The West Wing: Compromise And Political Idealism

Debating Ayn Rand in the West Wing: Compromise and Political Idealism In the acclaimed 2000s TV show “The West Wing,” which fictionalizes the daily battles of American politics, senior staff members in the White House scatter from issue to issue, disaster to victory, and most often, from meeting to meeting, where the staff negotiates and renegotiates their political strategy. Trumpeting idealist and liberal American values, “The West Wing,” written by Aaron Sorkin, also underscored the necessity of compromise, with White House Chief of Staff Leo McGarry remarking that “Compromise is statesmanship.” However, it is this trafficking of compromise, and all its murky implications, that is most often criticized in modern American politics. Political