Who Won the 'West Wing' Live Debate?

AP via Yahoo ^ | 11/7/05 | Frazier Moore

[robertpaulsen]

I swear, every time I'm channel surfing and stop on "Commander in Chief", Geena Davis is getting all dressed up to go to some social function.

Since I have yet to linger more than 15 seconds, can anyone tell me if this is all she does in the series -- play dress-up?

(By the way, she was great as Charlie Baltimore in The Long Kiss Goodnight.)

[turbocat]

Yes _ I agree with the comment on the African nations. made a LOT of sense.

Actually, it felt that Vinick/Alda won on content and plans. Santos seemed like the real Dems, with no real plan.

I wondered after such an impassioned speech, whether Alda was swayed at all personally LOL

[ghost of nixon]

actually - the entire segment I saw, which was the last 20 minutes - Alda performed exceptionally well as the conservative candidate - (eloquent defenses of limited government, drilling in ANWAR) - so much so that I was stunned that the West Wing writers could write a compelling conservative case, and that Alda could deliver it.

[ClearCase_guy]

Actually she is supposedly an Independent.

I haven't seen the show, but I'd bet money that President Geena Davis is an Independent who holds the following views:

Pro-homosexual
Pro-abortion
Anti-Christian influence in politics
Anti-death penalty
Anti-business
Pro-social services.

In other words, mainstream, moderate views held by every Democrat in the country.

[chiller]

This political junkies usually watches and last night was amazing on several points.

1) it was actually a good political exchange, but it surprises me that NBC thinks that would draw any audience. I suppose their hook was the "live" aspect, although scripted.

2) My hats off to Alda, who's liberalism I despise, but he was a fabulous spokesman for conservative causes. I suppose Pegggy Noonan wrote the words, but Alda was faithful to the thoughts. He almost sounded like he believed them!

Noonan (or whomever) didn't miss many points for our side. Alda asked if anyone in the audience had ever been to ANWAR? No one had, not even Dem. Smitts. Alda's point was that noone will EVER go to ANWAR, so it is the perfect place to drill for oil.

Bottom line, Alda showed what a professional he is. It may have been the most interesting, amazing, puzzling hour of network TV I've ever seen.

[ghost of nixon]

I would even go so far as to say it was an important TV moment for conservatives. Maybe the first time conservatism was portrayed (mostly) correctly, and liberal issues debunked by a main stream media production.

[chiller]

We're in agreement on Alda, as I posted. He was so convincing. I do wish more had seen the show.

They got off on the right foot when Alda suggested tossing the stodgy debate format we always see, so they had a good free-wheeling debate, just like we'd all like to see.

It was an indictment against these very type of boring debates we've seen for several cycles.

[Tim n Texas]

He argued "lower taxes" as a solution to third-world poverty ... referring to the taxation found in 3rd world nations. They need to lower taxes to courage foreign investment instead of foreign aid. However, no mention of the warlords who have many of these nations in a death grip... there are no Ronald Reagans in Africa I'm afraid.

[chiller]

Agreed. Your thought brings to mind the delicious character than Donald Sutherland brings to "Commander". He does a great job of making the Republican leader look very sleazy, but I don't mind for some reason because it's Sutherland, who is publically hates conservatives.

Maybe too because I'd like to see our real leaders play sleazy hardball as the ethically challenged Dems do on a daily basis.

Not a hint of that in West Wing, though.

[stopem]

Maybe our candidates should have the producers write a script for them ;)

[dsmatuska]

I watched about two minutes of it. (gag) I thought: "Alan Alda playing a conservative makes as much sense as casting him in the lead role in the John Candy Story."

[stopem]

"He argued "lower taxes" as a solution to third-world poverty ... referring to the taxation found in 3rd world nations. They need to lower taxes to courage foreign investment instead of foreign aid."

Right, I thought it was funny when Smit said that the answer to everything with conservatives was to lower taxes and than they asked about foreign aid and how to fix the problem and he replied with "lower taxes" and the audience gasped and laughed until he explained the why and how of it.

[chiller]

You would have been very wrong.

[Dave S]

The real fantasy here is that the Republican (Vinick, played by Alan Alda) is a senator from California and the Democrat (Santos, played by Jimmy Smits) is a senator from Texas

Santos is not a senator. He is a congressman. That makes it even more a fantasy.

[Dave S]

Nay! It's just their way of helping Corzine(?) and Kaine...those two jerks are goin down on Tues., so NBC=Nothing But Communist, are doing their best to help out the sinking rats!!

Got any thoughts about the Illuminati too?

[Allen H]

I watched bits and pieces. It's so cute when liberals try to play grown-up. 8) It's insulting and disgusting that the show makers and writers couldn't even get someone like Bruce Willis or Fred Thompson to be the character that was a Republican. Oh heavens no, they have to have flaming liberal socialist alan alda. It must have killed him to have to say conservative things, though they did a pathetic job outlining the conservative plank. They only touched on taxes and economic policy, and briefly on the death penalty based on what I saw. I didn't see them mention anything about the core of conservative values. Traditional marriage, budget cuts, domestic oil exploration, pro-life, on and on and on. Liberals just don't get it, and that "episode" of the left wing proves that.

What I MOST enjoyed, is the fact that BOTH of the actors flbbed up their lines many times, and I barely watched half of it. I LOVE THAT!!! And these are the same people who for five years have savaged W. Bush for not being some perfect speaker and flubbing up sometimes. Now we see that, golly gee, pinko flaming libs aren't so hot when they're live without take after take after take until they get it perfect. 8) THAT WAS GREAT!!! It's no fun when your first take is your ONLY take and millions are watching is it liberals? Though I doubt there were millions watching the left wing. This stunt, and their move to Sunday Nights, I think shows their ratings have tanked. The show has been in three or four slots in the past three years. If it was any other show, I think it would have been cancelled years ago, but it's the liberal golden calf, and the closest they can get to the White House, so it will go on for years, and continue to be a reaon for more and more people to vote conservative. I think left wing is like howard dean and michael moore, they're GREAT for conservatives, showing what radicals liberals are.

[GOP_Proud]

Dittos on Grey's. Cool watching the heart catch on fire. I love George.

[ChadGore]

Frankly, what got me was "NBC NEWS" putting their logo in the lower right hand corner of the screen.

This is a demonstration of, in a quest for synergy, NBC News has 'jumped the shark' into info-tainment.

Will the NRA be allowed to run a live debate in prime time with the NBC NEWS LIVE logo on it? If so, how much will they have to pay NBC to rent out the logo ?

This was a DNC infomercial, one hour of free prime time, given to the democrat party for free.

[MRobert]

Yes, Grey's Anatomy and E-Ring are my two "must-see" tv shows this year. Oh, yeah, and Medium. The writing in Grey's Anatomy is so superior to anything out there and I haven't picked up any political overtones yet. The episode last week was so emotional (train accident) that my husband and I both got tears in our eyes. It has been a long time since a television drama moved me that much. Sorry to be off topic.

[NewRomeTacitus]

On the Illegal Immigration question - Vinick: "...my Guest Worker Program. We have to face the fact that we have at least ten million people who have illegally entered this country but are now putting in an honest day's work and are mostly doing jobs Americans do not want to do." Vinick said he'd double the Border Patrol (nothing about a wall). Santos asked why not triple it, correctly pointing out that the Border Patrol has already been tripled in the last decade with almost no effect at all on the invasion. The point was too little resources for a massive problem will always be just that: too little.

Santos "won" the Illegal Immigration part by noting how Mexico will always be a place people flee from as long as it limits opportunities for it's citizens.

While I suspect that this unique (and very good) episode was probably a tune-up exercise designed for Hillary by her obeisant Hollywood thralls it was a surprisingly fair synopsis of some ongoing issues performed by top-notch actors. The only real fantasy here was that illegal immigration was addressed at all. I believe HMOs are a scam (that helped Frist and Tennessee Governor Bredesen(D) rake it in) while medicine is already half-socialized in its present form, ANWR should be drilled (the caribou love sheltering under the current Alaskan pipeline) though energy companies are only paying lip service to alternatives and pharmaceutical companies fail us by NOT distributing the costs of R&D throughout the global market.

Boners: Vinick claiming nuclear energy is completely safe (as a lead in to the true statement that the real market is a better guide than government) and Santos' weak argument that Liberals have stood for most positive policies while Conservatives "always" opposed them. Vinick garbled CAFTA, Santos screwed up education...as I said before - this was all about preparing Hillary for her coming debates. Despite that it was still worth watching.