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Writer's pictureScott Robinson

Six Degrees of Abbey Bartlet



So Jed met Mrs. Landingham in prep school, where his dad was the headmaster and she was dad’s secretary. That makes them the oldest connection in The West Wing, predating even his meeting Abbey at Notre Dame.


Jed then met Leo at some point in the next decade, but their friendship began in earnest around 20 years later. Leo was also good friends with Noah Lyman, father of Josh. So Leo knew Josh. 

 

Somewhere in between, Abbey Bartlet babysat for a young Amy Gardner. Where she found time to do that, already having at least one daughter of her own and becoming a surgeon, is anybody’s guess. 

 

Josh pulled in Sam, and they clearly had been good friends for years – though Josh went to Harvard and Yale, while Sam went to Duke and Princeton. Maybe they met at Dungeons & Dragons camp. 

 

Charlie showed up to be a White House messenger (he had his own bike); and Donna just walked in off the street.  

 

Leo brought in Toby, and Toby had worked with CJ and convinced Leo she should come on board. 

 

But here’s where it gets squirrelly...  


Abbey knew Amy from having babysat her; but she (Amy) was also “having quite a bit of sex with Chris”, Josh’s roommate at either Harvard or Yale. Put another way, Amy was babysat by the wife of the best-friend-to-be of the close friend of Josh’s dad. 

 

Or, put another way, Amy was babysat by the wife of the best friend of the old friend of the father of the roommate of her future lover Chris. 

 

That’s pushing plausibility waaaayyy too far, can’t we say? 

 

But even if we grant this against-the-odds coincidence, we still have some unanswered questions: how did Leo know Toby, so well that he wanted him on the campaign over and above Jed’s homeboys and in spite of his love of bourbon? And, if we’re parsing coincidences – what are the odds that Leo’s top-priority political operative's choice for press secretary had been doinked by the Senate boss of the son of Leo’s old friend?  


Or, put another way, John Hoynes doinked the press secretary selected by the political operative hired by the best friend of the husband of the woman who babysat the lover of the college roommate of Hoynes’ staffer Josh.  


Let’s get to the bottom of that... 

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