The Next President Will Be...

For West Wing lovers, aka The Fabulous Kelly P., the next President will be decided not by us, the loyal viewers, but by the writers of the show. The writers wish to figure out who is the most compelling character and make either Alan Alda or Jimmy Smits the next Pres. I guess Gary Cole as the current VEEP isn't in the running at all.

Series producer John "I'm driving a tank through the Chicago E.R." Wells insists real life politics won't influence the outcome of the Presidential election next season.

Indeed, neither Smits' nor Alda's character is a party ideologue. Both depict candidates who are politically moderate and disarmingly likable -- far more nuanced than the Republican challenger played by James Brolin [Ed. Previous producer and series creator Aaron Sorkin really created a numbnut character for the Republicans that year. He was quite P.O.ed about the Gore loss to Bush and admitted he was running a fictional campaign that should have been what the Democrats run in real life. Ah yes, Aaron Sorkin Zen-master political strategist!], who was defeated by Bartlet's re-election in the show's fourth season.

Wells admits that it isn't preordained for Smits to win. That means Toby, Josh, C.J., et al may be booted at the end of next season!

Wells dismissed what he called misconception about the show -- that its audience is overwhelmingly Democratic and agrees with Bartlet's politics. "That's actually not true, and I can prove it by our mail bag ever week," he said. "We have a very, very large Republican audience that loves to watch the show and throw things at the screen."

Hey! I have NEVER thrown anything at the screen.