I just don’t get some of the sentiments expressed here. Folks, this is NBC. If you want even-handed presentations of political commentary and handfuls of $0.25 words, switch over to PBS. The West Wing is watched by a very large, diverse population, and the examples and terms used are meant to be readily understood. I’m sure that there are many high school teachers out there who will quickly and willingly use this episode to aide understanding of what’s going on - and this episode will do a very good job of that because they use simple concepts and ideas.
It was said in the opening montage that this was a play. This was meant to be able to stand alone, and present ideas in a very not-so-subtle way - and I think it did an incredible job. As ShibbOleth said, it didn’t quite hit on the usual levels that a typical episode of WW does, and in that respect it falls short of WW standards. Sure, they could have used a variety of obsure examples to further flesh out terrorism, but there’s not many people who have ever heard the term “Bader-Meinhoff” before.
The only thing that I was disappointed with was the fact that Leo never said “I’m sorry.”
Oh, and it would not be hard to cross the Vermont/Canadian border. There are a web of dirt roads that are completly unmonitored, as well as just hiking over the border easily. It’s not like there’s a wall or anything.
sorry, I was gone over the weekend but I couldn’t resist…
now that is funny.
I understand your point about the show’s need to reach out but quite frankly, the people who need to hear this probably don’t watch The West Wing. They are watching Smackdown.
Thanks! I agree, to an extent. I think another thing this episode did was create concepts that are easily grasped and, more importantly, easily recommunicated. In other words, while many of the Smackdown audience didn’t see the episode, the next time they are talking about what’s going on in the world, someone who DID see the episode will be able to help explain, using things like the KKK analogy. Also, as a former teacher, I can completely see this episode being reshown in the classroom. Gotta love a captive audience.
This is probably a topic for a whole 'nother thread, but a line of dialog started me thining…
Sam (Brad Lowe) states that the remarkable think about terrorism is that is has a 100% failure rate–no act of terrorism has ever achieved its stated goal.
It seems I just saw a History Channel documentary on the topic, and that the independence movement in Algeria was basically a terrorist campaign. And lo, Algeria seems to be independent today.
And one could say that the presence of the Good Friday accords in N. Ireland may be the outcome of the IRA’s terror campaign.
I liked the episode. I thought it covered a lot of ground in a very small amount of time. The kids were idiots, but they weren’t anything more than a plot device. Real kids wouldn’t have just sat there dumbstruck. Some of them would have argued at many different points.
One thing concerned me though. The one intelligent comment made by the kids got glossed over.
“What about the Boston Tea Party? Wasn’t that terrorism?”
They responded with a bunch of fluff about good ol’ England and powdered wigs. That doesn’t answer the question though. There IS a difference between the two, but there are similarities as well. Both want change and both were willing to resort to violence to achieve their goals. I think that answering the question correctly really could have improved the show.
At least some of the Smackdown audience (people who aren’t regular West Wing viewers) did see the episode. It was the highest rated West Wing episode ever, with 25 million viewers. The West Wing averages about 17 million viewers. So Sorkin’s message got to a wider audience than usual.
The point about the Boston Tea Party was that it was an act of economic vandalism, not an act of terrorism. While vandalism isn’t necessarily right, it does not kill people, nor does it instill in people the fear that they could be killed as they go about their daily activities.
That said, I found the episode incredibly pretentious, but I was still glued to my seat until the end.
I found the KKK comparison rather strange. There were 13 hate crime murders in 1998, and 17 in 1999 (source: DOJ). This would include both KKK and any other fringe people. Also, the KKK does not enjoy broad-based support anywhere that I know of.
That does not seem to be the case with Islamic terrorists, who commit significantly more crimes, and do not seem to be unwelcome in most of the Islamic world.
If anyone checks back in, feel free to show me where I missed something.
The KKK enjoyed broad-based support in parts of the US 100 years ago. I am certain the number of hate crimes perpetrated by the KKK was much greater then than it has been recently. Perhaps in another 100 years Islamic terrorism will have experienced a similar decline in support among Muslims.
I think the comparison is valid. Perhaps if we went further back in history we could find a better example of Christian terrorists, but the KKK is the most recent.
Seriously, JMS wrote the entire fourth season, if I recall correctly, and good parts of the third. I don’t see how Arkin couldn’t pull off the same feat in a hurryup situation.
Speaking as… uh. Someone who has most of the same interests as Chas. E.
Perhaps, but they belong to any one organization as easily identifiable as either Al Qaeda and other Islamic terror organizations, or the KKK and other white supremacy organizations?
I thought it was more of a frieghtening trend rather than a conspiracy.
