Bartlet vs. Bureaucracy: The Impossible Decertification
Plot Beats
The narrative micro-steps within this event
Bartlet questions Colombia's credibility and intentions, expressing frustration over their lack of cooperation.
Bartlet vents his frustration, demanding the plane land, while Will humorously checks if his outburst worked.
Who Was There
Characters present in this moment
Righteous indignation tipping into helplessness — anger at institutional absurdity masking a deeper sense of impotence.
President Bartlet challenges the policy logic, presses Will for a way to use U.S. leverage, then erupts in frustrated disbelief when told the rule makes recertification automatic; his frustration culminates in a raw, personal plea for the plane to land.
- • Preserve U.S. credibility by withholding recertification as leverage.
- • Find a practical way to stop the automatic recertification before the deadline.
- • Assert moral authority and refuse to be thwarted by procedure.
- • The President should be able to use policy to punish wrongdoing and uphold moral standards.
- • Bureaucratic procedures should not override moral or political necessity.
- • Physical constraints (like time/deadlines) can still be changed if leadership exerts will.
Not depicted in scene; invoked as a political variable rather than a person with emotional interiority.
Garcia Larco is referenced by Will as the opposition candidate who accepted cartel cash — his existence and electoral threat are used to argue against weakening Colombia's current president; he is not physically present.
- • (Implied) Gain political power if the incumbent is weakened.
- • Exploit U.S. action to argue against current leadership and win an election.
- • (Implied) Campaign financing can shape electoral success.
- • U.S. interventions can shift domestic political outcomes in Colombia.
Objects Involved
Significant items in this scene
The signed Colombia recertification paper is the concrete procedural trigger: Will cites the physical requirement that a signed sheet be delivered by midnight. The paper embodies the bureaucratic mechanism that will automatically recertify Colombia unless the correct delivery interrupts the process.
Economic and trade sanctions are invoked as the direct consequence of decertifying Colombia; they function as the deterrent cost Will warns about and as the political calculus that complicates Bartlet's moral impulse to withhold recertification.
Location Details
Places and their significance in this event
The Senior Staff cabin on Air Force One is the cramped, humming setting where privileged information and blunt truths are exchanged. Its claustrophobic, airborne intimacy turns policy debate into a private crisis; the physical aircraft amplifies urgency (deadlines, landing, timing).
The Summit of the Americas is invoked as recent diplomatic context where Colombia promised crop diversification; it functions as a background frame that raises the moral expectation the President cites when demanding accountability.
Organizations Involved
Institutional presence and influence
The Colombian Government is the subject of the recertification decision: its failure to control narcotics and the electoral risk posed by Garcia Larco drive the debate. It figures as the geopolitical actor whose certification status triggers U.S. policy instruments.
The State Department is the institutional voice behind the warning that decertification would damage U.S. credibility and has counseled caution; its posture frames Will's presentation and constrains the President's options through bureaucratic advice.
Narrative Connections
How this event relates to others in the story
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Key Dialogue
"WILL: "Well... actually, you can't.""
"BARTLET: "I want this plane to land!""
"WILL: "Did it work?""