Academic

The first elected woman President on TV is a Republican?

By Tung Yin

Over winter break, I watched the extended version of "24: Redemption," and of course, the 4 hour premiere of season 7 earlier this week.

The most striking thing for me is that the new President of the country, Allison Taylor, is apparently a Republican!  (I put "first elected" in the blog title because Geena Davis played the President in "Commander-in-Chief" a few years ago, but I believe her character ascended to office from the Vice Presidency.)

How do we know this about President Taylor?  Well, she defeated her predecessor, President Noah Daniels.  Played expertly by Powers Boothe in season 6 and in "Redemption," Daniels is reptilian, loathsome, and disloyal -- all of which would ordinarily be Hollywood-speak for being Republican! Moreover, Taylor is thoughtful, compassionate, and decent -- Hollywood-speak for being Democratic.

Yet, Daniels was previously Vice President to Wayne Palmer's President.  And Wayne Palmer was the younger brother of David Palmer, President in seasons 2 and 3.  And from season 1, we know that David Palmer was a Democrat, because at the end of the season, he wins the Democratic nomination for the Presidency.  Of course, mere family relationship is not enough to impute equivalent political party, but from season 3, we know that Wayne was David's chief of staff.  So if David is a Democrat, so is Wayne, and so too is Daniels.  (Yes, I suppose Wayne could have been truly bipartisan, but that seems rather unlikely.)  And Taylor beat Daniels, so she must be a Republican.

Of course, one might chalk this all up to the fact that the co-creator of "24," Joel Surnow, is a self-described right wing nut, but Surnow left somewhere during season 6, so this doesn't appear to be his doing.

Anyway, on other fronts of "24," it's nice to see that the FBI is just as (in)competent as the old CTU was; it too is incapable of setting a "hard perimeter" that can't be breached by simply driving away.  What, when CTU was disbanded, did the FBI swoop in and hire all those perimeter-setting CTU agents?!?

Also, here's an interesting Iowa connection: the Chief of Staff on the show, Ethan Kanin, is named after a University of Iowa professor, Ethan Canin.

Full post as published by The Yin Blog on January 15, 2009 (boomark / email).