In the fifth episode of the third season of The West Wing, the team deals with multiple near-disasters on their day off. Intrigued? Then it’s time for Mark to watch The West Wing.
Gods help me, THIS EPISODE WAS SO STRESSFUL.
C.J.
The history between her and Will Sawyer is left completely out of “War Crimes,” and by gods, I definitely want to know what the hell is going on. I think we were intentionally meant to ponder this. The rapport between these two is far too intimate and honest for them to know one another in merely a professional fashion, though I suppose it is possible that they worked together years ago. Maybe on the campaign? Regardless, I was fascinated by their dynamic, and by Will’s ultimate decision regarding Toby’s remark in a meeting. I don’t think Will is some perfect moral foil for anyone in the episode, for what it’s worth. All the white-savior joking and third-world commentary felt more creepy to me than anything else, so I’m not interested in putting Will on a pedestal in the narrative. What I was interested in was his rejection of Toby’s comment as a story worth his time, and I took that as an expression of his experience with stories that were, to him, far more important than some off-the-record statement by a White House staff member. I didn’t expect this, and C.J. didn’t expect this. Given how much weight was put on this plot throughout “War Crimes,” as well as Hoynes’s appearance in the episode, I simply assumed that we’d see some sort of convergence of stories. But nope! So how long should I expect Will to be around? Will he be re-assigned by the next episode? If he’s not, how is he going to adapt to the nature of working on the White House news cycle?
Toby
Which brings me to Toby’s reaction to this potential crisis. Just like the plot involving Will and C.J., I was completely surprised by the end result. Throughout “War Crimes,” Toby is on the defensive. He’s vulnerable. We don’t often get to see him in this state! Hell, I’d even describe him as being playful when C.J. confronts him. He’s like a guilty puppy, I swear.
So when he gathered all the junior staffers in the mess, I thought we’d see angry, frustrated Toby again, the man consumed with anger and irritation. Instead, he’s remarkably emotional when he confronts the staffers. He’s tired. He isn’t interested in a witch hunt. He just wants his team to support him as he supports them. I thought it was an important message to impart because of what the future holds. This White House is going to attempt re-election in the next year, and they’re going to need to stick together in order to get through it. Leaks like the one in this episode are only going to make everyone’s job harder.
Ugh, Toby, you’re so great.
Sam
I am personally in favor of eliminating the penny. Bless you, Canada, for doing the same thing. IT WAS SO WONDERFUL NOT TO HAVE TO USE PENNIES WHEN I WAS IN CANADA THIS PAST MARCH. Sam really doesn’t have a big role here, does he? His most important moment was the lovely pep talk he gave to Donna prior to her deposition. Bless him for that, for the record.
Donna
Well, this sucks. You know, I think Donna was more concerned about disappointing Josh than anything else, and you could tell that her fear over what she’d done in testimony was largely based on her suspicion that she’d lost Josh’s respect. This was a horrible and complex mess, one that angered me because Cliff seemed so willing to acknowledge that he was just as complicit in this nonsense as Donna. Once he started rattling off the consequences of Donna’s lie, all I could think was, “DUDE, YOU WERE AT HER HOUSE, AND IT’S NOT LIKE YOU CHOSE TO BE THERE.” Also, you snooped around her house. No. NO! So I’m glad that Josh ultimately defended Donna and helped her make sense of this situation. Yes, he’s angry at her at first, but he supported her in the end. He chose to sit on that bench with her while Cliff read her diary. He was the one who threatened Cliff with… well, blackmail. Okay, so I have to admit that this whole thing is totally unethical and ridiculous, but it was a mess from the start. It is what it is. I guess I was just overwhelmed by my Josh/Donna feelings. THERE ARE SO MANY OF THEM IN THIS EPISODE.
Leo
Leo spends the bulk of this episode in a discussion with General Adamley about a proposed War Crimes Tribunal administered by the United Nations. Now, I don’t consider myself the biggest fan of the U.N., but I am squarely on Leo’s side on this issue. I am quite familiar with the colorful (and terrifying) past that the United States has with the rest of the world, and we need to be held accountable for the things we’ve done. We cannot expect the nations of the world to be ethical and moral if we, as a government, cannot hold ourselves to the same standard as everyone else. It’s true that the United States has a bloody and oppressive history in support brutal regimes, in ousting democratically-elected leaders and inserting people who best benefit our own policies, in initiating and sustaining wars for economic supremacy, and in contributing to genocide in our land and in other countries. It bothers me that the idea of national sovereignty is supposed to take precedence over this, and Adamley’s insistence that this will degrade our power is just… it’s so silly that it’s offensive.
Which is why I was so horrified at how he tries to change Leo’s mind. My father was in Vietnam, and up to the day he passed on, he refused to tell me what he did in that war. I had heard brief mutterings over the years of some horrible things, but he’d never go into detail about it. (Strangely enough, he pushed my brother and me hard to enlist, despite that he had such a demoralizing and traumatizing experience being in the Army.) I thought it was heinous that Adamley believed that revealing Leo had been lied to during Vietnam and had taken out a civilian target was a proper debate technique. It’s gross. It’s horrifically manipulative, and it just made me sad. Why would you do that??? WHY WOULD YOU DO THAT??? I did sense that Adamley was a bit ashamed after this. Notice how he refuses to look at Leo, and his eyes often drift towards the ground, like he’s just been scolded by his parents. Still… man, fuck you. FUCK YOU! What an awful thing to do to someone.
Bartlet/Hoynes
Y’all, these two are consistently awkward. Are they ever going to get along? Probably not, and I can already tell that the re-election campaign will be hopelessly uncomfortable. As a complete ticket, I feel like Bartlet and Hoynes can garner a lot of votes, but they really do disagree on so many things. Plus, their dynamic as President and Vice President has reversed since Bartlet announced his MS publicly, so I’m curious to see if Toby’s comment proves to be correct. How much will Bartlet need Hoynes?
What these two argue over is not new for The West Wing, but the way in which they discuss gun control was fascinating to me. It’s no surprise that I support stricter gun control. I come from a family who has owned guns as long as I can remember. (Here’s an interesting fact: I didn’t shoot a gun until last year. My father never taught me how, and my brother learned how to handle a gun years before I did.) So I don’t have too much of a personal interest in the issue. I’m used to being around them. They don’t bother me in theory or in execution.
The issue is that I simply do not trust the idea that gun ownership should be unregulated. Actually, on a deeper level, I just don’t trust other people. The shooting in this episode is a good example of that. I don’t trust that every person who owns a gun has been trained in proper safety techniques. I don’t trust that every gun owner knows how to shoot defensively or how to shoot in a way to minimize ricochet or innocent bystanders being struck. I don’t trust that every gun owner has been trained in defensive techniques that minimize the need for a gun in a first place. I don’t trust people to put aside their racist or classist prejudices when they are holding a gun. I don’t trust other people, and I do not think an unregulated gun market will default to a trustworthy climate or atmosphere. When people of color can be gunned down and murdered in the name of self-defense, or when people of color can be summarily executed by the police with no trial or demonstration of guilt, I am not going to defer to the hope that gun owners are inherently trustworthy. And when the NRA doesn’t speak a peep about Marissa Alexander, who refused protection under the Stand Your Ground laws in Florida, the very same law that they so viciously defended and lobbied for, I am certainly not going to trust that the NRA wants to protect my rights under the Second Amendment. No, I think this country wants to make sure that white people are armed by their constitutional right, and pretty much no one else. (Unless you’re George Zimmerman, of course.)
So yeah, Hoynes, you’re wrong. Granted, he doesn’t believe this, and the heated clash he has with Bartlet is just another sign that these two both need one another while they fundamentally disagree with each other about how to run this country. It’s going to be an interesting re-election campaign, y’all.
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