Dowel Jones

As far as I could tell about the VA payment, the VA expects the veteran to pick up the 25% through his own insurance or out of pocket, and the hospital finance officer was worried that, if the public hospital picked up the 25% of the surgery bill, it would set a precedent that the VA would follow with future veterans' treatment, and start dumping all the cost on the particular hospital. That would be the privatization that she mentioned. What she wanted to do was to force the VA to pay 100% of the claim. That's my story, but I'm not stickin' to it. I'm glad Max is, for the moment, accepting his condition and realizing that he really has to fight it. This 'if I ignore the cancer, it will go away' was really getting old. I am confused about the surgery on the female officer. The nurse said "There's no more blood to pump." You mean 5 liters of blood drained out in around a minute? I've always understood that they would hang blood or plasma for that very reason, to keep the system full. I could understand if some neurological or cardiac condition suddenly caused the muscle contractions to stop, but loss of blood?

So, the next obvious question is, who replaces her as SoS? Did they make mention of an Undersecretary, or is Dalton going to appoint one, or both? I vote for Russell. They can always find another CoS, and I would love to see him jousting with the various ambassadors.

I watched the episode last night, but couldn't think of anything to comment on. It was just that ho-hum. I am puzzled as to why the FBI would have such an interest in what the CIA is doing offshore. And, I guess, why an otherwise hostile regime (Cuba) would allow the one agency that had the most to do with an attempted coup in the past to run a rendition black site on their little island. I did get a laugh out of the FBI agents telling the CIA guy not to follow their plant down the alley, because "they'll spot the tail in a minute." Unlike the big blue SUV parked at one end of the alley watching the plant.

Well, it appears that the gate guard has a few extracurricular activities. Note to TV producers: Can you do away with the trope of red lights and sirens when they are neither useful nor appropriate? What effect will they have pulling in front of an airplane setting up to park? That ending had soap opera written all over it.

And Eve, who knows that she is marked for assassination, just naively stands there and lets a complete stranger reach out and touch her. You would think she would be more wary of strangers.

Poor Harriman. As soon as he started eulogizing RFK, I knew he was dead. I loved Russell - "That's pretty cold blooded, even for me." Jason is the one going to get an education during this campaign. If he thinks he's going to hide behind the family front door while posting his opinions, oh boy is he wrong. His twitter account is going to blow up on him and every commentator from early news to late night is going to take him to task. He's an adult so they won't even grant him that immunity. For that matter, all the kids will have paparazzi following them everywhere now. Conrad was right to reject Elizabeth's request to stay on board. I thought for a moment they were going to continue on that line, but, in retrospect, she would have lost serious credibility by pulling out, and then getting back in at a later date.

Maybe they downloaded the plans from one of those woodworking sites on youtube.

In real life there would be an in depth investigation about the injury and how it occurred, and some chief in the department would notice the handover of incident command.

It's pretty simple, actually. You just spray the entire hive with a 10% solution of handwavium, and the problem is mitigated.

I wondered why she veered into an English accent when she met Julian's mother.

I was going to use his name from The Americans (Gaad?) but I couldn't remember it at the time. Sorry, Richard.

And who is going to read them their rights? The attorneys will all be suspects too. Okay, first off. John-Boy, what kind of logic, save impenetrable, leads you to believe that if you refuse to pay a ransom, the kidnappers will release your son and never attempt another kidnapping? Had you been watching All the Money in the World, or what? And then you go and blame it on the FBI. Well, that last sentence has some justification, though. Apparently the office has the HRT on speed dial, but, instead, they choose to go into a ransom situation with two incompetent agents and no backup. How about following the big giant SUV speeding away from the scene? Shameless plug alert: The woman in the cafe' is reading Just Fly Away, by Andrew McCarthy, who, not by coincidence, was the writer for this episode. Spoiler alert: Anyone who didn't guess that the young 'uns were in on it by halfway through, go to the back of the class. But we still don't really know who the Third Estate is. Of course, Navabi can talk himself into a house full of desperadoes by using the old cable guy routine, sans identification, of course. But he gets sold out by the snippy daughter of Mr. Collector. Shameless plug alert: Mercedes Benz, the vehicle of compensators worldwide. Reddington seems intent on stopping the Big Bad Ana Plan (I should work on a palindrome for that), but he's going through official channels. What happened to the old, bullet in the head Reddington? Brian Dennehey is ready for a comeback?

I think he died from complications of smoke inhalation, since that obligatory scruffle beard didn't seal the SCBA mask properly. You would think that CAPTAIN Sullivan would be qualified to be an incident commander, instead of passing it off to a civilian, even if a retired Captain. That should be noted in his performance review.

The other thing about the barter system at the hospital is, what happens if one of them is injured while performing the work? The artist falls off the scaffold, the electrician gets a shock, etc. Are they covered by the hospital insurance? Are they contractors? Where is the paperwork? Methinks that Dr. Max would find himself in legal deep water in a big hurry.

For that matter, why didn't Shepherd just put a bullet in Tal's abdomen at the house, and bargain for her daughter's safety? Next one goes in your head, big guy, and your network doesn't give a damn about you after you're gone.

I'm pretty sure it was a straight swap. There's no way (okay, Max would find a way) that the board would approve that kind of expense without a bid process. I know what you meant to say (the bolded part), but now I have this image of Max wandering the halls, ringing a large bell and calling out "Bring out your dead" and the poor patient replying "I'm not dead yet".

I had to laugh a bit at Erica's takedown at the Capitol Mall. All those agents standing in a circle with their guns drawn. What happens if they start shooting?

I think the IRS rules require that barterers report the value of the work done as income also, but the enforcement of that would be difficult at best. Interesting production error (I think) occurred at about 40 minutes in, while Max is leaving Dr. Staunton's office. He went in to get his keys, got the lecture, and then started to leave. She tossed him his keys, and he held them in his right hand while looking over his right shoulder at her. As he is leaving, the door shuts behind him. His right hand is visible, his left hand is too far away; who closed the door? It wasn't an automatic door, either.

So, I guess "it was a mistake" really is grounds for acquittal on assault with bodily injury and kidnapping, etc. Sheesh. It doesn't matter that the guy behind the guy was crooked as a snake, what the defendant did was purely wrong. The episode plot did do a good deed though, in pointing out the flaws in the bail enforcement industry. I wonder if there are ever any repercussions in the DA's office when their staff fails to look into the case below the surface.

Which brings me to mind of the scene in Mr. and Mrs. Smith, when Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie meet back at their house after each trying to shoot each other. "Missed you", he says, with a thin smile "Missed you too", she replies.

One word: Ressler. Reddington probably had his plane customized for this very purpose.

There isn't any Janet MacNamera on the Blacklist. I don't know either. Does the name ring a bell? My best guess is that she was somehow part of Reddington's network, or a government employee who knew that he was working with the task force (or both). Since she spoke of being "exiled", I take that to mean some kind of Reddington Protection Program, maybe after the task force building was blown up long ago. Spader sure can bring the evil to Reddington's face when he wants to. Those closeups were scary. Hooray for the little terrier dog that tried to protect his mistress at the beginning. Glad that the guy didn't kill it too. It makes no sense for the daughter to continue on with the "family business". It would be so obvious to any police force (the clowns in the task force notwithstanding) that there is a copycat killer about. Besides, other than anger and revenge, what is the motivation for spending large sums of money to kill off gambling addicts? They had nothing to do with the family's situation. Reddington is going to have to be really, really sneaky to get the jump on Dembe, if he is in fact convinced of Dembe's involvement in his imprisonment. Dembe is no slouch nor dumbass.

It's a scientific fact that the air in a tv coffin will last at least until the 3rd commercial break. After that it depends on the actor's contract.

Right there would have been a good place for Dennis Haysbert do a voiceover.

Thanks, I missed that completely. I just handwaved the cell phone scene at the end, figuring that she's such a ninja savant puzzle master that she just picked it up somewhere.