A quote from the Denver Post pretty much sums up my feelings about The West Wing…
“Passionate writing, earnest soliloquies invoking the very essence of democracy – in primetime! – ”West Wing“ defied the odds against serious thought on television. Sorkin pulled it off, while the long-simmering Josh- and-Donna attraction held interest on a more sudsy level. Recall a million shining Martin Sheen moments:
Bartlet: ”We’re for freedom of speech everywhere. We’re for freedom to worship everywhere. We’re for freedom to learn … for everybody. And because, in our time, you can build a bomb in your country and bring it to my country, what goes on in your country is very much my business. And so we are for freedom from tyranny, everywhere, whether in the guise of political oppression, Toby, or economic slavery, Josh, or religious fanaticism, CJ.
“That most fundamental idea cannot be met with merely our support. It has to be met with our strength. Diplomatically, economically, materially. And if Pharaoh still don’t free the slaves, then he gets the plagues or my cavalry, whichever gets there first.”
Characters quoting Immanuel Kant and Thomas Jefferson, spouting statistics on farm bills and the electoral college, offering dissertations on Constitutional law and international relations while racing through hallways, putting out diplomatic and political fires – that was “The West Wing.”
The show offered a peculiarly intellectual form of entertainment, except when it didn’t – and thank goodness for CJ (Allison Janney) lip-synching the acid-jazz hit “The Jackal” for her co-workers. “
Makes you want to turn the channel and watch the Dukes of Hazzard – the original, not the one with J. Simpson in it. Kant can’t hold a match to Uncle Jesse’s musing.