My biggest method of knowing whats really going on in terms of television, is to download shows off bittorent. Bitorrent is the greatest thing to happen to the internet since.. email; and maybe blogging. But thats not the matter at hand here today. Thanks to noble file-sharers everywhere, I get to pick and choose what American TV series to watch. And we all know most of them suck, but still – I check out many of them for sociological purposes; to understand perhaps a little better, how the people are thinking or what theyre watching and enjoying. (in theory if it stays on, someone likes it)
Now thanks to Drock, who first introduced me to the series when I was visiting him in DC a few years ago, I love the West Wing. It’s actually on Dutch TV every sunday at midnight, so I watch it happily – half fantasizing that the country could ever have such a charming and quick-witted white house.
Cut to– me browsing my bittorent site of choice the other day, and I come upon this new series: Commander-in-Chief. And although the title is a complete turn-off, I checked on the internets and they told me Geena Davis and an actor that I love – Donald Sutherland, were in it. I also was curious to see the underlying statement they would make with a woman president concept.
While I hate to give to much blog attention to television, this show generally worries me. The whole logic that military action and war is an option when dealing with international problems is the type of irrational concept that somehow a large segment of the American (and world I suspect) population have accepted. And of course, they had to throw in that aspect of the first woman president being more militaristic and war mongering than any man before her; the Clarence Thomas of the executive branch. Anyway my advice to you is watch one episode and then wash your hands and face often and try to clean away the horror.