Ok, just getting into the West Wing and at the top of episode 3 the president is giving a speech under a banner that says "practical idealism."

This is peak hate-watching.

Elizabeth Moss!

Bradley Whitford’s character just asked the Black guy from Psych to grab a beer in Georgetown after work and the Black guy was all “what kind of bar is this?” and boy oh boy I do NOT miss the “no homo” nineties.

Someone at the bar just called Hill “fairy poppins.” Why does everyone think this guy is gay? What’s happening? What is 1999?

Every woman is so stupid. Except CJ.

They just established that Bradley Whitford’s assistant has the following character trait: When she takes it upon herself to do independent research for her job she tends to find an obscure fact from an unreputable source and run with it.

This time, she read that “in some places in Indonesia they summarily execute people they suspect of witchcraft.”

All this in preparation to host the Indonesian head of state at the White House.

Also, there’s a joke about how difficult Indonesian names are to spell.

Also, they let CJ be smart and capable, but they had to humble her in the last episode by making her “not understand the census” and making a big deal if her needing Rob Lowe to explain it to her.

Also, it’s “sorcery” not witchcraft. My bad.

I can’t even begin to get into this “call girl” story line with ole girl from A Girlfriend’s Guide to Divorce.

It took seven episodes to introduce the incomparable Stockard Channing as the First Lady!?

I don't know if I can do this supreme court ep right now.

This new ep opens with Bradley Whitford's character trying to convince his female co-worker/assistant (the same one obsessed with Indonesian sorcery) to be his caddy. Their conversation is interrupted when he's served with a subpoena. He uses her back as a desk to sign it.

Paris Geller!

John De Lancie!

Just hit "The Jackal" and lord help me this is the most cringe thing I've ever seen.

Who even thinks up this premise!? It's not even well executed. I hate it so much.

Sorkin writes the women SO SO SO STUPID.

In this one, a female aid to a senior white house staffer is apparently SO clueless (and obsessed with the CALORIE COUNT in a muffin) that she's prattled on about it to the Chief of Staff and the Communications Director.

Credit where credit is due.

Twin Peaks crossover! It's Laura Palmer's mom!

Just learned from a flashback that when Donna, Bradely Whitford's character's assistant, first tried to join Bartlett's campaign, Whitford asks her when her boyfriend broke up with her. Because why else would she be trying to join the campaign?

And of course, Bradley is right.

Oh look, this shiny young prosecutor they're grooming for congress with the *excellent* conviction record has one problem: "He likes white juries for his black defendants."

OOPS!

Bet they'll clean this up. After all: he's just a player in the game.

A “leggy blonde” republican pundit just won an exchange with the deputy press secretary on TV. This followed.

I hate it.

Women are allowed to be smart but only to show that the men who direct their fates are even smarter. They’re like wild horses that are respected for how difficult they are to tame.

But they must be tamed.

The women are constantly surprised, they’re the last to know they’re the butt of a joke, they fall into their own swimming pools fully clothed and forget what direction their own homes are in— only to be pointed in the right direction by random men. It’s remarkable.

I’m losing my mind.

Also, 2 min earlier he repeatedly referred to this woman as “girl.” This “girl” has not only graduated law school, which would make her at least 25, but has completed a Supreme Court clerkship, which probably puts her closer to 30.

“Kitten.”

I'm going to have to stop this thread bc there's just too much. But in today's lunch-time episode a random (Russian?) politician shows up drunk in the WH driveway & it's reported that there's a woman in the car who is either security detail or a "prostitute."

To this, Rob Lowe, who had a whole "save a call girl" story arc asks "is it . . .?" as though there is only 1 sex worker in DC.

Later, when we see this woman, she is dressed in typical office attire and there is literally no reason why anyone would presume she's a sex worker.

Additionally in this ep, Ainsley is written as more competent than Rob Lowe's character, but lest we think women are equal, she undermines her wins by asking to ingest ever carb in every room she's in. Also, she advises the WH press sec to give a reporter a story "bc he's cute."

They’ve said “alabaster skin” so many times.

Women be shopping.

“We don’t have to move to our right if there’s an opportunity to spank the people to our left.”

I take it back. This is a documentary.

Holy crap. watch till the end.

This scene ends “come at us from the left and I’ll own your ass.”

For the uninitiated, the bald guy is supposed to be our protagonist.

Neelix!

Keiko O’Brien!

Followed by “the top 1% of wage earners in this country pay for 22% of this country.”

They have more wealth than the bottom 90%, so it sounds like they’re under paying.

A thing this show does is make characters “self aware” about sexism as though that absolves them.

In an earlier ep, Rob Lowe shoots down a woman’s talking point by saying it sounds like a “high school girl” wrote it. She asks, reasonably, if he has a problem w/ girls. He covers by saying yes, when they’re in high school. No one asks why he didn’t say high school boy.

After our white protagonist realizes he’s wrongly accused this Arab man of terrorism, he gives a halfhearted apology saying “my friends would tell you that wasn’t like me.” Then he walks away only to turn around and say: “hey kid. Way to be back at your desk.”

Then the episode ends with:

Having a normal one talking about being white gods at work.

Here’s some I clipped earlier and didn’t post bc I didn’t want to reveal how late I was up watching.

There’s no context that made this remark make sense. It’s just the kind of thing that gets said on this show:

Extreme “vote blue no matter who” vibes.

Again, there was no point to this. There wasn’t a running gag where he couldn’t remember anyone’s name. He didn’t get called out for being rude. They just humiliated the assistant to the chief of staff for fun. It’s as if Sorkin himself just thought of her as “red headed girl.”

It’s the day before Thanksgiving, so yes. There are “Indians in the lobby.”

Watching the HBO reunion special address to Black men by Dule Hill and Sterling Brown and wondering what Black man watching a West Wing reunion special isn't already planning to vote for Biden.

Oh lord Mary Louise Parker. Someday I’ll tell you all about how I hate-watched Weeds.

Modern family dad!

Narrator voice: it was not a valid point.

@realDonaldTrump

I’m sorry. The sex work discourse is SO BAD. Mary Louise Parker is on a losing streak. Im dying.

I’ll spare you the video, but in the C plot CJ is mad bc they’re selling guns to some middle eastern folks who “hate women.” The description of gender politics is reductive and insulting but I’m with her on “selling weapons bad.” BUT!

She tries to convince the black female sec of defense to reconsider by playing on her race: “if we had tried selling guns to South Africa 15 years ago you would’ve been livid.”

This is classic West Wing: sanctimonious characters claiming high ground they haven’t earned.

(I bet if they tried to sell guns to some random Black Country that contains women we wouldn’t see CJ on a feminism kick in their defense either.)

“Spandex.”

Like, why? Who is this for?

I promise you there’s no context I’m omitting.

“The only reason you’re not out there [with your FBI team] is bc you’re a woman or something.]

Would you believe me if I told you this wasn’t a scotch commercial?

In the A plot, Leo is testifying abt the president hiding his MS & one of the Republicans questioning him reveals info that was very inculpatory and for some reason the other Republican is mad at him for not disclosing the info that gave them a HUGE advantage bc it’s not fair?

In this very special affirmative action episode, CJ thinks her father wouldn't have Alzheimer's if he had "lived the life he'd wanted" instead of getting passed over for every promotion by "unqualified black women."

President Bartlett: "My family signed the Declaration of Independence, you think I have an ethnicity problem?"

41 of the 56 signatories owned slaves.

The whiplash in these 11 seconds is, whew.

The woman who played the scientist's assistant on Beekman's World rightly rebuked Sam for this (over his objection of "I was just complimenting her"!) and I'm sure the episode will prove Lady Beekman to be a joyless scold.

The gender/racial dynamics of even one brief exchange could fill a book. CJ *rightly* feeling upset about a journalist/friend's abduction but *wrongly* patronizing a (black) Congolese attache whose reasonable irritation w/ CJ is written as sexism. Whew.

There it is.

After this exchange, he goes on to ask Charlie what he’d think of the “dog on a leash” line if he said it to his sister. First Charlie said he’d think Sam was a hick. Then he said he’d beat Sam up.

I hate this show.

Now Ainsley is giving a speech about how superficial issues in feminism get in the way of more important issues like pay equity which might be half a point if she hadnt given a lecture a few episodes earlier about how she found pay equity legislation “sexist” & patronizing.

I’ve been ignoring the B plot cuz, blood pressure, but Toby & his ex, a congresswoman, have been fighting about language in a speech she wants toned down bc it’s islamaphobic. They don’t use that word though. Toby frames it as not wanting to cow tow to “the Arab world.”

10 seconds after the president joked about the female White House staff being calendar girls the British ambassador comes up to the First Lady and says “your breasts are magnificent!”

Who among us hasn’t gone on a date with this guy?

I felt Dern’s “ha ha” deeply.

They have the bougie mom from Half & Half playing a security guard.

It’s not funny when people in a position of power over you joke about abusing that power. But it’s a semi regular punchline for Sorkin. The president does it all the time & it’s supposed to read as charming. This time, it’s a secret service agent protecting CJ from a death threat

It’s not inappropriate workplace conduct if you get your subordinate to co-sign it.

CJ’s niece is ole girl from West World!

Also, although her colleagues should be less creepy about it, CJ does look stunning in evening wear.

Wow. They really couldn’t let CJ have a decent love interest for even ten min.

I’m PO’ed.

At the end of season 4 ep 1 an Asian American Rep comes to the oval to meet Bartlett, and Bartlett and Leo basically pat each other on the back at how benevolent America is for making this kid who “got out” of his birth country in ‘74 a congressman.

“I’m going to need some cell mates in Holland” is a really adorable way to end an episode about the president ordering the extra judicial killing of another head of state. It’s framed as him being noble and standing by his generals even if convicted of war crimes.

Now team Bartlett is all hot under the collar about a court ruling that says they have to let everyone into the debates.

“Green Party” *sneer* Lol

They’re trying to make college tuition tax deductible this ep (bc they met an Iowan in a bar who wants life to be *a little bit* easier— NOT TOO MUCH! “It should be hard.”) Anyway, the goal is good so there’s no way they’ll be successful.

This man is SO sanctimonious about his war crimes.

“I want there to be justice. That’s why I’m talking to a lawyer. Anyway, I just came in here to say hello.”

YOU ARE.

“I find competitiveness so attractive in tall women.”

The lead up to this is more significant— a sinophobic ramble about how labor abuses in China are still progress over how barbaric some dynastic ruler was— but the casual misogyny is the perfect punctuation.

Bartlett is coming off as a smug, superior, sanctimonious prick in this debate but it’s written as though he’s killing it. Just phenomenal stuff.

The whole “Bush is anti intellectual” thing really broke our brains.

He pulled a Biden!

This is amazing.

A thing women always offer at work is to “use sex as a tactic” to get signatures. Extremely true to life.

I found the source of the Democratic Party’s attitude towards non voters:

Points to Mary Louse Parker for recognizing that votes are there to be earned.

Ok they slighted Star Trek. I’m done.

Literally what is this?!

Josh is a loathsome bully.

In this episode, we’ve had a president talking at length about his (perfect) 40 year old SAT scores, all male Yale a cappella, and this:

“His third marriage was to 13-year-old Myra Gale Brown, his first cousin once removed, on December 12, 1957. Brown filed for divorce on the grounds of adultery and abuse.”

This is someone’s idea of an *ideal* democratic candidate.