Full Disclosure - TWW S5E15

 

Original airdate: February 25, 2004

Written by: Lawrence O'Donnell Jr. (10) 

Directed by: Lesli Linka Glatter (4)

Synopsis

• Toby's stuck in a meeting with union officials upset about Chinese bras, Josh is stuck in a meeting with the military base closing commission, and the mayor of DC wants the President to approve a private school voucher program - but mostly the White House is fired up in response to John Hoynes' return with a tell-all article and book. That all ends up overshadowed by a giant secret CJ has kept from us for ten years.

"You don't have to apologize to me." 

"I don't have anyone else I can apologize to."

CJ did what, now?

There's lots going on in this episode - trade disputes with China possibly leading to unions going on strike, the President "switching parties" to sign a bill setting up a public school voucher program in DC, jockeying over what military bases to close, Ben the park ranger still calling, and of course the looming prospect of John Hoynes trashing the administration to set up his own presidential run - but all I can take out of this episode is the bombshell CJ drops at the end. We get some signals throughout: the uneasy gulp of water CJ takes live on the air when she first hears Hoynes is doing a tell-all interview,

and all those glances between her and Toby, carrying hidden meanings we can't fathom until we get to the end of the day. It's a neat bit of foreshadowing (and a neat bit of illustrating the deep friendship between CJ and Toby) but in no way does it prepare us for discovering CJ slept with Hoynes ten years ago.

Honestly, this says more about Hoynes than it does about CJ. We've kind of picked up on the fact that Hoynes was a horndog unfaithful to his wife (an affair with a DC socialite to whom he whispered classified secrets was the reason he resigned the Vice Presidency in Life On Mars), and the notion he sweet-talked our CJ into coming up to his hotel room back in the day helps solidify that. CJ lays that part of Hoynes' life even more bare with her promise to expose the truth if he does run for President and tries to attack the women he'd dallied with before.

CJ: "When you run for President, the press is going to find some of those women. And if you try to attack them, if you get your opposition research team working on them, if you try to destroy them, if you try to say they're all bimbos and liars, then I'll be standing right there with them and I'll be ready to take anything you or your people throw at me, anything. So don't make me tell the truth about you because it will be the whole truth."

But still, CJ? A one-night stand with a married Senator? And this was never touched on, never even hinted at before? Of course this is brand-new information cooked up by a post-Aaron Sorkin writing staff designed to fit in with John Wells' more personal-drama-soap-opera-y style of show, but still ... Lawrence O'Donnell, what were you thinking?

I do appreciate the regret CJ shows for the whole affair, which says a lot about her character ("I knew he was married. I knew it. I always thought women who did that ...") and I do get why she would be reticent to bring it up (apparently only sharing that with Toby, which makes sense). But still, looking back, there are a few places where we should have seen something from CJ in her dealings with Hoynes. Oh, well ... the writers know you can't get in a time machine and go back to add things to episodes that weren't there.

Enough about that. The big story is that Hoynes is setting up a redemption tour, with a tell-all article to lay out his side of the story about his resignation and how the White House was trying to influence the whole affair.

Rumors abound about what's in the article, but nobody can get their hands on an advance copy. CJ convinces the reporter on the article, Greg Brock, to come in and discuss it (even though as a new guy on the White House beat, just in from Paris, as CJ says "he doesn't owe me a thing"). Brock is steadfast; nobody gets an advance copy, especially subjects of the article.

Brock: "Sorry. I never give subjects of an article sneak peeks."

CJ: "But I'm not a subject of the piece. (pause) Am I?" 

Aha! Another clue for us, that makes very little sense yet! Brock also lets CJ in on the news that not only is Hoynes releasing this tell-all article, he's in the process of writing a book. That solidifies CJ's belief that this entire effort is the first step in a Hoynes comeback and another try at the Presidency.

Brock, though, is a savvy guy, and he knows a little favor for CJ can get him access/exclusives down the road. He drops some stuff on the floor as he gets ready to exit, and conveniently fails to pick up a certain computer disk.

Of course the article is on that disk, and of course CJ quickly whips out copies for the President and the senior staff to read, so they can review Hoynes' claims and give her what she needs to rebut the inevitable questions from the press. Which leads us to the gripping scenes of these guys ... reading:

The President and Leo refute some of Hoyne's claims in the article, and also inspire the staff to draw up a huge list of all the "private, on-the-job screw ups" Hoynes made as Vice President (it's apparently over 20 pages long, according to Carol):

Carol: "The first ten pages are legislative achievements."

CJ: "You mean the ones Hoynes almost screwed up?"

Carol: "Right. And the next section is the bills he really did screw up, and the last twelve pages have all the diplomatic stuff."

(This memo leads Toby to ask CJ to promise him that she'll "never let them make a list of my screw-ups. They wouldn't have enough paper.")

CJ deals with Hoynes personally, taking the memo to his office and laying down the law to him over all the women in his past. It seems to be an effective approach to make Hoynes aware he can't dismiss his extramarital affairs by denigrating the women should he actually run for President again.

There is some other stuff happening. Toby tries to calm down union representatives furious over China taking advantage by flooding the American market with cheaply made bras. That plotline serves mainly to showcase Ed, Larry, and Rena, as well as all the official portraits sitting in a White House storage room.

Josh is wrapped up in a meeting with the military base closing commission, which as far as he is concerned is going to do what it's going to do, with or without him. Ryan inserts himself into the discussion, and when he sees the head of the commission isn't willing to buck a powerful congressman whose district houses a base that ought to be closed, he goes behind Josh's back and makes a call.

On the surface this appears to be a disaster, as Rep. Chris Finn storms into the meeting to defend the base in his district. Josh has had it with Ryan's shenanigans, pulling him out of the meeting to fire him. But this has all been a ploy by Ryan - knowing the commission would never dare close the base in Finn's district anyway, he could pretend to take the fall for bringing up the idea, and Josh gets all the credit for getting angry at Ryan and defending Finn's base.

It's a pretty good plan. Ryan actually has some pretty good political instincts, and it's downright funny to see Josh's confusion as Ryan plays out the scene of his dressing-down through the Roosevelt Room door:

"You want me to look like I'm crying? I can do that. I can look like I'm crying."

Meanwhile Congress (being in control of the budget of the city of DC, since it's not a state) has passed an emergency bill to pay for snow removal - but Republicans have attached a pilot program for school vouchers that directs taxpayer money to help students attend private schools. Democrats have always fought back against this "defunding" of public school budgets in favor of private schools (an issue going on currently right here in my state of Iowa), and President Bartlet asks the mayor of DC to come in so he can explain why he's going to veto the bill.

Turns out, the mayor wants the money. Public schools are struggling in DC, and the mayor thinks maybe it's time to try a different strategy and at least give some desperate students a chance to learn in an environment not suffocated by crime, metal detectors, and shootings. It ends up falling on Charlie to help convince the President to go along with the mayor. President Bartlet brings Charlie into the meeting thinking that Charlie's will be on his side, being the (successful) product of the public school system, but:

President: "Tell us where you went to high school."

Charlie: "Roosevelt."

President: "A public school."

Charlie: "Yes, sir."

Mayor: "Where'd you want to go, Charlie?"

Charlie: "Gonzaga. A parochial school, near Union Station."

Mayor: "Why?"

Charlie: "There's never been a shooting there. They don't even have metal detectors. Almost everyone goes to college."

Mayor: "Couldn't afford it?"

Charlie: "Couldn't come close to affording it."

When the President sees that even Charlie would have jumped at the chance to get some extra funds to go to a private school, he relents on the bill ("you plan on telling me that anytime soon?" he asks Charlie about his support for a voucher plan). Which leads to this little tidbit after CJ returns from her tense visit to Hoynes:

CJ: "What do I need to catch up on?"

Toby: "President signed school voucher bill for DC."

CJ: "Are you kidding? I leave the building for an hour and he switches parties?"

(This is similar to the tax-credit-for-stay-at-home-moms storyline from An Khe, as John Wells and the showrunners continue to fight the implication that The West Wing is a left-leaning, Democratic-supporting TV show. In the battle to please more viewers and appear more "fair" and even-handed politically, they've started to bring up some conservative policies and programs in a favorable light, even having the Bartlet administration go along with them.)

But despite the busyness of the storylines, despite the earnestness of Ed and Larry, despite the President going along with a bill loathed by most of his party, even despite the return of Hoynes and his self-centered redemption tour - we are left with the thought of CJ and her momentary lapse of self-control that night ten years ago, and what that means for her, for Hoynes, and why there was never an inkling of anything about this over the past five seasons.

It's nice to end the episode with her finally picking up the phone and calling Ben, though. 

Tales Of Interest!

- CJ's bombshell about her fling with Hoynes comes completely out of the blue. In all the time we've seen these characters over the past five years, that little tidbit would never have come up? Not when Hoynes had to resign over an affair with a socialite in Life On Mars? Not in connection with Josh, who used to work for Hoynes, during the fallout from that resignation? Not when CJ and Hoynes sparred in "Post Hoc, Ergo Propter Hoc"?  

- We also hear this happened ten years ago, which would have been about 1994. Could CJ and Hoynes meeting then have made sense? After all, in In The Shadow Of Two Gunmen Part II we saw CJ was working for a Hollywood marketing/PR firm in late 1997/early 1998. Well, there could have been a connection: Hoynes was in the Senate in 1994 (we learned in 20 Hours In L.A. that he served 8 years as Senator before becoming Vice President, so he was first elected in 1990) and we also found out in In The Shadow Of Two Gunmen that CJ had previously worked for various Democratic/women's fundraising groups like EMILY's List, so actually they could have met at a party fundraising function somewhere in there.

- But yeah, this is nothing but a wild made-up curveball created by the post-Sorkin writing team out of thin air. Another reason why Season 5 is a bit of a bumpy ride.

- On the other hand, I do like how this plotline shines more light on the Toby/CJ relationship. They've always been close - Toby just drops by CJ's office to hang out all the time, they exchange flirty banter, Toby was the guy who brought CJ into the Bartlet campaign in In The Shadow Of Two Gunmen Part II. Figuring out that Toby is the only person CJ apparently told about her one-night fling with Hoynes says a lot about how deep their friendship is. They're exchanging meaningful looks all through this episode, like the meeting in the Oval Office:

And their final talk in CJ's office, before she lets the viewer in on her secret, where Toby offers a reassuring, comforting touch on her shoulder before he leaves:

And of course, the final bit of dialogue where CJ tells Toby she doesn't have anyone else to apologize to. I like the relationship between these two.

- The 20-something page list of Hoynes' failures as Vice President include a mess he made with Mexico on immigration, tipping the administration's hand on an energy bill, losing the entire New York delegation on a transportation bill, and offending seven South American heads of state on a five-day trip. During the series we saw none of those things: we did see tension between Bartlet and Hoynes due to the Vice President's lukewarm support of "A3C3" in "Post Hoc, Ergo Propter Hoc" and remarks that this was "the third time in five weeks" Hoynes had done something unsupportive; Hoynes taking credit away from the White House for passing a gun-control bill in Five Votes Down; his rather petulant reluctance to cast the tiebreaking vote on ethanol tax credits (which the President eventually decides to back off from) in 20 Hours In L.A., and of course his early campaigning effort before the 2002 election that helped expose President Bartlet's MS secret in The Stackhouse Filibuster and 17 People.

- The storage room where Toby meets with the union bosses has several recognizable paintings stashed in there. Here's the famous painting of a reflective John F. Kennedy back behind some shelves. It's actually JFK's official White House portrait, commissioned by Jackie Kennedy in 1970 and painted by Aaron Shikler, and currently hanging in the Entrance Room of the White House:

(I think it's a bit odd that a Catholic President like Jed Bartlet wouldn't have made sure to have Kennedy's portrait out on display in his White House, but whatever ...)

- There's also this portrait of First Lady Grace Coolidge, painted in 1924 by Howard Chanler Christy and currently hanging in the China Room (which is decorated in a shade of red to match Coolidge's dress):

- And then this official White House portrait of President William Howard Taft, painted in 1912 by Anders Leonard Zorn.

- There are some shenanigans with Gail's fishbowl in this episode. When CJ first returns to her office after appearing on Taylor Reid's show, the fishbowl is nowhere to be seen:

But later, when Greg Brock shows up, there's Gail:

(It looks like there's a traditional-looking little red schoolhouse in there, which would apply to the DC school vouchers storyline.)

- Why'd They Come Up With Full Disclosure?

Hoynes says he's going to call his book Full Disclosure, a way to emphasize the fact he's trying to come clean about his past and restore his reputation. It's also a theme for CJ's story, in that we viewers are finally learning about this Hoynes-CJ fling.

 

Quotes    

Will: "Look, Hoynes is obviously trying to rewrite history to make himself morally superior to the President."

Toby: "Right, this from an adulterer, who --"

Will: "Who lied about sex. Everyone lies about sex. That's how his people are going to spin it." 

-----

Will: "The Vice President would like to urge you not to close any base in any state with more than one electoral vote."

Josh: "No problem." 

----- 

Toby: "I need Ed and Larry for a thing about bras."

Josh: "You sure they're the guys for that?"

Toby: "Chinese bras."

Josh: "Oh, well, they're the experts." 

-----

Charlie: "CJ?"

CJ: "Yeah?"

Charlie: "Don't go on TV with Taylor Reid again unless you're going to tell him what an idiotic, shallow, uninformed, lying punk he is."

CJ: "I think he knows that."

-----

CJ: "There is no night of my life I regret more than that one."

Toby: "You don't have to explain it."

CJ: "I wish I could, but I can't explain it. I knew he was married. I knew it. I always thought women who did that ... If I could take back one moment of my life, it would be getting on that elevator. I'm sorry."

Toby: "You don't have to apologize to me."

CJ: "I don't have anyone else I can apologize to." 

 

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

* The labor union guy who appears to be leading his part of the meeting with Toby is played by Ron Dean, who's played a lot of cops and tough guy characters (The Fugitive, The Dark Knight, NYPD Blue, Early Edition).

* One of the other labor union guys in Toby's meeting is played by Michael Mantell, who you know you've seen somewhere (A Mighty Wind, The Ides Of March, lots of TV appearances including the series State Of Grace). 

 

* General Stanley of the base-closing commission is played by recognizable face Kenneth Kimmins (Coach, Network, Arrested Development). 

 

* It's the first appearance of reporter Greg Brock, who will be a recurring character (especially in Season 7). He's played by Sam Robards (Spin City, Gossip Girl, American Beauty), and is the son of Jason Robards and Lauren Bacall. 

 

* Good old regular White House reporter Mark gets a shot during CJ's briefing (Timothy Davis-Reed is actually a holdover from the cast of Sorkin's earlier Sports Night series). 

 

* Representative Chris Finn gets involved in the base-closing commission meeting, thanks to Ryan's plotting - he's played by Frank Ashmore (several different daytime dramas, including two completely different characters 24 years apart on Days Of Our Lives, Airplane, V, Arrested Development). 

 

* The mayor of DC is played by James Pickens Jr., who's been seen in plenty of things (Roseanne/The Conners, 42, The Practice) but best known for his role as Dr. Richard Webber in Grey's Anatomy. 

 

* Speaking of Ryan, he's back, as well as Rena, who is once again expertly assisting Toby (I miss Ginger, though). Ryan's unauthorized phone call to Rep. Finn reminds us of his backchannel phone call to Rep. Theile during the confirmation vote for Vice President Russell in Han. 

* Ed and Larry get some screen time, in both the base closing commission meeting and the labor union meeting. 

 

* The Hoynes/affair/resignation story from Life On Mars is the main backstory to this episode, as well as mention of Josh's work on Hoynes' staff when he was Senator. 

* Hoynes' assistant at the law firm, who ushers CJ into Hoynes' office, is the same person who was on his staff and delivered his letter of resignation to the Oval Office that rainy day in Life On Mars. A neat bit of continuity, the kind of thing I appreciate. That's Mandy Freund, by the way, playing the character Claire Huddle - she most recently has been working in an off-screen role for Pixar Studios on movies like Toy Story 4, Inside Out, and Coco. 

 

* And the return of John Hoynes (Tim Matheson), whom we haven't seen since he resigned, but as a politician he's not yet going away. 

 

* Donna says, "You should have seen my hometown when the Army pulled out." It's been established Donna, while born near Warroad, Minnesota, considers her hometown to be Madison, Wisconsin (Dead Irish Writers); while there's an Air National Guard unit based in Madison, the Army has never had a base there. 

* I mention above the illustrations of how close CJ and Toby are with all the meaningful looks between the two. I think that relationship is nicely shown throughout the series. Of course in this episode we find out Toby is the only person CJ trusted enough to share her Hoynes secret. 

* President Bartlet wants to use Charlie's upbringing and public-school background to fight against the school voucher program. We've known about Charlie's background since his debut in A Proportional Response, where we discovered Charlie's police-officer mom was killed in the line of duty and Charlie was left to raise his sister alone.

* Phone calls from Ben, CJ's former college boyfriend, have been ongoing since Constituency Of One, and he actually stopped by to talk with Carol in An Khe. He and CJ haven't actually connected to talk until this episode, though.

DC location shots    

* None.

 

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

* "Drudge" (Matt Drudge) and his website get a shoutout at the beginning of the episode. The Drudge Report is still around, but doesn't hold the scoop/reporting power it had in the late 1990s and through the 2000s. 

 

* Other media organizations mentioned in the episode include ESPN, Time, Newsweek, Meet The Press and Russert (host Tim Russert), a fleeting view of the MSNBC logo, and onscreen looks at C-SPAN and CNN. 

 

* Actual military bases mentioned in the base-closing meeting include the Army base Fort Drum (yes, in upstate New York, but still in operation), Point Mugu Naval Air Station (which had actually merged with a Construction Battalion unit in 2000 to form Naval Base Ventura County), and the Twentynine Palms Marine base. 

* There are references to Walmart and the Kennedy Center (where the series actually filmed part of the episode Galileo). 

* Charlie says he went to Roosevelt High School, but wishes he could have afforded to have gone to the parochial school Gonzaga instead. Gonzaga College High School is indeed a Jesuit prep school near Union Station, as Charlie says. 

* Josh bad-mouths the band Radiohead ("Because reviewing a cost-benefit analysis for every military base in the country is as mind-numbing as a Radiohead concert") and brings up Oprah Winfrey's show as a stop for Hoynes' redemption tour ("He's going to make the book the final word on the scandal, hold his wife's hand on Oprah, and catch the next flight to Iowa.") 

* In the storage room meeting we begin in the morning with Starbucks cups: 

 

Continue into midday with soda cans, including Coca-Cola, Diet Pepsi, and Dr Pepper:

And go later into the day with water bottles from Fiji, Dasani, and Starbucks subsidiary Ethos (plus a bag of Fritos):

 

End credits freeze frame: The President and Josh meeting with the DC mayor.

Previous episode: An Khe

Next episode: Eppur Si Muove

An Khe - TWW S5E14

Original airdate: February 18, 2004

Written by: John Wells (3)  

Directed by: Alex Graves (19)

Synopsis

• Leo's loyalty to a longtime friend is tested by an unexpected revelation. Josh's opposition to a Republican tax credit for stay-at-home mothers is tested by Ryan and Will. Abbey is ready to put her medical experience back to work by volunteering at a free clinic. CJ goes on the air to parry with a conservative TV show host ... and we finally get a look at the mysterious park ranger Ben.

"I won't desert him, Mr. President." 

Loyalty has always been a big underlying theme of The West Wing. From Pilot, where Josh's near career-ruining comment on TV was forgiven by the President, to Let Bartlet Be Bartlet where the entire staff pledged themselves as serving "at the pleasure of the President," to Noël where Leo famously tells Josh, "As long as I got a job, you got a job," to the tale of Bartlet For America where President Bartlet's loyalty to Leo (and the reverse) is on display ... well, you get it, it's everywhere you look.

But rarely has loyalty been so quite so deep or quite so damaged as we see in this episode. After all, Leo literally owes his life and his freedom to his friend and former flying partner Ken O'Neal, as we see in the Vietnam flashbacks. And speaking of the flashbacks - why are they in this episode anyway? They don't actually serve any purpose; the same story we see in those flashbacks is recounted by Leo in his emotional final scene with the President. In general, with the visual arts I'm a fan of showing, not telling, but in this instance we just get both, and in the Sorkin-era West Wing we'd have no gratuitous flashback scenes that only cover ground we've been over already.

Although I guess it does give us the cool visual of Leo and O'Neal punching out of their damaged fighter jet:

After being shot down in enemy territory, O'Neal patched Leo's wounds, refused to leave him behind in order to save himself, and physically carried the barely conscious Leo to safety and eventual rescue. Back in the United States O'Neal gave Leo a job at his aviation firm, and the two remain close friends 35 years later (to hear Leo call him "the finest man I have ever had the great privilege to call my friend" is really powerful for us to hear, knowing the extremely close personal relationship we already know Leo has with Jed).

So when O'Neal mentions some troubles his company, Mueller-Wright, is having with a government contract, Leo is ready to do what he can to help, even after O'Neal insists he do nothing. He sends Josh to bring up the subject with the Republican Senator leading the Oversight Committee, who is holding up approval of the contract. Senator Hunt gruffly dismisses Josh, which causes him to reach out to a Democratic member of the committee to try to work things from that side.

As Leo steps in to try to twist Senator Hunt's arm, Josh discovers from the other Senator that there are serious, well-founded problems with Mueller-Wright's conduct in the procurement process. Knowing there's actually a big issue there, and also knowing Leo's personal connection to O'Neal and Mueller-Wright, both Josh and the President try to talk Leo down from getting involved.

Leo refuses to believe it until O'Neal admits the truth.

O'Neal: "You can't testify."

Leo: "If it comes to that, I can handle Hunt."

O'Neal: "You can't testify. I'm going to take the Fifth."

Which leads Leo to press his friend further:

Leo: "Why not do the AOA? The Army wants the choppers. What, were they going to buy them from the French?"

O'Neal: "We had to have the contract. I'm under a lot of pressure from my board. That Hollander merger was a disaster and the Navy left us holding the bag on the Warrior III missile system."

And the point is made.

Leo: "This was about money?" 

Leo's world gets rocked. His dear friend, the man who literally saved his life in Vietnam, the man with whom he worked alongside for years, has pulled strings and cheated the rules in order to win a government contract. It's a betrayal not only of the country and the rules of fairness, but also a betrayal of Leo himself.

The realization leads to an emotional discussion between Leo and the President, Leo's eyes brimming with tears as he laments the moral fall of his trusted friend, wondering how O'Neal (and, by extension, himself) could have betrayed the legacies of all those soldiers who fought and died for American ideals. 

President Bartlet tries to reassure Leo.

President: "Corruptio optimi pessima. 'Corruption of the best is the worst.' You've done more, much more, all on your own to honor their sacrifice, Leo. They'd be as proud to know you as I am."

And leading to what I think is an inspired final shot, Leo in his chair, wrapped up in memories and sadness, and the President, who did what he could to comfort him, standing and reflecting in the Oval Office, the wintry evening sunlight pouring through the windows.

A companion storyline to Leo and O'Neal, and their flashback tale of evasion and rescue in the jungles of Vietnam, plays out in North Korea. A military reconnaissance aircraft has gone down in the sea off the coast of North Korea, and the crew has made it to land but needs to be rescued. A military mission onto North Korean territory brings the risk of inciting a major conflict, as it would be regarded as an act of war. 

A high-risk plan to get the crew out secretly is developed, the President gives the go-ahead, and it all goes according to plan - except for one member of the rescue team who dies during the parachute jump. Obviously, this story serves pretty much only as a modern-day companion to the tale of Leo and O'Neal, with Leo's pondering of the sacrifices made by the soldiers and pilots to save them in Vietnam coupled with the sacrifices - and in one case, the ultimate sacrifice - made by the Navy rescue team in North Korea, as well as what the government (and Leo, Jed, and O'Neal personally) owe to those making the sacrifices. 

In other news, Josh is on the warpath against a Republican plan to offer tax credits to stay-at-home mothers. This idea in general goes against the typical Democratic approach of trying to make things easier for parents who want to work, instead of helping them stay home and out of the workforce. However, both Will and Ryan (Josh's intern) study the proposal and think there might be something positive to it.

(I think this is yet another effort by John Wells and the post-Sorkin production team to try to balance the political viewpoint of the show. The usual liberal-leaning positions of the Bartlet administration depicted on the show over the first four seasons brought criticism from some conservatives, and once Sorkin left it's fairly easy to see where the Wells team made some plot adjustments in an attempt to show that Republicans can have good ideas, too.)

Josh takes Ryan along on his briefing with the President, and it goes a little off the rails:

President: "What's the tax benefit for the typical family?"

Josh: "About $100 a year."

Ryan (speaking up): "Closer to $300. But that's not the point. A typical family of four making $68,000 can still get $1200 in child care credits if the wife decides to work, but if she wants to stay home with the kids we won't help."

President: "Who's this?"

Josh: "Ryan Pierce. He's interning in my office for a few months ..."

President: "Pierce?"

Josh: "... maybe less."

Ryan goes on to offer the President a pathway to negotiate around both tax credits for working families and those who choose to stay at home, which makes Josh a little bit miffed by the intern stepping on his toes. 

Ryan: "He asked a question."

Josh: "And I was answering it."

Ryan: "Incorrectly."

Josh: "You work for me, you don't correct me in front of the President."

Ryan: "Even when you're giving him wrong information?"

Josh: "Yes." 

Meanwhile, CJ finally agrees with Toby and Josh that she needs to go on Taylor Reid's TV show, after he had called her a "chicken" in the previous episode for ducking his invitations (which, in fact, had never been issued). She appears, gets flustered at first by Reid's rapid-fire questions and changing of the subject, but eventually gets in her groove and enjoys the experience.

She enjoys it so much that she stays at the studio longer than planned, missing out on the visit from her ex-beau and current park ranger Ben. But what we do get is one of the longest, slowest, most drawn-out reveal scenes in show history.

We start with Carol, having a discussion with the unseen Ben in her office. The camera slowly inches its way into the doorway.

After an interminably long camera push in, it finally edges around the corner to reveal ... this guy.

I don't think the character or the show has earned this kind of tease. It's a blatant ploy to the CJ/romance fans among the viewers, not to mention the fact that Ben himself and his constant phone calls to CJ have been an ongoing story since Constituency Of One which aired five months previously. I mean, okay ... this old college flame of CJ's is finally here to see her, Carol has been ga-ga over the guys' voice and persistence for weeks, we get it ... why do we take what seems like a few more weeks just to slowly push the camera around the door to get a look at him? It's a cheap gag, with hardly any payoff. I mean, Brian Kerwin's a handsome enough actor, but is he really a Robert-Redford's-hair-in-The-Way-We-Were looker?

And CJ doesn't even connect with him this time! Since she's spent way too long sparring with Reid on TV, Ben leaves before she gets back. Although the photograph and note he leaves for her gives her a smile:

CJ is also taken aback when Abbey stops by to give her a heads-up about her plans to volunteer at a free clinic, helping to give vaccinations to low-income toddlers. 

It's a reversal of her decision in Dead Irish Writers to voluntarily give up her medical license as long as Jed remains President, a way to sidestep the political ramifications of her complicity in Jed's coverup of his multiple sclerosis during his first campaign. Of course her plan to get back to medicine (and go back on her word) is going to have some blowback from the press, and probably some of the President's political adversaries, but that will wait for another episode.

It's loyalty, and the betrayal of it, that's the overriding theme of this episode. John Spencer's performance, particularly in that final conversation with the President, helped to earn him a fourth Supporting Actor Emmy nomination, and it's well-earned ... but the episode as a whole is not quite all it could have been.

 

Tales Of Interest!

- The storyline of corruption at a military contractor - including the granting of favors to a military procurement official after they helped the firm land a contract, and even the notion of an Arizona Senator heading an investigation - is based on real events. In 2002 Air Force procurement official Darleen Druyun recommended the Air Force lease brand new tanker aircraft from Boeing, bypassing the usual competitive-bid process while also costing the government more than expected. At the same time she was negotiating with Boeing for jobs for herself, her daughter, and her daughter's fiancé. Arizona Senator John McCain led the investigation into the scheme, similar to Arizona Senator Matt Hunt in this episode. Druyun ended up serving a nine-month jail sentence, Boeing's chief financial officer served four months, and both the chief executive officer of Boeing and the Secretary of the Air Force ended up resigning because of the scandal. 

- I do appreciate how a plot point like "an AOA" can be a serious issue in the story, the lack of which in a contract proposal can kick off a congressional investigation, yet the writers of the show feel no need to explain to us what an "AOA" actually is. I like it! Leo and Josh and Senator Hunt all know what it means, they have no need to define it just for us viewers, it's way more realistic to just leave it as-is. Frankly, the definition of it isn't important to us or the story, as long as we understand the fact that it's missing is a serious problem. 

Anyway, what an AOA is is an Analysis of Alternatives, required for military contract proposals as a way to show the contractor has looked at more than one way of accomplishing the contract requirements. It's intended to prove that the method proposed is the most effective, the most suitable, and has the lowest life-cycle costs of any other alternative. Obviously leaving that step out could mean the contractor is padding their price or including unnecessary, additional costs in their proposal.

- There's a mysterious "Mr. Thomas" meeting with the President in the Oval Office while Toby and Josh anxiously await their chance to go in. The actor is purposely shot to avoid seeing his face. It almost makes the viewer think this is setting up a later surprise appearance by "Mr. Thomas," or maybe it's an Easter egg with someone connected to the show, or perhaps even it's a viewer who won a contest to appear onscreen. Nope. None of that. It's just actor Allan Kolman, who's appeared on a wide range of TV shows and movies since the 1970s, often playing a character of Russian background. I have no idea why this scene was filmed in such an obviously framed way to avoid showing his face.

- John Spencer was nominated for an Emmy for Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Drama Series for this episode and the upcoming Memorial Day. It was his fourth and final nomination for the award, with one win for Bartlet For America/We Killed Yamamoto in Season 3. This year's Emmy went to Michael Imperioli for The Sopranos.

- Why'd They Come Up With An Khe?

Part of the radio chatter in the Vietnam fighter scene at the opening of the episode includes "Raven One approaching An Khe." While An Khe was an area of strategic importance during the Vietnam War, it was located in the Central Highlands of South Vietnam, well south of the DMZ/border with North Vietnam and nowhere near Hanoi (Josh tells Charlie that Leo had been shot down "over Hanoi," but An Khe is over 500 miles south of Hanoi).

Quotes    

Jed: "I don't need a portrait."

Abbey: "Of course you do."

Jed: "What, me with my Irish wolfhound gazing with portent out over the Potomac?"

Abbey: "You don't have an Irish wolfhound."

Jed: "My point exactly."

[...]

Jed: "And when am I supposed to find time to sit for some cut-rate Rubens while he angles me just so to catch the afternoon light?"

Abbey: "You do know it's not a nude, right?" 

-----

Carol: "And Toby and Josh are in your office."

CJ: "What do they want?"

Carol: "To make fun of you, I think."

CJ: "And you let them in?"

Carol: "And got them coffee."  

----- 

Show assistant: "Address Taylor, not the camera. If he points to the Truth Meter --"

CJ: "The Truth Meter? Am I on a game show?"

Show assistant: "If he points to the Truth Meter keep looking at Taylor."

CJ: "If he dunks me in a river and I float, does that mean I'm a witch?" 

-----

Toby: "Can I get a ballpark on how much longer it's going to be? An era, a Tchaikovsky symphony, a brief ice age perhaps?"

Debbie: "You have some food stuck in your beard." 

  

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

• Leo's friend and former Vietnam War flying partner Ken O'Neal is played by Jeffrey DeMunn, another of those actors whom you know the face but not necessarily the name (The Green Mile, The Walking Dead, The Shawshank Redemption, Law & Order, etc, etc).

• Ryan Pierce, Josh's intern played by Jesse Bradford, returns for the first time since Disaster Relief. We discover he's not only the great-great (-great?) grandson of former President Franklin Pierce as we were told earlier, but he's also the nephew of a current Senator - which might help explain the mysterious phone call he makes to a Congressman in Han that helps out Josh in his quest for a unanimous vote confirming Vice President Russell.

• The wonderful character actor Philip Baker Hall (you've seen him everywhere, from Secret Honor to Magnolia to the memorable library cop in Seinfeld) plays Senator Matt Hunt. Hall died just a few months prior to this post, in June of 2022.

• We finally get a look at Ben, CJ's old boyfriend and current Alaska park ranger. He's played by Brian Kerwin (BJ And The Bear, One Life To Live, 27 Dresses).

• Debbie Fiderer is back - haven't seen her around since Christmas and Abu El Banat - but we're also reminded (since Ryan has reappeared) that Toby's new assistant Rena hasn't popped up for a couple of episodes.

• After a quick glimpse of the comedian and actor Jay Mohr as Taylor Reid on a TV screen in the previous episode, here's more of him hammering CJ with rapid-fire questions on his show. He represents any number of conservative media hosts of the early 2000s, from Rush Limbaugh to Bill O'Reilly to Sean Hannity.

• In both War Crimes and Red Haven's On Fire we are told that Leo flew F-105s for the 355th Tactical Fighter Wing. In this episode's flashback scene, we see him wearing a patch for the 333rd Fighter Squadron (both units did in fact fly F-105s out of Thailand during the Vietnam War). Perhaps he was reassigned? In War Crimes a mission he flew in September 1966 is mentioned; in this episode Leo says he's known Ken O'Neal for "35 years," which would be around 1969 (although he could certainly be rounding off that number).

• President Bartlet is wearing the same Notre Dame fleece we saw him wearing in The Warfare Of Genghis Khan.

• Leo's still wearing his wedding ring - we get a good look at it when he hugs Ken at the Chicago banquet. Leo's wife left him in Five Votes Down, the divorce became final in The Portland Trip, and even though he's had an on-and-off relationship with attorney Jordon Kendall in 2001 and 2002 he still wears that ring. It reminds us of Toby's wedding ring, an acting choice Richard Schiff made on his own after being cast in the role (his backstory was that Toby was a widower, which helped explain his dour demeanor). After Aaron Sorkin noticed Toby was wearing a wedding ring, he came up with an ex-wife Congresswoman backstory and got Rep. Andy Wyatt involved in several episodes. At some point in the recent past - perhaps after Andy conclusively turned down his request to remarry him in Commencement - he stopped wearing the ring.

• (Speaking of which, we haven't heard much about the twins Molly and Huck lately. In Twenty Five Toby pledged his undying fatherly love and devotion to the twins, which surprised him given his feelings about his worth as a father before they were born. Well ... not much devotion since, given the new show-writing staff and all.)

• The prospect of American military personnel trapped in North Korean territory - and a potential mission to save them - was the topic of Gone Quiet.

• Abbey's return to medicine, volunteering at a free clinic, reminds us of her decision to give up her license in Dead Irish Writers. Her quote from that episode also serves to back up CJ's concern about Abbey possibly going back on her word, despite Abbey's assurance that that's not what she meant.

Abbey (from Dead Irish Writers): "I'm going to voluntarily forfeit my license for the duration of our stay in the White House."

Abbey (in this episode): "I voluntarily chose to stop practicing, CJ. And now I'm choosing to give a few underprivileged toddlers vaccinations. I never said I was hanging up my stethoscope for good." 

• Likewise, Reid uses Abbey's decision to volunteer as a way to bring up her role in covering up President Bartlet's health condition. We discovered Jed suffered from multiple sclerosis in He Shall, From Time To Time ... and the story of how that was kept from the voters and the political/electoral fallout from that has resonated ever since, especially at the end of Season 2. 

• We learn a bit more about CJ and Ben. She told us in Constituency Of One that they'd lived together for six months, but when they tried to reconnect later they always quickly got on each other's nerves. He's been calling her office since that episode, and we eventually discovered he's a National Park Ranger in Alaska. Now we find out he's transferring to the Washington area, that he went to the University of California with CJ, and their time living together was around or perhaps immediately after their college years. We also learn he was married but is now single again.

DC location shots    

• The shot of a snowy hotel, supposedly in Chicago, is ... I don't know where for certain. Somewhere snowy! I know in later seasons the show often got exterior/location shots in Canada and around Toronto, which was a cheaper place to film, but I couldn't find any information about this particular shot.

• The scene between Ken O'Neal and Leo along the Tidal Basin with the Jefferson Memorial in the background was obviously shot on location. It was also pretty cold, as the Tidal Basin is frozen over. This is almost the exact same place where we saw Toby and his ex-wife Andy have a picnic meeting in Mandatory Minimums. 

Scene from Mandatory Minimums

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

• The Vietnam War, the 333th Fighter Squadron, and the F-105 Thunderchief all existed in reality.

• Names of people from the past include the painter Rubens, the World War II general Patton (specifically the George C. Scott movie based on him), former First Lady Mamie Eisenhower (a native of Boone, Iowa!), and infamous murderer Jeffrey Dahmer. 

• Pop culture references are made to Jimmy Olson (the Daily Planet photographer in the Superman comics), Wilma Flintstone (from The Flintstones TV series), Robert Redford's hair in The Way We Were, and the devious Eve Harrington (from the movie All About Eve). We also get a mention of McNuggets from CJ, as well as a reference to Tyson Foods in regards to the Taylor Reid/chicken incident.

• Musical references include the composer Tchaikovsky (and his long symphonies, according to Toby), the Beatles' song Yellow Submarine, the band Crazy Horse, and The Hollies. The group Crosby, Stills, and Nash receive the National Medal for The Arts in this episode, which is a real thing, and give President Bartlet a tape of them singing America (My Country, 'Tis Of Thee). (I think the song performance is specifically just David Crosby and Graham Nash, without Stephen Stills, but the three have performed the song together - perhaps most famously on the first episode of The Tonight Show With Jay Leno that aired after the 9/11 attacks in 2001.)

• The Navy aircraft carrier USS Carl Vinson and the missile cruiser USS Cowpens are discussed in the Situation Room. We also hear about the European aviation company Airbus being a competitor of Mueller-Wright for the military helicopter contract.

• CJ's favorite restaurant, The Oval Room, was indeed an actual place. Located at 800 Connecticut Avenue NW, just across Lafayette Park from the White House, the restaurant closed during the COVID-19 pandemic in November, 2020.

End credits freeze frame: The President and Leo in the Situation Room awaiting word on the rescue attempt.

Previous episode: The Warfare Of Genghis Khan

Next episode: Full Disclosure