It seems like I am forever playing catchup with my sources of entertainment. Half a decade after The West Wing finished airing, I finally took the time to finish all 156 episodes. Seeing as each episode is 42 minutes long, this is on hindsight an incredible waste of my short mortal life, but goddammit it is the best waste of life ever produced for American TV.

Politics for most people is a battle of words and ideas. Political discourse for the average person is conducted in pretty much the same way most hypothetical physics questions are answered: in a vacuum frictionless room containing a perfect sphere. While convincing arguments can be made on paper and discussion boards, the real problem with politics is that it involves humans who are irrational, illogical and whose shit is generally all retarded.

Politics, as it applies to real-world governing, must therefore necessarily go beyond merely finding out and trying to convince people of the best solutions to society’s problems, but also compromising and making the most of any situation in a debate populated by people who will never see eye-to-eye with you, perhaps even rightfully so.

The West Wing, a serial drama depicting the fictional presidency of bleeding-heart liberal Josiah Bartlet (portrayed by Martin Sheen, who is also the voice of the Illusive Man in Mass Effect), highlights the human side of politics and in doing so paints a picture of democracy that feels closer to the truth than the caricatures spewing talking points on cable news.

Whether you find The West Wing to be an uplifting feel-good story of people trying to do good in an imperfect world or a depressing look into the way backroom political deals that affect the lives of billions are made for the most trivial of reasons depends on how much (or little) you already know about American politics. If you went in like wide-eyed Bambi, happily oblivious to the money politics and unscrupulous maneuvering taking place behind the scenes, you might enjoy the show’s implications less than a more seasoned cynic who got to see the softer side of the story.

My recently rekindled Magic addiction has left me thinking about the idea of the “metagame”, which I think is an appropriate description for the kind of politics portrayed in The West Wing. At the basic level, the game is a debate of ideas: does single-payer work better than private health insurance companies? But the metagame is the larger picture: knowing the opinions of all the other players in the playing field and the facts of the situation, how do you then go about winning each particular game? That’s a level of strategy that most online political debate will never consider.

While ultimately not all rainbows and sunshine, The West Wing presents a compelling case for the audience to be conservatively optimistic in the democratic process. Of course, the real hardened cynic would note that this is exactly what the media would have you believe with its thinly-veiled propaganda film.

Although the series has a clear liberal leaning in that it depicts a Democratic White House and most of the main characters generally fall on the left side of spectrum when it comes to hot-button issues such as the separation of church and state, education reform and gun control, the series does not serve as an advocate for any particular issue. It generally tries to humanize both sides of the debate while highlighting failures and imperfections in the system wherever they crop up, such as how the corn industry in the US wields disproportional influence on the formulation of public policy (such as corn-derived ethanol being pushed as “clean” energy) due to the importance of the Iowa caucuses in determining presidential nominees.

In fact, the show can sometimes be too mind-bogglingly apolitical for a story that is supposed to be set in the White House. For example, throughout the series, President Bartlet does not make a single policy speech on-screen. Major speeches, such as the State of the Union, are always cut off right after he steps up to the podium. The sole exception to this is a presidential debate that takes place in the last season where the two candidates actually speak substantially on real political issues such as education and healthcare reforms. I suppose this is because backlash was no longer a concern for the producers in the show’s final season and they felt it was a good opportunity to help raise the level of political awareness.

The West Wing has a knack of surprising you with fresh insights by attaching abstract ideas — often ones you disagree with — to the passionate voices of flawed but lovable characters as they go about trying to run a country. It will occasionally challenge your preconceived notions by lending voice to other ideas.

One particularly memorable example of this is when the black Democratic mayor of Washington D.C. met with President Bartlet to discuss a rider passed by the Republican Congress to create an experimental program allowing some parents in D.C. to have the option to receive school vouchers to pay for private schools. The rider was attached to the spending bill for D.C.’s budget and President Bartlet reassured the mayor that he was going to veto the bill because school vouchers take funding away from public schools. But the mayor surprised the president by requesting that he signed the bill because public schools in D.C. were not improving and the mayor felt that he owed it to the children of his district to at least try out the Republicans’ idea.

You will grow fond of these characters and feel like you are watching them every step of the way as they develop as individuals over the course of an eight-year presidency and do their best to make the country better, or at least not collapse under its own weight.

The West Wing is an highly intelligent show and I highly recommend it to everyone with an interest in politics. Of course, given that I am five years late to the game, this is probably a meaningless recommendation.

This is somewhat of a spoiler, but I find it interesting how closely the fictional election depicted in the series’ final season parallels the 2008 elections: The young minority Democrat beaming with naive enthusiasm and the old moderate Republican with a reputation for being a maverick in his own party. The writers must be amazed by their own prescience.

Also, the eighth episode of season five titled “Shutdown” depicts a federal government shutdown after the Republican Congress fails to agree with the President on the budget bill. This is obviously intended to echo the shutdown that happened during the Clinton administration, but it is also very relevant to the on-going stand-off between the Obama administration and the Republican House of Representatives over the national debt ceiling and the possibility of an impending government shutdown. The players may be different, but the name of the game is still “more tax cuts”.

“They want more tax cuts? Screw it.“

It’s time for another rant that is completely unrelated to the theme of this blog because I just felt like it. Fourth of July just ended a few hours ago for the folks in the Land of the Free. While dropping in and out of consciousness during a particularly boring Maths lecture on integration and volume of a disk of revolution, my mind wandered and — by a random firing of neurons — I ended up thinking about the birthday of what is, or was, arguably the greatest nation in the world.

Warning: Long Rant Ahead.

Indeed, it wasn’t that long ago when the name America symbolized the triumph of human ideals and the collective might of free-will beings in the heart of a young and impressionable boy living on the other side of this spherical hunk of rock. You know, like in the movie Independence Day when President Whitmore said, “today, we (the people of the world) celebrate our Independence Day”?

That used to be America.

The inspiring speech made by Ronald Reagan, one of the greatest Republicans ever lived, at the Berlin Wall had its 20th anniversary marked just a month ago. As he spoke to the people of West Germany and the rest of Western Europe, he spoke to a generation of people who rose out of the postwar ruins and rebuilt their countries with the aid of the Marshall Plan, the greatest postwar rebuilding master plan ever formulated and a distant reminder of America’s diplomatic success. When Ronald Reagan, addressing the General Secretary of the Soviet Union, said, “Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!”, it resonated in the hearts of millions of Westerners living in freedom and millions more who longed for it.

Where did that America go? The more I hear of Mr. Bush Junior, the more firmly I believe that it must be somewhere really, really far away.

The fall of the Berlin Wall.

Perhaps America has always been the political shithole that it is today and perhaps I was misled into believing tales of the nation’s past greatness by Hollywood’s many WWII offerings. Perhaps it was due to the fact that at a young and naive age of ten, I was reading all the Tom Clancy novels I could get my hands on. But even if the truth does often turn out to be less inspiring than the sanitized accounts of history, I still believe that America was once closer to its founding ideals than it is today.

The United Nation’s Universal Declaration of Human Rights owes a lot of its birth to the American ideals of freedom and equality, ideals that are enshrined in the nation’s consitution. This constitution is the basis of the Union and represents the hopes and aspirations of a nation of people who had just tasted the sweet nectar of freedom. This is also the very same constitution that was dismissed by Mr. Bush as “just a piece of paper” not too long ago. How did it come this far?

A portion of the Bill of Rights.

The cynical side of us can argue that ultimately America’s past acts of benevolence were inspired by its own selfish interests. I believe that is not true. There are always people who lie with a straight face and who manipulate and deceive to further their own interests. But similarly, there too will always be people who truly believe in the greater goods of humanity. America’s decision to finally enter WWII was not one of pure altruistic intentions, but it is simply absurd to compare it to today’s Operation Iraqi Freedom. There might have been individual acts of selfishness, cruelty and moral ambiguity, just as there continues to be in today’s armed conflicts, but WWII, for the Americans, was undeniable a “good war”.

America was never flawless, but its people fought hard to stay true to the ideals of its founding fathers. The civil rights movements of the 20th century came to be only because America’s ideology environment enabled its birth. There continues to be racism and injustice even today, and indeed they may never disappear completely, but a huge part of the American way of life is the struggle itself. Today, in a nation described as secular by its constitution, the President publicly called the war on terrorism a “crusade” and his father, the ex-President, said that “atheists are not citizens or patriots“. To hell (literally?) with the founding fathers and their silly ideas about separation of church and state, eh?

Thomas Jefferson is spinning in his grave now.

But there’s a catch that Mr. Bush and religious fundamentalists should keep in mind: America’s greatness for the past fifty years was largely thanks to the huge advancements it spearheaded in the various fields of science and technology. And here’s some food for thought: according to a recent study in American Scientist, an overwhelming 80% of the leading scientists in American are strict atheist and only 5% holds a traditional view of God in the religious sense. In a nation that is overwhelmingly Christian, this is almost concrete proof that high level enlightenment in science is incompatible, or at least less achievable, with a religious world-view.

Now I profess to be an atheist but I do not take it upon myself to actively persuade people into “converting”. I think people, even Pastafarians and Scientologists, should have the right to believe in what they want to. But it is not unreasonable for me to demand that such beliefs remain personal to those who hold them and be kept out of my life. In today’s America, making such a demand in public is tantamount to career suicide.

The Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster.

Like the African Americans and the homosexuals of the 20th century, American atheists today are discriminated against on a scale unimaginable in most developed European nation. Hell, even the Church of FSM probably gets treated better because apparently in America, belief in any divine supreme being is better than believing in nothing. According to a recent poll, all other factors held equal, more Americans will rather vote for a homosexual or black candidate than an atheist one.

Keep in mind that 80% of American scientists, who are a good representation of the intelligentsia, are atheists and then compare that to the fact that not a single elected politician in America has publicly declared himself/herself to be atheist, we are left with a very unpleasant conclusion: successful American politicians are either liars or idiots. This is clearly not a healthy political environment for the world’s superpower to be in. When will the civil rights movement for the oppressed American atheists come? Will it ever? That is one of the most important questions upon which the future of America’s progress as a nation built on democracy will depend on.

In a recent issue, Captain America died. The superhero who best represented the American spirit is dead. Again the cynical side of us know that Marvel is just trying to make some quick bucks off a character death and he may not even stay dead for long. But still, I find it symbolic and at the very least it manages to stir up some emotions that have been within every one of us who once looked up to America and saw greatness.

Captain America.

But just like how dead superheroes never stay dead, America still has some life left in it. It is not hard to return America back to where it belongs. It took one President to destroy America’s legacy. It will just take another one to restore it. And there is only one candidate who is up for the job.

So if you are American…

PLEASE VOTE FOR

RON PAUL

Thank you. You will be much appreciated by the rest of the world.

Disclaimer: I am just a Singaporean teenager. Ideologically speaking, I am neither Democrat nor Republican. I have nothing to gain (except possibly as a member of humankind) from Ron Paul becoming President.