The West Wing (TV Series)

17 People (2001)

Richard Schiff: Toby Ziegler

Quotes 

• Toby Ziegler : No, I don't think you did either, sir. I meant that during a night of extreme chaos and fear, when we didn't yet know if we'd been the victims of domestic or foreign terrorism, or even an act of war, there was uncertainty as to who was giving the national security orders and it was because you never signed a letter. So I'm led to wonder, given your condition and it's lack of predictability, why there isn't simply a signed letter sitting in a file someplace. And the answer, of course, is that if there was a signed letter sitting in a file someplace, somebody would ask why. The Commander-in-Chief had just been attacked, he was under a general anesthetic, a fugitive was at large, the manhunt included every federal, state, and local law enforcement agency. The Virginia, Maryland, New Jersey, Pennsylvania and Delaware National Guard units were federalized. The KH-10s showed Republican Guard movement in southern Iraq. And twelve hours earlier, an F-117 was shot down in the no-fly, and the Vice President's authority was murky, at best! The National Security Advisor and the Secretary of State didn't know who they were taking their orders from! I wasn't in the Situation Room that night, but I'll bet all the money in my pockets against all the money in your pockets, that it was Leo, WHO NO ONE ELECTED. For ninety minutes that night there was a coup d'etat in this country.

  President Josiah 'Jed' Bartlet : And the walls came tumbling down.

• Toby Ziegler : It's never happened before, right?

  Leo McGarry : No.

  Toby Ziegler : The Vice President would never challenge a sitting President for the nomination.

  Leo McGarry : 'Course not.

  Toby Ziegler : You see his itinerary for the weekend?

  Leo McGarry : Who?

  Toby Ziegler : The Vice President.

  Leo McGarry : I don't keep tabs on John.

  Toby Ziegler : He's giving a speech at a semiconductor plant. The title of the speech is, "Clean Air Industry in the High-tech Corridor of the Industrial Northeast."

  Leo McGarry : Where?

  Toby Ziegler : Nashua... New Hampshire.

  Leo McGarry : Toby, nobody, and particularly not Hoynes would be naive enough... what I mean to say is if he's going to New Hampshire for the reason you're thinking he would mask it with something. It wouldn't be an official trip. He'd make up a benign excuse to be up there.

  Toby Ziegler : I know.

  Leo McGarry : So why worry?

  Toby Ziegler : Because it comes in the middle of a three-day camping trip to Killington.

  [pause] 

  Toby Ziegler : Why does Hoynes think the President isn't going to run again? What's going on, Leo?

• Toby Ziegler : I have no kind of investigative mind. Zero. It took me six days and 23 minutes to figure it out.

• Toby Ziegler : Leo, Hoynes left bread crumbs! He wanted me to find out!