The basic premise of the episode is that Tracy is coaching an inner-city baseball team, and that Jack intervenes with his "superior resources" to make the team winners. Jack responds to Tracy's concern that he doesn't understand the entire situation, saying "You don't have to understand their world in order to help. It's like this great country of ours: we go into a nation, impose our values, and make things better. Bush is doing it all over the world." Okay, so maybe it doesn't count as an allegory if the show comes right out and says it. But wait, it gets better!
1. Jack plans to fix a player's bunting with a biography of Winston Churchill. Clearly, we can use values and figureheads to solve pragmatic, daily problems.
2. After Jack builds a new field for the team, the team celebrates by tearing down the statue of Confederate leader Jefferson Davis. This exactly mirrors the destruction of a statue of Saddam Hussein in Iraq after he was deposed in 2003:
3. "Conditions deteriorate" with the team when Jack fires Tracy as coach and appoints Kenneth. Jack justifies the downturn by saying that the team is "testing our resolve" and that they should "stay the course." Bush has used "stay the course" as his general plan on multiple occasions, and the phrase "testing our resolve" appears five times in this Congressional Record on the War on Terror.
4. When forced to admit that he has made an error, Jack says that because it's hard for him to admit he's made a mistake, he'll have Kenneth do it. So Kenneth explains to Tracy that they "didn't know what they were getting into," that they "just wanted to help, but things got out of control." He says they have two options to make the team into winners:
1. Cut and run, but that would mean betraying the commitment they made to the people.
2. Form a coalition, combing Tracy's know-how with Jack's superior resources.
5. The result of the coalition of Tracy and Jack is what they call "the Surge." Not exactly subtle, but pretty funny all the same. Tracy's two friends/bodyguards/entourage, Griz and DotCom (these huge African American men), are brought in with fake Dominican birth certificates to play on the team of 14 year-olds and make them win.
6. Another great reference and important concept: "Just because I don't support Jack Donaghey does not mean I don't support the kids." I hope I don't have to explain the connection in that one.
