In which DCist and the City Paper discuss Veep, HBO’s new comedy about the vice presidency.

Jon: Yeah, score one—finally!—for Team Selina. But while Vice President Meyer is surely entitled to a policymaking victory here or there, I’m not sure I like her as the victor.

While much of Veep to date has given details of how Meyer views her fellow politicians—not favorably in the least—an early scene last night provided her fullest assessment so far of the voters who made her vice president. When discussing the inevitable media reverberations of a potential Hurricane Selina, Amy briefly makes the error of thinking the American people will not make the connection.

Timothy C. Simons as Jonah, the White House aide with the “rapist face.” (Bill Gray/HBO)

Selina’s reply is as blatant as anything she’s ever said about the electorate: “Really, Amy? I’ve met some people. Real people. And I gotta tell you, a lot of them are fucking idiots.” That’s a far cry from last week’s “normalizing” at the yogurt shop. Shaking all those hands and kissing all those babies on the trail of her failed primary run took Selina to some very dark places.

Jon, to answer your question about the wielding of power, I’m not sure this episode did anything to burnish Selina’s reputation as a major player. Her lone tactical move last night was to use the weight of her office to lean on the National Weather Service to change the name of a hurricane. That’s not powerbrokering, that’s diva behavior of the highest order. Same goes for Selina’s first-lady-blocked attempt to get a dog, even if she’s trying to avoid a “diva dog.”

Which I guess was the punch line last night. The scene in which Selina and her daughter, Catherine, talk it out in a room full of poster-sized magazine covers bearing vice-presidential head shots was meant to be that obvious. But it perfectly punctuated the episode’s—and perhaps the whole show’s—theme that the issue most important to Selina Meyer is her own public profile. (And there’s an amazing shot in which Julia Louis-Dreyfus cocks her head exactly as it is positioned on the Newsweek cover right behind her.)

I wonder if those kinds of anniversary parties are a real thing. I’d bet somewhere in his research Armando Iannucci stumbled across some senator getting all hoity-toity after so many years in elected federal service. Still, what an affair to throw for oneself. I’ve been in Washington for just over three years. Can I throw a bash for myself if I’m still here in 2014? Or do I have to be elected to Congress first? I’d go to Senator Doyle’s anniversary party. That guy, with his threats of using eye sockets as sex toys and previous suggestions that filibuster reform would be akin to “asking a guy to fist himself,” is my fast becoming my favorite senator, real or fictional.

It was Dan who leveraged the real power last night. I don’t think there’s any doubt he’s a weasel of the highest degree. This is the guy who dumped a senator’s daughter via text after receiving a job offer from the vice president’s office. When Selina said in the pilot that she “needs a shit,” this is exactly what she meant: A guy who doesn’t pause before spinning his lies or even pretend to feign interest in his new boss’ only child. Has he read anything by Faulkner? I’m sure he hasn’t.

Dan’s solution of the Catch-44 was Machiavellian, but I still don’t know if I’d affix that label to him overall. He’s still prone to plenty of fuck-ups, such as last week’s yogurt outing, and I’m sure there will be other missteps in future installments.

And I wish “Garyoke”—agreed, it is one of the best gags Veep has done so far—had gone on longer.

Jon, there’s no question Jonah totally has a “rapist face.” But here’s my question for you: Last night on Game of Thrones, as you mentioned, Joffrey Baratheon was on the receiving end of a flying cow-pie during a riot in King’s Landing. A week ago, we saw Selina Meyer soil herself while exiting the yogurt shop. In two consecutive weeks, we’ve seen main characters on HBO series wind up covered in shit. So, I wonder, will Girls complete a fecal-matter trifecta this coming Sunday? And if so, to whom will it happen and what uptempo pop song will be playing in the background?