leo, when talking to the economists in the Roosevelt Room, says "The President's going to look at the WBO revenue analysis and say that economists were put on this earth to make astrologists look good." Later in the series we discover that not only is President Bartlet an economist himself, but he won the Nobel Prize for economics (which doesn't actually exist, by the way). In a few episodes we will also learn that President Bartlet apparently took a law class typically taken only by those actually in law school, not those studying economics. In other words - Sorkin hasn't quite figured out exactly what Bartlet's history is at this point.

• The Sam/Alger Hiss mention proves to be somewhat of a foreshadowing of Sam's efforts to help a friend of Donna's clear her father's name of spy charges in Somebody's Going To Emergency, Somebody's Going To Jail  in Season 2.