24: Déjà Vote

Once again, I have to ask: what the hell happened in Denver? They don't mention it specifically, but now everything that Doyle does makes me wonder about it. Because if I know, his actions might make some sort of sense. He discovers that Milo is the reason for the security breach (I knew it! I told you his facial hair was untrustworthy!) and covers Milo's ass anyway, and then gets into a religious debate with Nadia where he claims that he's "looking for answers." I was kidding before, but now I think maybe they really did kill someone and cover it up. Doyle is not the kind of guy to get into an existential crisis lightly.

Like that other conspiracy to take down a President Palmer back in season two, VP Daniels is arguing not that Wayne is physically incapacitated, but that he's just plain incompetent. Come on! If the Cabinet could really remove a president for making bad decisions, then the president would feel compelled to surround himself with loyal "Waynies," if you will. But Wayne's team of rivals is more than willing to put Wayne's competence to a vote, and the result is less like the first time the 25th Amendment was invoked on this show, and more like the 2000 election. The vote ends up deadlocked, one of the votes (Karen, playing the part of Florida) is disputed, and they have to go to the Supreme Court to settle it. Unlike the 2000 election (as far as we know, that is), the Veep's concession is forced by Tom, who finds out about the perjury he was planning and threatens to expose him. The irony is that it didn't really matter anyway, since Wayne decides to go ahead with the strike on the unnamed, innocent Middle Eastern country. Now the Cabinet knows how regular voters feel: no matter who you vote for, you're still screwed.

And what about the ostensible point of this season, the terrorist plot? Well, you know what they say – if you get a tracking device in the arm in the fourth act, the arm goes off, uh, later in the fourth act. Yes, Gredenko cuts off his own arm to escape, but then he ends up a) giving Fayed away in a bar, and b) collapsing from blood loss and possibly dying, so that really wasn't a well thought-out plan. Of course, no plan that ends with you cutting off your own arm is really a good one, unless you're that guy who got his arm caught and had to cut it off to survive. Gredenko is not that guy.