Walking And Talking And Yelling At Clouds: July 2021

Original airdate: April 2, 2003

Teleplay by: Eli Attie (7) and Aaron Sorkin (81)
Story by: Eli Attie & Kevin Falls (8)

Directed by: Jessica Yu (2)

Synopsis

There's a problem with the landing gear on Air Force One, and everybody on board has to wait just a little longer after an 18-hour flight. President Bartlet uses his time to reconsider certifying Colombia as a drug-war ally, while CJ and Will spend their time trying to trick the press. The peacekeeping bill for Kundu faces an unexpected hurdle. Josh's work with a Republican congressman on a bipartisan bill gets blown up by party politics.

"I want this plane to land!"

"Did it work?"

Here's another one that just doesn't grab me all that much. This episode doesn't move the overall world of The West Wing along in any kind of way, the time it takes to resolve the supposed "danger" Air Force One is in is kind of laughable for anyone who knows much about aviation, and some of the plot points seem to move in slow motion. Just one guy's opinion, of course, but that's what I'm here for.

Now, as I've said before, Aaron Sorkin usually gets things revved up into high gear with his story arcs leading up to the end of every season, and he's going to do that this year as well. There's just four episodes left, but he gets the moving parts fitting together into what I think is a rip-roaring end to his involvement with the show, and a stunning end to Season 4 (it was so stunning, in fact, that when it first aired in the spring of 2003 it actually made me stop watching the series for almost a full year. More details on that to come).

Air Force One is returning from a trip to Manila, but after nearly 18 hours in the air the pilots announce there's a problem with air traffic control and their landing will be delayed. The chief pilot, Col. Weiskopf, meets privately with the President to inform him the problem isn't with ATC, but with the plane - they did not get a confirmation that the nose landing gear has locked into place. And the drama begins ... are these staffers, reporters, and the President himself trapped in the sky? If they land will the gear hold? Or will they foam the runway (as Margaret keeps bugging Leo about) or might they try a hard landing to "whack" the gear into place (which may also break the plane in half, according to Will)?

In the meantime, President Bartlet wants to keep this news away from the reporters on the plane. He thinks if word gets out that Air Force One is in trouble, it could crash the foreign markets when they open, not to mention the national security issues involved with a presidential aircraft in distress. That gets even more difficult when Will and CJ are told the next step is for Air Force fighter jets to fly right next to the aircraft to try to check the gear visually.

President: "Here's what's going on. The light that indicates that the landing gear is locked didn't go on, which usually indicates that there's something wrong with the light. But what they're going to do is, they've sent a fighter jet to fly up alongside and get visual confirmation that it's down, and then we land. Here's the tricky part."

CJ: "Here's the tricky part?"

CJ, Will, Larry, and Ed concoct a story about some sort of floral festival in the Shenandoah Valley, with bonfires and lights of some kind "arranged in a pattern that befuddles astronomers to this day" - none of which is true, and the plane isn't near the Shenandoah Valley anyway. Will tries to use this ruse to get the reporters to the side of the aircraft away from the fighter:

But Chris, still doggedly working on her story, stays in her seat until she loudly exclaims, "Oh, my God!"

And the jig is up. The reporters reach for their phones, CJ cuts off their access, and the tension between the press and the press secretary gets pretty high.

In order to pass the time while they fly around, President Bartlet needs an in-person briefing before he officially recertifies Colombia as an ally in the war against drugs. He's not really on board with that, and his position is even more uncertain after Will gives him the information that the Colombian government really isn't all that much of an ally. Bartlet sends Will on a mission to discover what happens if he doesn't sign the recertification. Will gets the information, tells the President it would result in some minor irritations but no huge foreign policy problems, but then ...

Will: "Well, actually ... you can't."

President: "I can't what?"

Will: "Can't not recertify them. They're going to be automatically recertified."

President: "Why? (dawning realization) Because the deadline was midnight ..."

And all the mounting frustration over being stuck in the air for 22-some hours and decisions being taken out of his hands because of that boils over.

President (shouting angrily): "I want this plane to land!"

Will punctures Bartlet's anger.

"Did it work?"

Which at last brings a genuine grin to the President's face.

I think that's a nice little moment, especially for the newest member of the staff to be able to get a smile out of Jed.

Back on the ground there are a few things going on. As the American military involvement in Equatorial Kundu continues, a friendly fire incident results in the accidental deaths of five soldiers. Of course this could complicate passage of a bill funding the peacekeeping force, which encounters more difficulties when the White House discovers the head of the Congressional Black Caucus, Rep. Mark Richardson, intends to come out against the military operation. Toby is dispatched to try to fix that problem, and he finds the congressman's opposition has some deep roots:

Richardson: "I'm not opposing the peacekeeping bill. In fact, the whole Black Caucus is going to stand behind it, but with a proposed amendment."

Toby: "Doing what?"

Richardson: "Reinstating the draft. I think the kids in my district are going to live longer if their fortunes are tied a little more closely to the fortunes of the kids in Josh Lyman's district."

Toby: "You want to draft a million middle-class kids out of spite?"

Richardson: "Well, I don't want to draft anybody out of anything. I'm just trying to promote some patriotic unity."

This issue - drafting soldiers versus depending on an all-volunteer military - is certainly a topic of debate. Does the volunteer Army mean a disproportionate number of low-income young people serve in harm's way, since their other opportunities are limited? Would a draft even the playing field, putting higher-income (and, let's be honest, whiter) Americans on the line in combat positions and making political leaders think twice about overseas military adventures? Or does a volunteer military actually work better than one consisting of reluctant draftees? There are very good arguments on both sides ... and Rep. Richardson really just wants to have the discussion.

A lot of back-and-forth ensues with Leo and Toby and the President, and the decision is finally made to support a conversation on the issue of reinstating the draft (Richardson: "It's not going to screw you too much?" Toby: "No, it'll screw us the regular amount"). I really think this is an intriguing story line with two sides that each have really good points - but it's glossed over here. It could have been more prominent and been a key part of the episode.

Another storyline that could actually be an A story - and while Sorkin gives it a good amount of coverage here, it could handle even more - brings us Josh and the GOP congressman Tom Landis working on a bipartisan deal to clean up Chesapeake Bay. Their negotiations in the Roosevelt Room are a good example of the parties working together to do good for Americans - but when two Democratic congressmen see Landis working with Josh in the White House, they start making waves about this "cooperation."

You see, Landis' hold on his Maryland district isn't as solid as he'd like. His willingness to work with the Bartlet administration puts him on shaky ground with Republicans, and possibly a target of a primary challenge; meanwhile, Democrats see that vulnerability as an opportunity to take the seat away from the GOP. The thing that could hurt both parties' ambitions is to have a popular bill go through with Landis' name on it with the support of the White House.

Landis: "You guys are really going to go after the seat next time, huh?"
Josh: "So are the Republicans, Tom. You're probably going to have a primary challenge."
Landis: "You know, if you keep squeezing out the liberal Republicans and the conservative Democrats ..."
Josh: "That's who's beatable."

Josh wants to make things work, but after the Democratic congressmen whine to their leadership on the Hill, leadership demands changes - "revenue enhancements" assessed to small businesses around the Bay, which is just another word for tax increases. Landis knows adding tax hikes to the bill will kill any Republican support, and it will make him even more of a pariah in his party. If it advances at all ...

Josh: "It's not the Democrats this time, it's the Republicans. It's not going to happen."

Landis: "What do you mean?"

Josh: "It's not going to get out of committee. The White House is going to have to pull its support, but there's room in the EPA budget, room in the Interior budget."

Landis: "Room for everything but my name?"

Josh: "Yeah."

Sorkin then has Landis go on with a forced, and in my opinion rather unpleasant, comparison of the marginalization of moderate politicians to the Holocaust ("Why don't we have comedians as funny as you back home in Germany?" "Because you killed them all"). I get that it's an important political point (as illustrated by how much worse things have gotten thanks to the squeezing out of liberal Republicans/conservative Democrats, much as Landis warned about), but geeze, Aaron ... the Holocaust? Really?

At last, the pilots of Air Force One get the zany idea to try to recycle the landing gear, raising it and then lowering it again, and - SHAZAM! - the light comes on. Never mind this would have been the first thing they would have tried in real life, at least they came up with the idea after having the plane buzzed by fighters, getting a midair refueling, and meandering around in the sky for four hours. The news pleases CJ to no end:

Larry: "Gear's down."

CJ: "What?"

Larry: "They got the indicator light."

Ed: "They recycled the gear, and the light went on this time. We're landing."

Larry: "I was the one who said it first."

Finally ready to land, CJ turns the press phones back on - and instead of grudging anger at being kept from doing their jobs for a few hours, the reporters express their thanks to CJ for, I don't know, keeping them out of the loop? Keeping information away from them? Trying to do her job, which sometimes goes directly against their jobs? That's kinda weird. And then, to add yet another last-minute wrinkle, there's been a wind change at Andrews, they'll have to use a different runway, and it's going to take just a bit longer. The President's reaction is classic:

Kind of a placeholder in West Wing history, certainly in Season 4, this episode just doesn't do all that much. But let's get ready for a wild ride involving scandal, death, kidnapping, Constitutional crises, blustering Speakers of the House, and arguments about balancing eggs on end - because that's how Sorkin wraps things up over the next four episodes.

Tales Of Interest!

- Another long, unbroken take to start the episode (as we just saw in Privateers). This one lasts almost a full minute and helps to show off the Air Force One sets that were first built for The Portland Trip. Also like Privateers, the episode ends with a similar long take, just over a minute long.

- Let's talk about some of the aviation-related topics in the episode, shall we? After all, that's something I know a little bit about ...

At the start of the episode CJ and the reporters are discussing the confusing time-change issues around the 18-hour flight from Manila to Washington, DC. At the end, Col. Weiskopf announces they've been airborne for 22 hours and 13 minutes, which seems to say Air Force One has been flying around checking on the landing gear for about four hours. To me, this seems ... excessive. If a pilot has an issue with a landing gear light, the very first thing they'd try is recycling the gear, raising it and then lowering it again. It wouldn't take them four hours of fighter jet flybys and mulling over buzzing the tower for them to try that simple option.

The pilot also tells the passengers they've been taken off the "Valhalla vector" (whatever that is) and told to "proceed along Jet Route 5." This would be quite an unusual ATC instruction, given that Jet Route 5 extends from Los Angeles to Vancouver, British Columbia, along the Pacific coast and some 3000 miles from Andrews AFB.

Col. Weiskopf tells the passengers they've been taken off their vector and told to maintain altitude, which from what we hear later from reporter Mark is apparently 33,000 feet. Pilots don't lower their gear at 33,000 feet. Flying with the gear down adds a lot of drag, slows the aircraft and increases the rate of fuel burn, so you don't do that until you're on the final approach path and very close to landing. Anyone who's flown before knows the sound of the gear lowering, and that doesn't happen until you're almost on the ground. If Air Force One encountered a problem with the landing gear, that would have happened on final approach at Andrews, they would have likely stayed in military airspace near Andrews instead of flying over West Virginia and Tennessee, and they almost certainly wouldn't have climbed back up to 33,000 feet. Maybe, just maybe, Sorkin might convince me that for the protection of Presidential aircraft in an age of terrorist threats, the decision was made to climb up high while they worked the problem - but gallivanting around an hour-plus away from the destination is likely the very last thing a pilot with a landing gear issue would want to do.

We hear early on that Air Force One is over Harper's Ferry, WV, which would put them some 70 miles northwest of Andrews. Interestingly, there's a restricted airspace area about 25 miles northeast of there, over Camp David, that would be an ideal place for Air Force One to work the problem.

There's also a restricted airspace area southeast of Andrews, near the Paxutent River Naval Air Station:

and a military operations area between Elkins, WV, and Harrisonburg, VA (which would, ironically, put them in the vicinity of the Shenandoah Valley anyway).

Any of these areas would make a ton more sense for Air Force One to fly around in rather then heading off to central Tennessee.

And finally, Col. Weiskopf tells the passengers the tower at Andrews is changing them over to "Runway Three-Niner." No such runway exists, at Andrews or anywhere on the planet. Runway number designations are used to describe the compass alignment of the runway - Runway Two-Seven, for example, would be an east-west runway, with the aircraft lined up to land flying westbound on a heading of 270 degrees (the opposite end of that runway would be called Runway Niner, with that heading being 090 degrees). Since compass directions are in a circle, and there are only 360 degrees in a circle, there's no such thing as a "390 degree" compass heading - therefore, no such thing as "Runway Three-Niner."

- The conniving and backstabbing over who gets the credit for a bipartisan Chesapeake Bay cleanup bill seems to be a harbinger of the much, much more partisan things to come in our politics. In the timeframe of this episode (with the George W. Bush administration running roughshod over Democrats in foreign policy as well as areas of domestic governance), it may have appeared that relationships between Republicans and Democrats were as bad as they could get ... but frankly, that era has nothing on the current drastically polarized position we find ourselves in. Landis had an unfinished thought about what happens after "squeezing out the liberal Republicans and the conservative Democrats" - and I think the government we find ourselves with in 2021 tells us what happens after that finally comes to its conclusion.

- I haven't really been keeping track of the President's overseas trips. Here he's returning from Manila. Earlier we've seen him coming back from a trip to Stockholm in Take This Sabbath Day, we know of a trip to Cairo when CJ received a statue of a cat goddess that she later broke (The Stackhouse Filibuster), and there was a summit meeting with Russian President Chigorin in Helsinki (nearly cancelled in Enemies Foreign And Domestic, with the party returning with various Finnish gifts of moose products in The Black Vera Wang). I'm sure there's been mentions of a couple of other trips, but as I said, I haven't been keeping track.

- The show doesn't typically use the names of actual countries when they're setting up serious foreign policy plotlines (for example, Qumar and Equatorial Kundu were both created to give The West Wing universe some overseas antagonists without actually making a real government angry). There have been some instances: Syria was blamed for shooting down a medical relief aircraft in "Post Hoc, Ergo Propter Hoc" for example; Colombia was in the forefront of drug-war storylines in Bartlet's Third State Of The Union/The War At Home (as well as in this episode); and a coup in Haiti was a plotline at the end of Season 2/beginning of Season 3. Saudi Arabia hasn't been mentioned, except for an event that actually happened (girl students prevented from fleeing a school fire because of their "immodest" clothing) in Enemies Foreign And Domestic (CJ's commentary on that got her death threats, remember?) To add to that, the 9/11 attacks didn't occur in this timeline - there was something terrorist-related that happened (the obvious quick-response episode that was Isaac And Ishmael, the general tone of looking over our shoulders and bellicose language throughout Season 3 - "they'll like us when we win!"), but we never know specifics. But Rep. Richardson drops a telling little remark as Toby tries to make his argument for intervention in Kundu:

Toby: "But you agree there are moral imperatives?"

Richardson: "Well, if there are moral imperatives, then you've got to tell me we are going to get everybody. Beginning with the Saudis."

That remark does two things: it clarifies better than the President ever did what the Bartlet Doctrine should be (you go after every country that's oppressing human rights, not just the easier-to-defeat ones like Kundu), and it points out the Saudis as bad actors in the human rights arena. That was, of course, CJ's point in the deaths of the schoolgirls, but in real life the 9/11 hijackers were all Saudis. While the reaction of the Bush administration was to go after Afghanistan and the Taliban - and later, Iraq and Saddam Hussein - there was no real military or foreign policy response to Saudi Arabia, one of our staunchest Middle East allies and, coincidentally, a prime supplier of crude oil to America and the world. Sorkin's little name-drop of Saudi Arabia in this context is, I think, a very deliberate calling-out of the kingdom for all sorts of issues, from the treatment of women in the country to their looking the other way with the 9/11 hijackers - and it's a very unusual thing for The West Wing to do.

Quotes

Steve: "I've agreed that it's 9:25 from the beginning. I'm just saying that it should be 9:25 in the morning."
CJ: "But it's not, Steve. You can just look out the window and and check that one off the list."
-----
Toby: "I sent Will to the Philippines in my place."
Josh: "It's not like they're not going to fix it. You don't have to feel guilty about it."
Toby: "No, I mean, thank God I sent Will in my place."
-----
Josh: "I get the House is angry we didn't take back the House, and setting aside the fact it was their damn fault and not ours, stopping all bipartisan legislation is like saying, 'Let's blow up the place. Maybe voters will hire us to rebuild it.'"
-----
Leo: "Well, the left's come full-circle, hasn't it? By the way, not for nothing but draftees aren't nearly as well-trained. It's why there were so many casualties in Vietnam."
Toby: "Right, also the Viet Cong."
-----
Leo: "Hardly anybody's happy. The President's going to study reinstating -- we're for peacekeeping in Kundu."
Toby: "And Mark's point is who keeps the --"
Leo: "I know what Mark's point is."
Toby: "People who got nowhere else to go --"
Leo: "For advancement, they go for advancement."
Toby: "The five guys on their way home right now - didn't advance very far, I think is Mark's point."
-----
CJ: "It just suddenly worked?"
Will: "The gear?"
CJ: "Yeah."
Will: "Yeah."
CJ: "I'm not sure I'm good at living in a world where that kind of thing is possible."
Will: "But you are."
CJ: "I imagine myself destitute, I imagine myself unlucky in love ... but I never imagined my life would be in danger with really uncommon frequency. It feels a little bit good, doesn't it?"
Will: "No."

Story threads, callbacks, and familiar faces (Hey, it's that guy!)

Congressman Tom Landis is played by Matt McCoy, who's appeared on many TV series (Lloyd Braun in Seinfeld, Carnivale, Silicon Valley, as well as Sorkin's later effort Studio 60 On The Sunset Strip).

The two Democratic congressmen who question Josh about Landis being in the White House for negotiations are played by familiar character actors George Wyner (left) and Gregory Jbara. Wyner has been around forever (The Rockford Files, Hill Street Blues, Spaceballs) and you may recognize Jbara from Blue Bloods or In And Out (he also did voice work on Family Guy and American Dad).

Congressman Mark Richardson, head of the Congressional Black Caucus, returns. Played by Thom Barry (Cold Case, The Fast And The Furious, Michael Jordan's dad in Space Jam), we first saw him chiding Leo for trying to speak for Black men in Five Votes Down and also was seen in Ways And Means. In this episode we find he represents part of Brooklyn, including the neighborhoods of Bedford-Stuyvesant and the one where Toby grew up ("And you're one of my constituents, too, Toby," he says at one point - from Holy Night we know Toby grew up somewhere near the Brooklyn Heights neighborhood, which is just west of Bedford-Stuyvesant).

We've seen the "Valhalla Vector" mentioned before, in The Portland Trip. I said in my entry for that episode that I've never heard of named "vectors" like that during my time in air traffic control, but Sorkin decided he'd just use that same nomenclature over again. In that episode a screen caption listed the "Valhalla Vector" on Jet Route 23 over Wheeling, West Virginia - this time we're told ATC is taking Air Force One off that vector and putting them on Jet Route 5 (which, as I mentioned before, runs between Los Angeles and Vancouver - an entire continent away from Washington, DC). In reality, when a pilot requests a "vector," both pilots and air traffic controllers know he's asking for ATC to give him headings to fly, whether to a final approach course or just to create a kind of ad-lib holding pattern ("fly heading zero-niner-zero ... turn right heading one-eight-zero" etc). "Vectors" by definition aren't named flight paths, they're directions given individually by controllers - unless there's something going on here I'm not aware of.

In Manchester Part I and The Two Bartlets, we heard the voice of Lt. Col. Gantry as the pilot of Air Force One. In this episode, the plane is being flown by Col. Jesse Weiskopf, who we actually get to see in person.

Speaking of pilots, Leo's assurances to Jed about the landing gear light and the stories he can tell about airborne catastrophes reminds us that he flew fighter jets in Vietnam (a story best reflected in War Crimes, also brought up in Red Haven's On Fire).

The talk of recertifying Colombia for their "assistance" in the war against drugs brings to mind Bartlet's Third State Of The Union and The War At Home, when the President sent special forces into Colombia to rescue DEA agents, but the troops were ambushed and killed. That experience (and the emotional toll it took on Bartlet), while never mentioned in this episode, could help explain some of his reluctance to approve the recertification.

The friendly-fire incident in Equatorial Kundu and the peacekeeping bill tie us back to the Bartlet Doctrine and its policy of American intervention to support freedom and prevent genocide, a story arc that started with Inauguration: Part I and has continued in every episode since.

Josh teases Donna over her handwriting:

Josh: "They're having a problem with their landing gear?"

Donna: "I know, I wrote the note."

Josh: "No, you wrote they're having a problem with their landing geek."

Josh first poked fun at Donna's handwriting all the way back in Six Meetings Before Lunch when he claimed her note about a "panda bear" actually read "banana bar."

The familiar Bartlet "jacket flip" makes an appearance. Martin Sheen's left arm was injured at birth, making him unable to lift that arm above his shoulder. Sheen developed this over-the-head method of putting on jackets, which obviously became a trait of President Bartlet, as well.

Josh's reference to Donna dating Republicans includes "Cliff" (Cliff Calley, in a first date set up by Ainsley in Ways And Means) and "Commander Wonderful" (Jack Reese, first seen in Election Night and then summarily shuffled off to Italy in Inauguration: Part I). I'm not sure if "Doctor Freeride" is a reference to somebody we've seen in the series.

Donna's request to Josh to take on more responsibility in her job is something we've seen a bit of in the past - in Night Five she got a job offer for a startup website, and passed on that hoping Josh would give her more to do; in The California 47th Josh told her certain things were below her "level" and sent her to meet with an agricultural labor leader. In this episode Josh tasks her with digging into the details of Air Force One maintenance, which isn't much but she's happy to take on. Her quest for more meaning and relevance in her job duties will only grow over the next three seasons.

Leo tells Toby he has to "meet with Nancy," which would mean National Security Adviser Nancy McNally. That character, played by Anna Deavere Smith, hasn't been seen since 20 Hours In America, Part Two (Smith took a role in the TV series Presidio Med which kept her off The West Wing for a while), but she will return for an important arc at the end of this season.

This is the first mention that Will is a member of the Air Force Reserves, but it won't be the last.

CJ's comment to Will about her life being in danger with "really uncommon frequency" has us thinking about how often we've seen that. Obviously the assassination attempt in What Kind Of Day Has It Been and the stalker following CJ in the final episodes of Season 3; but we've also had the armed woman who jumped the White House fence in Mr. Willis Of Ohio and the lockdown in Isaac And Ishmael (and just the general tone of apprehension and caution in a post-9/11 world, even though that specific event didn't occur in this universe). Coming seasons will see West Wing lives in danger even more.

WHAT'S NEXT moment: Not exactly in the show's theme of "What's next?" but the President does ask that question of Col. Weiskopf when he hears the news that the fighter jet flyby wasn't able to determine if the gear was locked.

DC location shots

None, but plenty of scenes in the Air Force One sets.

They Do Exist! It's The Real Person, or Thing

Rep. Richardson has a painting of Calvin Coolidge in his office. That's an interesting choice - Coolidge was a Republican, Richardson is a Democrat; Coolidge was from Massachusetts, Richardson represents Brooklyn ... perhaps it was Coolidge's support for civil rights that led Richardson to have his portrait there.

There are several mentions of Rep. Richardson's upcoming speech at the Brookings Institution where he intends to come out against the military involvement in Equatorial Kundu.

After Will tells the President about Colombian narcotics officials embezzling American anti-drug funds to take vacations, Bartlet wonders why he should recertify the country if they're using stolen money to visit SeaWorld.

When Leo tells the President about Rep. Richardson's efforts to tie the draft to the intervention in Kundu, Bartlet says, "And when did these guys become Smoot and Hawley?" That's a reference to Sen. Reed Smoot and Rep. Willis Hawley, who in 1930 wrote what came to be known as the Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act, greatly hiking tariffs on foreign goods during the Great Depression and likely making the effects of the depression worse in the United States. Why would Bartlet bring them up in this context? I'm not sure, except for the fact President Hoover was against the bill in the first place and only signed it after intense pressure from the Republican Party and his own Cabinet.

Rep. Richardson's conversation with Toby about Civil War draftees being able to get out of their military duty with a $300 payment is indeed factual. They also talk about the Vietnam War draft lottery, although Toby's story about his lottery number is kind of bogus. We know from Holy Night that he was born December 23, 1954. The draft lottery drawing for men born that year wasn't until March of 1973, with the last draft call occurring the previous December and the authority to induct draftees ending in June, 1973. With Toby's birthdate of December 23, 1954, his actual lottery number would have been 238, not 125 (with the highest number called 95, not 90).

Products, and there are several. First, we see cans of Dr Pepper and Pepsi on the table where Josh and Rep. Landis are negotiating:

Josh is drinking a bottle of Deer Park water in his office when Donna startles him, and there's another bottle on the table in the Roosevelt Room:
Ed uses a Gateway laptop to look up events in the Shenandoah Valley:

Charlie enjoys a bottle of Rolling Rock beer:

And the President has a little airplane-sized bottle of Wild Turkey while he passes the time playing a little solitaire: