Episode Report Card M. Giant: B- | Grade It Now! YOU GRADE IT Swap Meet
By M. Giant | Season 6 | Episode 19 | Aired on 04.22.2007
At the White House, Karen and Tom are pedeconferencing through the White House hallways, all buddy-buddy about how they'll coordinate the multi-agency search for Kiefer. For a moment, it's almost like watching an old West Wing, only boringer. Karen's cell phone rings. She's surprised to hear what the person in the phone is telling her, and when she's done talking, she tells Tom that someone named Peter Hock from the Justice Department is waiting to talk to her in her office. Tom clunkily warns Karen that Hock's "got a lot of clout on the Hill." And then they split up so that Karen can go to her office and get clouted.
Once Karen arrives, Hock -- a middle-aged, goateed man we've never met before -- gets up from the chair where he's been waiting, and informs her that he's been interrogating Chad Lowe. All night? When do these fucking people sleep? The more I watch these scenes, the more I wonder how the 24 version of the United States is able to survive when it's being run by people who are so sleep-deprived they must be on the verge of a psychotic episode at all times. Karen isn't too surprised to hear that Chad Lowe is probably going to be up for the death penalty for his part in blowing up Wayne. As you'll recall, Chad Lowe's "part" was planting the bomb and detonating it, which, let's face it, is a pretty big "part." As a result, Chad Lowe has been spilling everything he knows to try to make a deal. Like what, Hilary Swank's grade-school nicknames? The chemical formula for sucrose? The lyrics to the closing theme from WKRP In Cincinnati? Well, no. As Hock says, Chad Lowe actually knows something that has to do with Karen and Buchanan. He opens up his laptop on her desk and cues up some video of Chad Lowe's interrogation. He plays her a bit where Chad Lowe offered some "key information that will help keep the blame [for the terror attacks] away from this administration." The administration he blew up that day, mind you. "He's such a weasel," Karen opines to Hock. Hock fast-forwards to the good bit, which is where Chad Lowe spilled the info that Tom used to blackmail Karen into resigning twelve hours ago. Specifically, Chad Lowe told Hock that Buchanan had Fayed in custody and let him go two years ago, and then Karen put it in a "blue file" at Homeland Security. He calls it a "cover-up." Hock stops the video and asks Karen if it's true. Karen says it all is, except for the cover-up part. Yes, Fayed was nabbed as part of a border sweep, but there wasn't enough evidence at the time to hold him. He wasn't anybody yet. And then the file got blue-coded, whatever that is, as part of standard operating procedure. Hock asks her, if that's the case, why she resigned over something that was nobody's fault. Karen reminds him that they were under attack, and that she needed to protect Wayne and Buchanan so that they could do their jobs. Hock says that now it's twelve hours later, Wayne's in a coma, 13,000 people are dead, "and all people are going to be asking is, 'Who let this happen?'" Ooh, I know! Scott's dad. Remember him? No? Never mind. Karen says no one's going to be blaming Buchanan, that's for sure. Hock lays it out for her: somebody's going to go down, and he wants it to be someone as far away from Wayne as possible: "It's going to be either you or Bill. Bill would be my preference. He's lower on the food chain. But you'll do." Hock and Karen glare at each other until the clock ticks past 12:23:53. I'm sorry, I thought Hock was from the Justice Department, not the Finding Political Scapegoats Department. By the way, that would be one Cabinet member you could never get rid of.