The West Wing Revisited: a uniquely American confluence of bullshit

Welcome back to Kheiro’s West Wing recaps, where as always nothing bad happens to the racist guy

Today’s episode of The West Wing (S1E15, “Celestial Navigation”) is a slightly racist farce, interspersed with a story about cops’ inhumanity to man and racial profiling. Everything goes south shortly after the agency of two women are ignored. Someone’s life is actively made worse by the pursuit of antiquing. An unqualified boor gives a TED Talk.

If that confluence of bullshit doesn’t define America, I don’t know what does.

This episode made me cry and yell and clap and appreciate Mandy Onlyinthefirstseason, of all people. It’s everything television should be.

We open on Josh’s TED Talk. Or rather, his Margerie Dupont lecture. Josh gets a call from Sam, telling him that Judge Mendoza has been arrested for drunk driving. But Mendoza doesn’t drink. Sam promises that he’ll keep Josh in the loop, despite the fact that Josh shouldn’t answer his phone during his TED Talk. Josh walks out and introduces the structure of the episode:

Host: Josh, why don’t you start by telling us about a typical day at the White House?
Josh: Well, the first thing I’ll tell you is, there’s no such thing. There’s a schedule and there’s a structure to be sure, and to a certain extent it starts out as a 9-to-5 job, but you can pretty much count on it being blown to hell by 9:30.
Host: Give us an example.
Josh: I’ll give you an example from this week. In fact, the story I’m about to tell you all happened within the last 36 hours. Anyone who’s been reading the papers in the last few days has probably been following along with what we call the news cycle that wouldn’t end. Depending on how you look at it, it started either with a cabinet secretary losing her temper, a committee chairman baiting her during a hearing, the President answering a question he shouldn’t have, a dentist appointment, or me being stupid.

To a seasoned TV viewer like myself, the above dialogue telegraphs that this will be a Day in the Life episode. They go into the everyday routine of one character. It’s a wackier framing device than a straight issue-heavy episode — and a structure most TV shows don’t resort to until at least season 4. But Aaron Sorkin moves at a faster pace than most, and at a larger scale! We get a three whole days in the life of the West Wing as opposed to the regular day, and we see the minutiae of many people’s jobs, not just one. Personally, I’d prefer an episode following Charlie or Donna around, a real Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead number, but alas.

Despite the framing motif of this episode being lighthearted and goofy, I would argue that the issues it tackles are more relevant and upsetting than even last week’s death penalty show. The secretary who lost her temper? She’s the Secretary of Housing and Urban Development. She’s a black woman, and she basically calls a committee chairman racist. In committee, some pathetic little nobody named Congressman Wooden tries to destroy public housing. As the head of HUD, Deborah O’Leary has a problem with that. She tells Wooden that if the Republican party “were as invested in solving the problems associated with poverty as you are in scoring political points on the backs of poor people and minorities, you might just see the value” of public housing. In essence, Congressman Wooden Does Not Care About Black People.

Does anyone in the West Wing disagree with O’Leary’s assessment, that this Mr. Wooden is a racist? No. Do they make her apologize anyway? Yes. Why? Because they want white votes. IMHO, it’s this inability of our progressive politicians to call out racism that has put so many racists in positions of power. Sometime in the late 80’s, we all agreed that being called racist was the worst thing you could be called. So all the white people decided that we’d never actually damn anyone like that ever again. You know, because we’re cowards? When Leo forces O’Leary to apologize to Wooden, I paused the ep and screamed into a pillow for about 10 minutes. (That’s another mark against Leo. Things aren’t looking good for our boy.)

But why was O’Leary forced to apologize? Because President Bartlet said so. And the president said so because Sam is physically incapable of listening to a woman. This time, CJ Cregg.

The President is signing a bill into law that will provide a lot of teachers to the country. It forgives student loans for teachers that work in high-risk areas, gives financial incentives for people to switch careers to teaching, and provides grants for experienced teachers to train new ones (also that no sex talk in schools stuff we agreed to in order to save Leo’s ass). Sam wants to push CJ’s daily briefing to 1 PM, after the bill signing. CJ has a dentist appointment at noon, which she is more than happy to cancel. But Sam tells Carol, CJ’s Donna, not to cancel because, as he says, “Your teeth are the best friends you got.” This is something a serial killer would say. And Carol listens to Sam and not her direct supervisor because…I have no idea. The point is, CJ is at her dentist meeting during the bill signing, where the president steps into it by telling the press that an apology to Wooden “would be appropriate.” So O’Leary has to debase herself so the president doesn’t embarrass himself. Cool priorities, everyone!

If CJ had been around, she would have stopped Bartlet from running his mouth off. And if CJ hadn’t been forced to undergo dental surgery, Josh never would have run his mouth off to the press corps. Because after CJ gets a root canal, he decides to run her press conference. It…does not go well.

This is not Josh’s job. It’s not even close to his job. It’s close-ish to Toby and Sam’s job, but really CJ should have a Deputy Press Secretary. The current Deputy Press Secretary is Hogan Gidley; the Bartlet Administration Deputy Press Secretary does not exist. Mandy could do it, though. But did Josh think to ask Mandy? No, he still resents her because they used to date. So instead he gets creamed by the press and invents a secret plan to fight inflation. Then Mendoza gets involved.

While vacationing in Nova Scotia (who does this? Prince Edward Island I understand, especially if you’re a big Anne of Green Gables fan, but Nova Scotia?), Mendoza tells the Chicago Tribune that Bartlet was wrong to make O’Leary apologize. This is bad for Bartlet because 1) it makes the prez look bad and 2) Supreme Court nominees aren’t supposed to talk to the press. They’re supposed to stay silent like the Harajuku Girls and let the President be their Gwen Stefani. So Bartlet orders Mendoza to leave the happening vacation spot of Nova Scotia and come to the White House to get yelled at.

Mendoza doesn’t really want to do this, and why should he? Of course, he has to come when the president calls because apparently that’s what he expects of all POC’s that work for him. So Mendoza decides to drive back to DC and on the way stops in Connecticut for some antiquing. Basically he is Paul Rudd in Wet Hot American Summer when Janeane Garofalo makes him clean up his lunch.

Or he’s like Paul Rudd in Wet Hot American Summer if Paul Rudd got pulled over for “driving while Hispanic” in the middle of his cleaning. The cops don’t recognize him as their next Supreme Court justice, and Mendoza refuses a breathalyzer test because it would be an illegal search. So he chills in the Connecticut pokey and plans his civil rights lawsuit. When Leo gets wind of this, he sends Toby and Sam to Connecticut to fix everything, somehow. “I want my phone to ring once every 15 minutes!” he yells, because this show was made in Medieval times and texting wasn’t a thing yet.

Toby and Sam have a heckuva time getting to the jail in Connecticut, again because this was 1486 and GPS wasn’t a thing. At one point, Sam actually uses the North Star to navigate, giving us the episode title. Except that Polaris was actually a passing plane. Anyway, the boys get there and Sam lets the police have it. Once the cops figure out who Mendoza is, they freak but remain steadfast in their biases.

Racist Cop: His driving was erratic. Still not entirely convinced he hadn’t been drinking.
Sam: Well, you have a problem there.
Racist Cop: What’s that?
Sam: Judge Mendoza has chronic persistent hepatitis, which is a non-progressive form of liver inflammation. If he’d had enough to drink to blow point-one on the blood-alcohol, he’d be dead right now.

Racist Cop is forced to apologize to Mendoza and to his son, who was in the car when he was arrested. Mendoza goes antiquing in the morning, CJ is yelled at for having surgery, and that racist congressman has nothing bad happen to him at all.

Again, if this isn’t a representation of America, I don’t know what is.

What’s Next: Hollywood, baby!