In defence of 'The West Wing'

Though very much *not* its most devoted fans

(Credit: QUEEN / MATRIX)

Jed Bartlet was a terrible president. Sorry, President Bartlet. In terms of major policy achievements, there was incremental gun legislation, a solid economy and I think they made college tuition tax deductible? But mostly, it was about the speeches.

Before we go any further, an important (albeit mortifyingly revealing) admission: I do not consider seasons 5-7 of The West Wing to be canon. Consequently, that time Toby saved social security and some minor character resolved the Israeli-Palestinian conflict do not count. How do I manage this? Quite straightforwardly, thank you.

Not only have I never re-watched an episode post-season 4, when the series creator and lead writer, Aaron Sorkin, left. But I’ve created my own fictional show within a show. Thusly, Bartlet (sorry, President Bartlet¹) loses re-election because, I mean, sorry lads but he lied about a degenerative disease and his Republican opponent carried Florida. At which point, NBC replaced the show with Sunday Night Football.

You get Hoynes

The list of what’s wrong with The West Wing is both long and not especially new. Even at the time, it was criticised for being too liberal, too schmaltzy, too didactic and far too earnest. A more modern lens would throw in misogynistic (19-year-old women are deemed too young to date while female staffers always seem to sit in wet paint). Most alarmingly, it is fairly striking how none of the characters seem to hold consistent world views from episode to episode.

To modern observers, the show appears irredeemably quaint. Not just the use of pagers, or the fact that a late evening news story breaking on “the blogs” would not be considered to have breached the information ecosystem until the morning newspapers. Rather, the underlying belief that you can make real and lasting change in the US through bipartisan consensus.

Clearly, it was another time. Most Republicans in The West Wing simply wanted to cut taxes and prevent gays from getting married. They didn’t appear eager to stop the promotion of senior black military officials or make the Jews responsible for all manner of evils. Democrats, meanwhile, had only good intentions, if only they could get out of their own way.

I’ll admit, fans of the show hardly helped matters. Though to be fair, fans of any show, football team or political movement rarely do. The idea that it was ‘smart people’s’ television, that all problems are solvable with a dash of intelligence and a sprinkle of good faith, the mimicking (both ironic and very much not) of the walk-and-talks.

Oh — I almost forgot! — the parliamentary assistants in MPs’ office who called themselves ‘chief of staff’ as if they were Leo McGarry and not, you know, answering constituent emails on badgers in some godforsaken corner of Norman Shaw South.

But here’s the thing.

The importance of not being earnest

Having worked both in politics and the civil service, I have some bad news. Politicians and their staff really are believers. Now, some of those beliefs may be dreadful — season according to taste. Meanwhile, MPs obfuscate, dissemble and occasionally lie. But they are deeply earnest people. You don’t go door-knocking for hours on end (Labour), or compete in the rubber chicken circuit (Tory) unless there is an ideological fire lit beneath you.

Then there are the speeches. More bad news, I’m afraid. If you are a president such as Bartlet who does not enjoy majorities in Congress, then using the pulpit at your disposal to try and shape public opinion is incredibly important! A major problem Joe Biden encountered in his otherwise legislatively successful term is that the man could barely speak cogently, let alone distil complicated policy achievements into digestible short-form video content.