Marta's Mathoms

I have been rewatching West Wing and just rewatched the episode "The stackhouse Filibuster" (Sn 02, Ep 17). The administration has put together a bipartisan bill to spend money on researching diseases that affect children, and they're trying to get it passed before a holiday when some senator launches a filibuster. It's not jaded or even particularly political - it's mainly people trying to get out of the office for their vacations while being reminded of the kind of thing that matters.

If you haven't seen it yet, you should. By the end I was smiling ear to ear, and I'm really not a very sentimental sort. It just has a lot of heart and builds up a great narrative rhythm by the end of it. Episodes can be purchased through either Amazon or iTunes.

If you aren't familiar with the series, there are two plot points that could use some explanation:

1. the president was diagnosed with multiple schlerosis, and he promised his wife he would only run for a single term because the disease would affect him more severely at around the time the second term began. Before this episode no one else knew about this one-term limit.


2. Sam Seaborn's dad had been having an affair with a woman for several years, which Sam just found out about in the previous episode.

None of that really matters that much. I just mention it because it might help make sense of some comments. Really, you should be able to enjoy this episode even without knowing anything else about the series.

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