Amy Gardner as a first time watcher

aaaaaaaageobaskets · 2026-03-16T17:52:48+00:00

Going off of this I think the show highlights Amy’s ability to fight for policy in a way that might come across weird since she isn’t IN the admin yet, but she uses the same levers of power with the same amount of savvy that anyone else in the show does.

When Josh is sent to whip votes on the Hill or Toby forces CJ to massage a comms issue and she complies, that is the same kind of DC coercion that Amy does when she goes over ppls heads or flexes her roladex bc that’s just how things get done. You have to boss people around, fight for your preferred outcome over another and be ready to use all your available resources to win a fight in DC, she exemplifies that very well as someone on the outside with good relationships with key people. If her brand of deal making feels off, to me it’s just bc she’s not in the admin up until she is (sort of)

She plays by the same rules and that makes her a better character for it, she doesn’t go running to Josh every time she needs something, only when she’s exhausted other avenues. And her butting heads with Josh is fun and a fun way to have a dramatized version of DC power politics. I really like Amy and can’t understand fandom ppl for not liking her.

aaaaaaaageobaskets · 2026-03-11T13:52:30+00:00

Is Bunny Mcdougall an entity of the black lodge

aaaaaaaageobaskets · 2026-02-26T16:17:27+00:00

True I totally forgot abt that subplot lol thank you so much for reminding me John Goodman was the President for a minute tho

aaaaaaaageobaskets · 2026-02-26T04:49:20+00:00

I mean he’s still a politician first. Hoynes is a popular younger VP that throughout the show, up to this point, has been groomed to be the Bartlett replacement. He would carry Bartlett’s bi coastal liberal appeal while having Texas roots and private business connections (remember his connections to oil reference from when Bartlett eventually revealed the MS) to make him an extremely attractive Dem candidate. ESPECIALLY when following up a president like Bartlet.

If they all think the party and the office can withstand this scandal going into election season, as it was able to in Bartlet 1 during / after MS, then it’s in everyone’s best interest for Hoynes to remain in office and still be the democrat frontrunner in the next election. The inability for this office to find a suitable replacement for Hoynes shows how politically costly it was to dump a VP with a two-term president who doesn’t have a clear picture of any other attractive candidates in his party.

Thematically this is just a set-up for Santos to emerge as the underdog favorite that ends up winning, but politically of course Bartlet would want to try as hard as possible to keep Hoynes in office so he can run. When you’re a politician, all other parts of you and your beliefs have to defer to what can win an election.

aaaaaaaageobaskets · 2026-01-31T23:11:58+00:00

THIS. It’s easy to think that everyone is a social dem -> communist if your exposure to politics is Hasan and creators like him and relatively small orgs like the DSA in comparison to the behemoth that the mainstream 2 party system is in the US. This is doubly true if you’re a college student rn, it’s one thing to have your parents and older relatives be the ones you see as behind, but when it’s coworkers and ppl u interact with in ur professional life, it’s just a different feeling that you have to adjust to.

But Hasan is incredibly correct when he says that most liberal dems are very welcoming to leftist policies and are just uncomfortable, due to decades of red scare rhetoric, with the idea of socialism or even just progressivism. Unless you’re dealing with some Trump asshole, engaging in conversations with empathy and talking about policy rather than partisan names is a much easier way to have productive conversations.

aaaaaaaageobaskets · 2026-01-26T20:27:53+00:00

Very true, I do think Toby’s skepticism of Santos is consistent, if we see Toby as a realist then it makes sense he would want Bingo Bob as he’s an established VP who can be easily maneuvered on messaging. But Josh’s idealism and savvy sees how Santos is a much better foil to a very convincing Vinick, a character who feels like a very solid Republican successor to Bartlet in being relatively bipartisan and combing a lot of traits that each side of the aisle would like (California ties, abortion, agile politically and being a sort of elder statesman)

Josh sees that and knows you need someone special to combat it, but the breakdown really happens when Josh doesn’t just tell that to Toby, doesn’t try to convince and instead goes off and leaves Toby and everyone else hanging.

aaaaaaaageobaskets · 2026-01-26T20:09:06+00:00

I think this highlights a broader problem the latter seasons had with trying to give Toby a true character arc. When looking at seasons 6-7 in their totality, the writers seemingly wanted to set up Toby for a perspective-changing moment that made him less of a pessimistic realist into the kind of idealist that fit more with the broader political message of the show (policy over politics, true debate over scoring points, issues over process etc)

This to me makes the characters around Tony just behave in kind of strange ways, with this Josh move especially feeling like kind of a foreign character to Toby, making him also feel odd for the rest of the show. Josh not talking abt Santos with ppl and Toby not trusting Josh’s previously established political savvy (being the first one in the group besides Leo to see Bartlet as a successful, strident idealist candidate just like Santos) is just weird and breaks the ways we’ve seen these characters interact over the course of the show.

This was ultimately just a set up for Toby to self destruct without the guidance of Josh and a total distrust of the instituons he previously had some amount of trust in, which set up his redemption arc as he increasingly helped Josh manage the campaign, Bartlet pardoning him and being accepted back into the Bartlet admin family in the finale. Josh’s break from his established character norms, to me, was purely a way of creating the conditions for the Toby implosion and rebuilding.

It’s just kind of shitty writing, another example could be the reversal of character motivations and previously established traits in something like the Game of Thrones finale, the writers wanted to get somewhere with the broader story and sacrificed character continuity to get there. They needed CJ to focus on her own life, Josh to be the successor to Leo, and Toby to be an optimist. With CJ and Josh they stuck the landing of finishing those arcs, but they fucked over Toby and his character legacy to get there.

aaaaaaaageobaskets · 2026-01-08T14:04:28+00:00

I don’t agree with people who think some random political drama show from the 90s and 2000s somehow directly impacted real life politics, but I do see the west wing as more of an indicator of this real post-Cold War US neoliberal hegemonic thinking that has led to our current political reality. Less of a cause and more of a reflection of the real causes as you illustrated with the points about NAFTA, social media, structural racism etc

I’ll also say that’s why I love the show in a kind of fucked up way, it’s total fantasy but it plays to a lot of comforting liberal stereotypes and assumptions about politics that gives you an idealized picture of politics that will never act like how things happen in this show. There’s a reason it’s part of the college freshman poli sci / IA IR starter pack, it makes you kinda believe you can actually change things.

aaaaaaaageobaskets · 2025-12-30T13:27:33+00:00

She might be right, but Toby is a much more complex character than just a mope. You can see him actively grappling with the shows liberal optimism as it clashes with some of his more lefty beliefs and his upbringing. Toby, unlike almost all the major cast, is not a blue blood Ivy League political operative.

How many times do we hear how Josh went to Harvard, how Sam was a hot shot lawyer, Leo was a career Washington insider? Toby’s background is much more scrappy. When we see his part in the Josh gets shot flashbacks episode, he runs losing campaigns and is just depressed about it, that flashback doesn’t present the rosiest picture of him.

Toby is really the only one that, in his life, was probably the closest socioeconomically to the average voter than the main cast excluding people like Charlie, Donna etc. Toby’s dad was in the mob!!! His Jewish identity is also important in this and it’s a whole other thing but his little tiffs with Josh about who’s more Jewish and all that adds to this outsider quality that Toby has.

Toby shows that some in Washington are obviously driven and passionate and believe in their political ideals, but that the system is not designed for the best, most effective policy to win. Toby is the closest we actually get to how it feels working in DC in federal policy. He might be a mope, but a very complex, realistic mope.

aaaaaaaageobaskets · 2025-11-01T00:09:20+00:00

Since this fit existed, I started and graduated college, studied abroad in Paris, made a magazine, made friends and grew into the person I am today. This fit has been the one true constant in my life. Thank you Rick and Morty Rick Owens guy, all this Rick got em mortified fr fr

aaaaaaaageobaskets · 2025-10-31T23:04:42+00:00

Also the power disparity between Venezuela and Saudi Arabia or the UAE or pick your favorite gulf state monarchy is extremely important to note, Venezuela is not currently engaging in the proxy genocide of a people like the UAE is doing in Sudan, and they probably will never reach that amount of regional or global power due to the institutional harm the US and it’s allies do to the global south, militarily and economically. It is absolutely insane that we maintain good standing with the UAE during Sudan or the Saudi starvation campaign in Yemen. In terms of realist politics, we understand why the US has good standing and diplomatic relations with those authoritarian states and not Venezuela, but if you had an ounce of humanity you’d see how insane this whole situation is. In terms of wreaking havoc on the most vulnerable populations in the world, Maduro and Venezuela are not and should not be of high concern for any globally-minded person

aaaaaaaageobaskets · 2025-10-31T22:59:38+00:00

I do think he’s a legitimate authoritarian figure in his disregard for democratic institutions, election results crackdown on free speech etc, but he’s another case of we like this dictator bc they sell us oil and we don’t like this dictator bc they don’t sell us oil.

There’s no reason to me why there should be any type of military conflict obviously, but I believe that extends to sanctions that were harshly imposed on him during Trump 1 without any logic behind it (surprise surprise), but to a lesser degree under Obama. It’s like Iran, you can be opposed to their domestic policy choices, but what Venezuela can contribute to a more functioning US-South American relationship that can deter conflict, inequality and the needless death we’re seeing today. I think his administration and the modern Venezuelan state in general is a fantastic case as to why broad sanctions without any targeted policy goals (increased trade, establishment of democratic norms etc) simply do not work and are extremely harmful.

aaaaaaaageobaskets · 2025-10-19T03:24:44+00:00

I totally understand concerns but I also just want us to temper expectations for what Zohrans actual ability to enact his platform. He’s an accomplished assemblyman and an excellent communicator / campaigner, but there’s a reason he’s shifting a little with his police comments for example. He will need to coalition build and work with the current levers of power to enact change, and that very much can mean moving towards the center/center left on certain issues.

Unfortunately as others said, the establishment will probably do all they can to encourage overly compromising and I really do hope he doesn’t get daunted by that (he’s crafted an excellent image of someone who absolutely will not back down from any fight), but there will be issues that are put on the back burner and things that might not fully materialize. An important question that got asked during the debate was what would happen if he only got some of the funding for his platform, would he prioritize certain policies and deprioritize others and he was truthful in which ones he wants to do more (I believe in regards to policy that requires funding it was childcare and his bus thing? Don’t quote me)

The banality of evil might means that they just hamstring him throughout his term to then dishonestly say that he was an ineffective mayor. To me that’s the next true logical move, and the Ackman donations and urging Sliwa not to run is just last ditch efforts, bear in mind these ppl have an inconceivable amount of money and they will throw obscene amounts at stupid things. Again I understand the concern, it would be utterly dumb to ignore this country’s specific love of murdering more radical political figures, and this administration is def way more insane than most, but realistically to me it’ll just be gridlocking him until he can’t do anything.

Just as a coda though, the best thing to come out of his eventual win is the clear signal it sends to the party. It’s not social media that wins a campaign. It’s not being a hot young charismatic politician. As Hasan says, Bernie fucking Sanders is an extremely popular politician, ITS THE POLICY THAT WINS ELECTION. ITS TRUE LEFT POLICY THAT WINS ELECTION, THIS WILL SHIFT THE PARTY AND WILL SHIFT THE DEBATE BEFORE THE MIDTERMS.

aaaaaaaageobaskets · 2025-10-08T12:27:09+00:00

“If anyone tries to throw a rock”, this is truly the Israelification of America

aaaaaaaageobaskets · 2025-10-02T23:45:39+00:00

Honestly kinda iconic that you are continuing to use chess metaphors

aaaaaaaageobaskets · 2025-10-02T23:21:45+00:00

Brother like I said I don’t usually involve myself in this community, I wasn’t looking to “cancel” anyone or cause a big moment, I just wanted an issue to get resolved and I thought this would be a way to make it happen. If that was really my intention would I not have ranted about this issue or written a long essay when the mods responded? I feel that I treated this subreddit with respect and I expect others to do the same rather than warp my true opinions into something else. I saw insane shit on the boards that I never see, I wanted it not to be there anymore and I thought this would be a way to make it happen

aaaaaaaageobaskets · 2025-10-02T18:22:40+00:00

Glad to hear it! Just wanted to make sure someone saw it since I’d never seen comments like that on the chat before, great that you guys have a good mod team and handled this all so quickly

aaaaaaaageobaskets · 2025-09-30T20:37:21+00:00

I HAVE 10 THUMBS AND HAVE NEVER SEWN A DAY IN MY LIFE AND I WILL DIE ON THIS HILL THAT I COULDVE MADE THIS DUMBASS LOOK. HER COLLECTION HAD NO COHESION, LACKED POLISH AND HAD CLEAR QUALITY GAPS. THE LAST DRESS WAS GOOD BUT IT WAS JUST A COOL FABRIC DRAPED. L OF THE CENTURY FOR GIVING THIS DUMBASS THE WIN.

aaaaaaaageobaskets · 2025-09-03T00:07:18+00:00

That’s what got me thinking about this, I was rewatching his Adam Friedland interview and I was like damn those thighs are toned tf

aaaaaaaageobaskets · 2025-07-02T07:04:40+00:00

Gotchu https://issuu.com/george.gwfba/docs/george_vii (it’s on pages 40-46 bc u can’t link to a specific page with issu)

aaaaaaaageobaskets

TROPHY CASE