For the first half of "Borgen" I watched not because the story lines grabbed me all that much, but the faces of the characters were interesting and the glimpses of life in Denmark were tantalizing. The story lines of family life were prosaic, but set in the Danish model of actually providing for families they were exotic enough to keep me in the game.
Figuring out the Danish parliamentary system, and accommodating to the accommodative style of Danish mores took a while. Watching "West Wing" on my morning treadmill and "Borgen" at night, the counterpoint became positively psychedelic. Ye Gads, these Danes know what they are doing.
Denmark is roughly the size of Maryland and has roughly the same population--around 5 million souls. But the Danes are far whiter than Maryland and have no predominantly Black city. They do have a problem dealing with immigrants, given their location. Trump talks about the "threat" from the Mexican border. Denmark is looking at the Middle East and Africa the way Sarah Palin looked out her window at Russia.
About halfway through the first season, this smooth ride along an asphalt road in a Volvo station wagon suddenly explodes into a moon shot on Apollo 13. The show which had been a sister to the tale of a Danish school teacher "Rita" suddenly opened a door to something more akin to "The Wire" meets Aaron Sorkin.
Now in the third season, our heroine (and a fine piece of work she is) Birgitte (pronounced somewhere down below your vocal cords, BAWR-ga) founds a new party. Her own Middle Party has not just drifted to the right, but has set full sail toward deporting immigrants for crimes like littering. On the left, there are wackos enough to make Toby Ziegler start searching for a flame thrower.
Birgitte opens an office, at no small personal financial risk and the space fills with enthusiasts of every persuasion, who see in the advent of a new political party their own personal Nirvana. "We are not a mass movement," Birgitte's friend tells her "We are movement of masses." She has her acolytes post on a bulletin board their most beloved policies and some are anti abortion, some pro choice; some want to see taxes raised; some want them lowered; some want immigrants to be welcomed and assimilated; some want them deported.
Brigid needs dues paying party members and she is desperate for money. But when a party founder finds a wealthy banker to donate 1.5 million kroner, solving the cash flow problem, she balks because it means money men will control the policies of the party. The banker tells her he wanted a 7% reduction in corporate taxes but the party man agreed to only 5% and that was okay. Politics is about compromise and negotiation he says, a very Danish sentiment. But not for Birgitte. She gives the money back and calls a meeting.
Birgette founded the new party, "The New Democrats" and she insists she will shape its ideals: She looks right at a woman in the crowd who is anti abortion and says, "We will not deny women abortions," and she looks to a man who has written a manifesto for the party which would nationalize most industries and says "We will not make war on capitalism, but only guide it and restrain its anti social excesses." And so forth.
And she watches people walk out, as each sees his or her most important issue dismissed or diluted. But Nyborg is willing to be rejected. She knows what Trump knew: Better a cohesive, dedicated army than an aimless mass of disparate dreamers.
Of course, I sat there watching, saying, this is what we face in America: The old Democratic party is a movement of masses, an unstable nucleus with protons and neutrons which cannot stay attached. We need a New Democrats party here, but if we get that, we will likely lose a lot of folks. We have staunchly pro Israel folk who are appalled by Muslim Congresswomen in head scarfs who rail about the Israeli lobby spending "Benjamins" to buy votes for Israel. We have people who want to defund police, whatever that means, alongside folks who fear crime in the suburbs.
There is a wonderful scene in West Wing when Toby has to talk to street demonstrators who shout him down calling him a tool of big pharma and big oil and corporate kleptocracy and he notes these are kids on Spring break who will go back to the dorm rooms their parents have paid for at the end of the week and he loathes these phony privileged children who do not have to function in the real world. Brigitte is faced with all that.
What is not in Borgen which is so prominent and pernicious in West Wing is elitism. Birgitte is denounced for elitism when she puts her daughter into a private psychiatric hospital having championed a law to reduce the deduction for private health insurance. An especially vile Rush Limbaugh type reads the lunch menu at the private hospital which includes items the average Dane cannot afford. That is elitism in Denmark. Brigitte's wonderful, savy "spin master" Katrine, makes her remove her expensive watch before going on TV. Flashing swag is very un Danish.
But, if Denmark has a caste system, it is nowhere near as pervasive or obvious as America's castes. We get a glimpse of it in "Rita" where a mayor wants her son to get accepted at a more competitive university, but there is none of the name dropping of Ivy League colleges, SAT scores, National Merit finalist awards that flash up every thirty seconds in West Wing. The Danes do not wave that sort of "meritocracy" in your face the way Americans do, at least if these TV shows reflect the real world.
But tiny Denmark leads the world in wind turbines, wind power and green energy. Somehow, without the graduates of an Ivy League, they succeed where America fails.
And, oh, of course, their mastery of languages: Birgitte (the actress and the character) flips in and out of fluent Danish, French and English effortlessly. I can attest from brief forays into Denmark, most people there speak English, or at least their English is way better than my Danish.
There is some chatter about David Simon, who did "The Wire" doing an American version of "Borgen." I cannot imagine Simon being able to comprehend the Danes and their delicate dance between wanting to succeed but not being seen as being more successful than their countrymen.
Borgen is not to be missed. It holds wisdom for us, here in America, if we are only smart enough to comprehend it.
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