Standards of Conduct

Standards of Conduct, January 20, 2003

A whistleblower, a lawsuit, the baby deal and five pregnant women make for this funny episode of JAG entitled Standard of Conduct.

We as people are all held to a Standard of Conduct. In this episode, Harm learns that the standard of conduct for Raymond Harrick are different than his standards of conduct while Mac learns that some Marine officers don't always go by the Marine's Standard of Conduct.

To start out the show, Harm and Sturgis are awarded the bronze and silver star for their heroic efforts in Afghanistan. I thought they would give Mac something because she was involved in it as well, but they didn't.

Harm was almost too late for the awards ceremony because he was involved in an auto accident. Poor thing! He just can't keep his car safe. Something always happens to it. In this case, he rear-ended an elderly woman while in traffic. Because his auto insurance expired, Elenore Motley took Harm for $35,000. Harm went to Sturgis for legal help, but when he couldn't help Bud came to the rescue. It turns out that her lawyer Raymond Harrick (ex-Cpt. Merrill Stubing, The Love Boat) is an ambulance chaser that has the insurance companies forget about sending out insurance renewal reminders and then Mrs. Motley comes along and sues the driver when they cause an accident. Pretty good scheme. It had Harm scared up until the last ten minutes of the show.

Meanwhile, the Admiral has Mac work on the case of Navy whistleblower named Lieutenant Jeremy Duncan. Mac handles his leave from the Navy with discretion as the Admiral asked and then she finds out that Jeremy stole from a company called Psycoustics, Inc, damaged the high resolution helmet in a Navy simulation game and then left the Navy to go back to work where he makes ten times what he made in the Navy.

When Mac finds out she was double-crossed, she gets angry. We all know how Mac gets when she's angry so the Admiral partners her with Harm so he can keep her in line. I think the Admiral thought she was going to kill Duncan if she got a hold of him. From that scene in the bull pen with the three of them I thought the same thing and I think that's why the Admiral sent Harm with her. I love the comment Harm made to her before she walked back into her office and slammed the door. Poor thing! He can't win here either. To help Mac out, Harm finds that Duncan has time left to do in the Marines and can't just leave the Marines as he did. With time he has left to serve in the Marines and with his leave not effective yet, Duncan can be court-martialed. He is and he spends one year in prison and gets booted out of the Marines.

To make matters worse, Harm sees the birthday present Mac got little AJ for his birthday in May. Mac makes the comment that it is his fifth birthday. This sends Harm thinking about the baby deal (see 'Yeah, Baby' for the full conversation) and after that he sees Mac pregnant everytime he looks at her. Boy, is she pregnant! However, he's not only seeing her pregnant. Harm also sees Singer, Coates, Harriet and Renee pregnant as well (in real life only Singer, Renee and Mac are pregnant ). Harriet is pregnant on the show and Coates isn't pregnant at all.

Harm is going completely nuts. This baby deal is making him really, really nervous. He even makes comments to Mac about her biological clock and kids to see what she thinks. Only at the end, did Harm inform Mac that it was AJ's fourth birthday and not fifth. I thought that it was his fourth birthday because they mentioned at the beginning of the season that he was three. Mac tells him she made a simple error and the relaxed look on his face is evident when she tells him that she's fine with the deal staying at five years.

Best Quotes of the Show:

"I'm going to give you this medal before I decide to take the thing away."~Admiral (to Harm after he shows up late)

"Anyone hurt?"~Sturgis
"Just my bank account."~Harm

"You're being sued over the auto accident?!?"~Sturgis
"Yeah and so far I've got a fool for a client."~Harm
(Sturgis laughs)
"You're representing yourself?"~Sturgis

"You little rat. You low life scum."~Mac (talking to herself about Duncan)

"Something tells me Lieutenant Duncan's going to be sorry he messed with this Marine."~Harm
(Mac gives a disgusted sigh and slams her office door closed while Harm stares at the door)

"Maybe it's just a clock I hear ticking."~Harm (inferring about Mac's biological clock)

"I'm going to get Psycoustics to sue him."~Mac
(Harm shudders)
"Don't mention that word around me."~Harm

"Why the sudden worry. It's over a year away."~Mac (about the baby deal)
"I just thought that since Singer's pregnant and Harriet's pregnant."~Harm
"You thought I would want to join the club? You're funny."~Mac
(Harm grins)

By Kasey

May all beware: Mess not with Mac…or with anyone who has Bud to represent them.

I loved Mac as the pitbull determined to ensure that Jeremy Duncan was punished for stealing software and using it to make a profit - it's a little scary to think of Harm as the level-headed one, given not only his past actions (like firing off automatic weapons into courtroom ceilings) but the fact that he was hallucinating quite a bit throughout the episode.

Yes, once again Harm's hallucinations return - though this time without even the aid of hitting his head. Turns out all he needed this time was Mac misspeaking. He went to her office and saw a toy computer. Upon inquiring about it, Mac responded that it was for little AJ's fifth birthday. Flashback to footage of The Deal. From there on, he kept picturing Mac hugely pregnant, and even had a nightmare of walking into the office and every female there being pregnant - Singer (who was holding a cigarette), Coates, Harriet, Renee, and Mac.

I have to admit, I had been a little skeptical about the idea of Renee returning and pregnant…I think the way they did it, just in a dream sequence, was a good idea - otherwise it would've been a little over the top. Why would Renee just come by to see him or something? This way was amusing and not overly unrealistic - anything's possible in dream sequences.

Poor Harm, though - once again, his precious 'Vette was a victim of TPTB. This time, though, instead of it being stolen (or him thinking it was stolen), he accidentally rear-ended a little old lady on his way to JAG Ops for his award ceremony - he was getting the Silver Star for his actions in "Enemy Below", with Sturgis getting the Bronze Star. He handed the old lady his insurance and ownership information after inquiring if she was okay, and was getting ready to write down the rest of his info when she examined the card and said "Oh dear - this appears to have expired." He never got his insurance renewal notice, so it had lapsed. The next thing he knows, he's getting a call from the old lady's lawyer - he's being sued! He asked Sturgis for help, but Sturgis was swamped and doesn't know anything about civil litigation. Sturgis, though, mentioned to Bud that Harm might have a case he needed handled. So Bud began representing Harm.

The old lady's lawyer, Raymond Herrick, was a real piece of work. Turned out he was an ambulance chaser - he arranged for insurance notices not to get sent out, then set up minor accidents to get the settlement money. I felt sort of bad for the old lady, Eleanor Motley, though - she was 61, a widow, and on a fixed income, so she tried to supplement that using the settlements. I got the feeling she had been sort of coerced into it by Herrick, but that could just be my imagination. Bud managed to ambush the two of them - I loved his line about "Oh, I'm not here to intimidate Mrs. Motley - I'm here to intimidate you." Even more proof that God did not take his brain when He took Bud's leg.

Then there was Mac's guy - Jeremy Duncan. Originally a simple Article 88 violation (contemptuous words against the SECDEF about a new VR Battle system the Marine Corps was using), it turned into a case of theft, lies, and private enterprise. Duncan resigned his commission as a plea bargain for his Article 88, then went into a private video game company, taking the technology for the system with him. The contract between Psycoustics, the manufacturer, and the Corps had been canceled due to the malfunctions reported, only it turned out that Duncan had hacked into the system to cause the malfunctions. When Mac found out she'd been lied to, she about went ballistic, wanting to make sure he paid for what he had done.

And pay he did! Turns out he'd been in such a hurry to leave the service that he didn't have his outbriefing, and he had accumulated leave, so he was still owed paychecks…meaning he was still subject to the UCMJ, and ultimately found guilty.

There were many parts of this episode I liked - the fact that Harm was trying to keep Mac from being the loose cannon, but in the end he was the one who helped her find the way to get Duncan; Bud figuring out what Herrick was doing; the final scene between Harm and Mac during which she says he's funny for thinking she'd want to "join the club" (of pregnant women); and by the way, I think I also need a bumper sticker than says "Die Yuppie Scum" (I always knew I liked Mac's outlook on things) - however there were a couple things that seemed a little sketchy. For instance: Why would Mac get little AJ a toy computer? She's the one who says "anything that keeps me off the internet is a good thing", so it seems a little strange to me that she would pick that as a present. Also, is it me, or was Harm a little overly terrified by the idea of having a kid? Maybe he's a little afraid of commitment, but I at least have always gotten the idea that he *really* wants Harmon Rabb III…and especially with having just volunteered to raise the child that may or may not be his niece or nephew in the last episode…I don't think he's as scared as they made him out to be this week. Overall, though, I think it was a very good ep, with some nice comedy, and some cute Harm and Mac conversations.

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