That one scene from West Wing..

You know, the scene where Bartlett give the rhetorical backhand to the Dr. Laura lookalike. Does anyone know where I can get a transcript of that scene? Or maybe post it here, provided that is legal.

I love that scene.

Apparently, this originated online (the authorship is not clear) and was circulated via email. The writers of the West Wing subsequently used it as the inspiration for Bartlet’s encounter with the Dr. Laura-type character.

So saith Snopes, who has the original document on line, but not the specific version used in The West Wing.

I could give you from memory…

Are you a medical doctor? No? How about a psychologist, therapist, or doctor of philosophy? No? Because I think some of your listeners are under the impression that you are.

I really admire your principled stand on homosexuality. Is it your contention that homosexuality is an abomination? Because according to the same scripture, so is shaving and working on the Sabbath. And could you give me some advice about something? I’ve been considering selling my daughter into slavery. Could you help me go about that? And while we’re at it, I want to stone my wife to death for wearing garments of different kinds of thread woven together. That’d be all right with you, wouldn’t it?

And by the way, “Doctor,” in this house, when I stand, nobody sits down.

(To Toby) That is how I talk to my opponents.

Actually, the end was more like:

“Toby”

“Mr. President”

“That’s how I beat him.”

In reference to an earlier conversation between Bartlet and Toby, discussing someone who was running for some local political office in Bartlet’s hometown. Bartlet had beaten him for some post, and Toby asked how he had accomplished it, but Bartlet couldn’t remember.

You left out the part about Leo working on the sabbath and touching the skin of a pig. :slight_smile:

Here’s a transcription that inexplicably leaves out “That’s how I beat him” but includes Sam’s pilfering of a crab puff. Unless the Bartlet-Toby exchange happens after they leave the room…

Don’t know about that West Wing character, but Dr. Laura has a doctorate in physiology, which is the science behind medical practice; a Nobel Prize is given in “Physiology and Medicine”. She also was a licensed family therapist.

Bartlett’s rudeness in that scene totally turned me off to his character. You do not treat your guests that way, even if you disagree with them politically.

The episode was from the 2nd season, and it’s titled “The Midterms”.
Try this like, towards the end.

She didn’t stand when he entered the room. His rudeness was mild compared to hers.

Nope, the Toby-Bartlet exchange definitely took place right there. Maybe because it wouldn’t have made much sense without the earlier context, they left it out?

One of the prime rules of good manners is that pointing out someone’s breach of etiquette, especially in public, is bad manners in itself. When you are the host and the person is your guest, it’s especially bad manners. She may not have known to stand when the president enters the room (normally, a woman is not required to stand when a man enters). But he certainly knew you don’t act rude to your guest before a group of people.

That bothered me. I like the Bartlett character, but I can’t help but wonder why she wouldn’t respond herself.
“But what if I am ignorant of the custom, or ill Mr. President? Or if I simply can’t stand you and the immoral liberality you stand for? Will the Secret Service drag me to my feet?”

I’ve never met the President. I have no expectation of ever being invited to the White House unless I sign up for the tour. I don’t even like the current President that much, but by gum, if he comes into a room I’m in, I know I would stand. Even if I hadn’t thought about it beforehand, when I noticed everyone else standing, I would stand. And I’m quite sure you don’t get invited to the White House cocktail party without getting a rundown on the etiquette expected of you.

I think the transcript is wrong to say that “Jacobs sees that, in fact, the president is standing and she is the only one in the room sitting.” She knew what she was doing, and was clearly sending a message by not standing. I say kudos to President Bartlett for not putting up with her childish, passive-aggressive display of her lack of respect for him. If she was happy enough to come to his party and lap up the attention and free crab puffs, she should have sucked it up and been civil when he showed up, no matter what her personal feelings for him might have been.

I know someone who used to serve in the president’s cabinet. There is no “etiquette briefing” for cocktail parties or dinners.

Thats not very nice. Why would the president keep someone locked in his cabinet? Talk about a breach of etiquette.

If she was so hated, why was she invited to the party in the first place? I think one of the major rules of the WW is if the press are present, screen the guests for embarrassing backgrounds. Laura Dern played a poet who was going to confront Bartlet about his stance on landmines until Toby talked her down.

She was “the press”.