#cj as cos and press secretary would argue like hell sometimes

[siriusly-sapphic]

I need need need need need to talk about the way that Press Secretary!CJ Cregg would get into so many shouting matches with Chief of Staff!CJ Cregg if they had to work together because I love that about her character so much. It's... she's so idealistic when she's Press Secretary. She can't fathom a father being ashamed of his son for being gay even after the son is dead, even though she damn well knows how realistic that is. She yells at Leo and at Toby and then at Nancy until she's crying in Women of Qumar. She removes half the seats in the press room to make a damn point when the media companies don't do what she'd like them to and Leo just has to deal with that.

As Chief of Staff, she and Leo share that quality of being able to put what the job is an needs of them above what their own agendas and moral compasses might tell them. Press Secretary!CJ would've run into very similar problems dealing with CJ as Chief of Staff that she did with Leo as Chief of Staff. Press Secretary!CJ would not have argued so strongly in favor of "the President should just sign the ban on gay marriage to pass the budget, we're running a White House here" and, while Chief of Staff!CJ would never have done so, Press Secretary!CJ would've come dangerously close to leaking the shuttle story before Toby got a chance to, she might've done it even. She certainly would've raised hell at Chief of Staff!CJ for refusing to do anything about it herself.

And I just love how that's possible within the same character. Cause she doesn't really change. Her ideals and her opinions don't change. She vehemently states that she thinks Bartlet is in the wrong when it comes to the shuttle thing, for example. But she's in a different position! She has a different job, and it's no longer to advice the Chief of Staff and champion her own causes to a degree of possibility, it's no longer being just one part of the bigger administration. Her job has become running the entire West Wing, in the midst of half her senior staff leaving and her President needing to be put to bed on time. Her job has become preserving the President's legacy and running his White House, and making sure that works out even when that includes doing things she personally would not agree with. And I absolutely love how both that idealism and that intense sense of duty and do what you have to do can be so important to the character.