Designated Survivor

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didymus

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New series on ABC, you can watch the pilot on their website.

Long story short during the State of the Union or other joint meetings of Congress one Cabinet officer, usually low ranking, is chosen be absent in case something happens. In the show the Capitol is bombed, killing the whole Congress, Supreme Court, Joint Chiefs &c, leaving the Secretary of HUD, Donald Sutherland president.

Actually it’s pretty stupid to have the whole government in the same room, especially in post-9/11. We should go to having the President deliver the State of the Union from the Oval Office. For most of US history the speech was delivered in writing to the Speaker of the House.

Anybody else see it? Thoughts?
 
Saw the show and liked it (but then again, I’m a history geek).

You make a very good point about having all the governmental leaders in one place at the same time. In fact, during the show, I remember thinking to myself, “I wonder if this show is giving any terrorists out there any ideas?”

Somewhere along the line, the State of the Union message went from a written report to a full-on political event. I like the idea of delivering it from the Oval Office…it would be much quicker since all the forced applause provided by the President’s party to every fourth word would be absent.
 
I saw the first half hour before I dozed off (not the show’s fault 😃 ) I enjoyed what I did see. I’ve given up caring if the premise of a show is feasible or not, Hollywood doesn’t seem to care.
 
I DVRed it and watched it with the Spousal Unit. I thought that the pilot was interesting; it sort of takes off from the end of Clancy’s Debt of Honor, with hints that the subsequent series will look sort of like Clancy’s Executive Orders. There was one major discrepancy that they’re going to have to resolve – the whole Capital was destroyed, and everyone killed, but the only piece of unexploded ordnance that they found was an anti-personnel mine, not nearly enough to do that kind of damage, even if they used a bunch of them. We’ll see . . .
 
DaveBj said:
I DVRed it and watched it with the Spousal Unit. I thought that the pilot was interesting; it sort of takes off from the end of Clancy’s Debt of Honor, with hints that the subsequent series will look sort of like Clancy’s Executive Orders. There was one major discrepancy that they’re going to have to resolve – the whole Capital was destroyed, and everyone killed, but the only piece of unexploded ordnance that they found was an anti-personnel mine, not nearly enough to do that kind of damage, even if they used a bunch of them. We’ll see . . .
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I was thinking that it kind of took after Debt of Honor. The next book, Executive Orders shows some of the practical problems. Reconstituting the Senate is fairly straightforward; in each State governors nominate and legislators approve two new senators so that could be done in probably a month. A new House would require elections and take much longer. Then the biggy, the new President gets to choose nine (9) Supreme Court justices.

One thing I didn’t like was the general who looks like he’s ready to pull a coup. Not only don’t I believe an American general would try it but mostly because the character is so cartoonish.
 
didymus said:
I was thinking that it kind of took after Debt of Honor. The next book, Executive Orders shows some of the practical problems. Reconstituting the Senate is fairly straightforward; in each State governors nominate and legislators approve two new senators so that could be done in probably a month. A new House would require elections and take much longer. Then the biggy, the new President gets to choose nine (9) Supreme Court justices.

One thing I didn’t like was the general who looks like he’s ready to pull a coup. Not only don’t I believe an American general would try it but mostly because the character is so cartoonish.
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Agreed. I told the Spousal Unit at the time that this particular character was rather two-dimensional.
 
Glennon_P said:
Saw the show and liked it (but then again, I’m a history geek).
**
You make a very good point about having all the governmental leaders in one place at the same time. In fact, during the show, I remember thinking to myself, “I wonder if this show is giving any terrorists out there any ideas?”**

Somewhere along the line, the State of the Union message went from a written report to a full-on political event. I like the idea of delivering it from the Oval Office…it would be much quicker since all the forced applause provided by the President’s party to every fourth word would be absent.
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Tom Clancy had this exact same scenario in one of his novels back in 1994 with his well known protagonist Jack Ryan just having been sworn in as VP and about to be introduced to a joint session of Congress when a Japanese Terrorist flies a 747 into the Capitol building. The attack results in the President, Cabinet, almost all of Congress, and the Supreme Court being killed and Ryan left to pick up the pieces.

It was also eerily similar to what happened a few years later on September 11th just down the street at the Pentagon.
 
Padres1969 said:
Tom Clancy had this exact same scenario in one of his novels back in 1994 with his well known protagonist Jack Ryan just having been sworn in as VP and about to be introduced to a joint session of Congress when a Japanese Terrorist flies a 747 into the Capitol building. The attack results in the President, Cabinet, almost all of Congress, and the Supreme Court being killed and Ryan left to pick up the pieces.

It was also eerily similar to what happened a few years later on September 11th just down the street at the Pentagon.
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Japanese terrorist?
 
I watch the show. I very much like it. Was a huge fan of Sutherland’s 24 tv series.

I doubt it but would be cool if they could put some cast members from 24 in a episode.
 
777rak said:
I watch the show. I very much like it. Was a huge fan of Sutherland’s 24 tv series.

I doubt it but would be cool if they could put some cast members from 24 in a episode.
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I keep waiting fr Sutherland (or the writers) to bring in some of Jack Bauer’s moxie.
 
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