Tuesday, March 28, 2000

Promises - 104

[A weakly written, mostly unbelievable episode; but which "set up" the base for future "back-story" episodes.] Renee's recruitment video was unveiled- (not containing any shot of the Washington monument at "magic hour", and mostly voice over shots of sub's, jets, and "exciting stuff.") Chegwidden (C) noticed for Harm (H) that Renee, Leatham (L) and Mac (M) were talking in a group and the only thing they had in common was HIM. Seaman Andrea Granato walked off the USS Hartung after continually being given grunt work by an apparently sexist chief. Then her equally sexist female CO charged her with desertion for missing ships deployment. H was assigned defense and M prosecution. Singer (S) volunteered to help H but C denied and instead gave her the prosecution of a "joyriding" PO. Cdr Woodling told M that Granato was a "whiner." M asked directly if "it was personal" and she launched into rhetoric about how hard females were discriminated against in the military and said M "had better understand that if you were going to prosecute the case." H spoke with Granato who said that her recruiter had lied to her about air traffic controller positions being available. She told H that if he couldn't get his head around that, then he shouldn't be her lawyer. She had seen his recruiting commercial and called him "just a recruiter." Recruiter Roger Pearson denied he had promised her anything but let slip that his quota of 1.5/month was doable where the former requirement of 4/month was not. H asked S to do some checking and see if there were others that Pearson had lied to. She turned around and dumped the job on Gunny (G) and when he found someone, she then ran and gave it to H taking all the credit in full sight of G. L came to M to interject herself into the women's issue wanting Granato to testify to her "retention subcommittee." Granato's mother told H that the recruiter "filled her head with exciting stuff" and didn't know she was unhappy until she got home. M found that Granato had gone directly to boyfriend Peter Skowron's house and on the stand Skowron claimed Granato wanted to get back together with him. H shot down his ego trip to that he only had a casual relationship with her.

The chief Rowe complained how angry he was that Granato quit cause everyone else were working like plow horses. H had him admit that he was singling her out for drudge work. Woodling claimed that Granato's absence made life harder for everyone else. H showed that her absence hadn't hurt the ships readiness and that Woodling had basically "let off" 3 men for U/A under her command but charged the one female with desertion; basically to prove that she was a tough commander. When H told M that Woodling was doing exactly what I said she did "and you know it," M called Renee as a witness (????) M claimed she was a "recruiting expert" and Renee said she was chosen for "my edge, my honesty, my independence. The Navy wanted to present a fair picture of itself." It was easy for H to box her into admitting the picture she portrayed wasn't anywhere near the image that she, herself, had of the Navy." She went from the courtroom in tears portraying the martyr. Pearson was shown to have had another male recruit who was given an honorable discharge eight months after signing when the navy failed to honor a contract that Pearson had made. He admitted he didn't lie but didn't point out any of the "bad things that could happen." H told the jury that the charges "far outweigh" the transgression and they found her not guilty on everything except being UA. H told Granato that she would probably get a dishonorable discharge.

C was asked by his friend, Peter Tulley, to help him with his FNAEB for taxiing his jet off the end of the ramp having taken Viagra 21 hours prior. It supposedly hinders ability to distinguish green and blue (taxiway lights) but civilian requirements are only 6 hours. C went to see urologist Sydney Walden "about his friend" and she assumed he was lying. He told her "I am the JAG for the US NAVY and as such I think I possess enough respect for the truth to be forthcoming if I had a problem, which I don't." He commented on noticing the photo of her son Danny, who played lacrosse for Maryland. She wanted to test Tulley to see if the drug really effects him; but, he refused because the alternative meant that he was a bad pilot. C just stood up for him at the hearing and said that Tulley's career didn't deserve to end on such a note. Tully was returned to duty and suggested C come to dinner and "bring a date." Harriet flit through the episode angry and annoying everyone until she admitted that she was again pregnant. C was shown calling Walden for a date.