Otter's Rock

So, I love seasons six and seven of the West Wing.  The earlier seasons are good, but as a Republican, I get seriously tweaked over the way that almost all Republicans in the first few seasons are Evil! or Corrupt! or Stupid! or some combination thereof, and there's no possible way to be Good or Smart or Honest without being a Democrat and supporting all the same political positions the show and characters do.  But the last two seasons, while the Democrats are still the good guys, there are plenty of good Republicans, too, and differences of opinion are just that--differences of opinion, and not proof of evil.  And the wit isn't that much less, imho, and the cinematography is just as gorgeous, and really, that is one presidential election I would love to have in reality, because it was genuinely a choice between two good options.

Anyway.  To cut to the chase, Bravo sometimes shows West Wing in the mornings, which is cool, and they just finished the series and went back to the beginning, and I was reminded of how much I love the show, and went to re-read some West Wing fanfic.  And the fanfic is mostly Josh/Donna, because they had a great relationship in the last season.  I loved that, how that was handled.  She was strong, and not mooning over him, and mature, and he wasn't the beginning and ending of her world, and a romance between boss and subordinate can be skeevy and they handled it in a very non-skeevy way.  So I like Josh/Donna.  And went to re-read one particular fic I haven't re-read in a couple years.

Yeah.  It's no longer in my bookmarks.  It's set in the first couple of seasons, and the author keeps saying how strong and wonderful Donna is, but her entire life revolves around her Epic Love for Josh.  She's got it all planned out--she's going to wait the six years until Bartlett's out of office (assuming re-election), and then she and Josh can be together.  She won't see if she can, say, transfer to another post at the White House where he wouldn't be her boss and then see if they can make a relationship work, because then she and Josh would be parted!  She'll date, while she's waiting, because she's not dependent on a man or anything, but Josh is her One True Love so that doesn't really count.  Then Josh realizes he loves her, and they get married.  Then the Republicans hear about this, and crucify them in the press trying to use this as the wedge to bring down the Bartlett White House.  And Josh gets sued for discriminating against some other woman when he hired Donna.  And by the way, did I mention the fact that workplace codes of conduct designed to protect women from discrimination and harassment are viewed consistently as horrible things designed to get in the way of True Love?  Things that only Evil Republicans could possibly support?  And the Republicans are Evil?  And the lawsuit about discriminatory hiring practices is horrible and vile and only Republicans could possibly think that a man with a history of workplace romances who later married his assistant might possibly be influenced by attractiveness and how receptive a prospective assistant might be to his advances.  Basically, they try to throw out thirty years of feminist progress.  (Okay, there is one mention of how most lawsuits aren't frivolous, but it's one mention in a very, very long story.)  And the anti-Republicanism is virulent.  I didn't quite realize how much before, and I definitely didn't realize how problematic their take on women in the workplace was.  They do have witty banter, which I think is why I bookmarked this thing in the first place, but really that's no longer enough to cover the anti-feminism and destruction of Donna's character.

I can't believe I ever liked this thing.

Does anybody know where I can find the name of Mrs. Bartlett's Chief of Staff on the West Wing as of the end of the series? I know she was in at least one episode early on, but I don't know what episode that was or if it was ever mentioned that she got a new one (after all, in eight years, that might have changed). Thanks, I'm writing a fic that takes place during the very end of the show as Donna is working as Mrs. Santos' chief of staff during the transition.

Well, I learned how to feed someone using a feeding tube today. This is important, because my grandfather just got one put in, and having someone else who knows how to do it means that Grandma can actually get out of the house once in a while. (The way his feedings are scheduled, there's not really time to go do anything in between them.) Hopefully, by the time I leave for Gettysburg, he won't need the feeding tube any more, because I'm the only one in the family who has a part-time job and so can come over during the daytime to help out. By the way, for those of you who don't know, feeding tubes don't go through your throat or anything--they are attached to the stomach and come directly out your side. Ick.

On a completely unrelated subject, check out used2bvader's Star Wars vids. The Padme one, in particular, is really good. And for team Stargate: SG-1 vids, check out Sierra Phoenix's vid Somebody Help Me, about times when Our Heroes aren't quite themselves; it's one of my favorites.

And the third subject that's been bugging me is the West Wing. It's almost over, as a series. Finito. Kaput. I just started watching it, like, about two months ago. I got hooked. And now it's ending. Why do I do this to myself? It's not the first time. Farscape, Babylon 5, Buffy, etc., all were either over or in their last season when I got hooked. All I can say is, thank heaven for DVDs.