Spoiler alert: we are recapping House of Cards on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays. Please do not leave spoilers for future episodes if you have seen further ahead.
Stuart Jeffries' episode four blogpost is here
I don't think we're meant to like Chinese billionaire-cum-putative-diplomat Xander Feng. While it's jejune to be sniffy about a person's sexual preferences, seeing a character with a plastic bag over his face being grimly pleasured by two prostitutes before he meets the vice president of the US means that I, for one, am going to excise Mr Feng from my Christmas card list. Really, if Beijing hasn't yet called in the US ambassador to protest about this depiction of their operatives, then they really should.
Remember the good old days when back-channelling wasn't even a verb let alone the means by which the Chinese and Americans played diplomatic footsie? Me neither. Here Feng, after sensibly recycling his asphixiator's plastic bag, one hopes, tried to make a deal with Frank Underwood whereby – stay with me people, this gets complicated – he insisted that the US should not drop the WTO currency manipulation lawsuit against China. Why?
Because China wanted to look as though it had been bullied by America into moving towards an open currency – even though an open currency is what it really wants. Again, the US man or woman in Beijing should really get a dressing-down over this misrepresentation of Chinese currency policies. Unless, of course, it's accurate.
More importantly, for our concerns, Frank thought he could see in this Chinese policy a means of undermining the influence of US billionaire (and Feng's business associate) Raymond Tusk over Potus. If only Frank could make it look as though Tusk was using his access to President Walker to featherbed his probably nefarious Chinese business interests, then Tusk would be out of the Oval Office loop and Frank more in than those must-have Victoria Beckham culottes everybody's talking about this spring. Ultimately, Walker thought both Underwood and Tusk were scheming jerks and put the phone down on their three-way conference call. Well done, Mr President: first time this season you've demonstrated you have a clue. That, however, was enough for Frank to secure a partial victory over Tusk, though it does mean that the WTO deal which meant one of his original aims in these talks, namely inducing the Chinese to bankroll a nice new American bridge, may have collapsed.
Enough about Sino-American relations. Claire is trying to use both her recent revelation that she was raped by a US general, and reports of rapes on serving officers by the same man, to change the military's code on sexual assaults. Apparently the existing code counsels that "in some circumstances it may be advisable to submit rather than resist," as Claire disclosed during a meeting with the Chiefs of Staff attended by the first lady. I know Claire Underwood is being held up as a feminist warrior here by some, but I can't help asking: what's her angle? Why does she want to take Dalton McGuinness down now? Is there something more to this new-found campaigning than she's letting on? You'd think.
More intriguingly, who is Seth Grayson? He pops up in the home of the widow of the doctor who may have given Claire an abortion after Dalton McGuinness raped her 30 years ago. Claire had already said there were no medical records of this termination, but Grayson managed to get access to the doctor's journal which contains a reference to the operation. Grayson presented Claire with the journal, trying to parlay his virtuosity in getting the information that her and Frank's current communications director overlooked into a job. Way to apply for a job, sicko.
Two bald men fighting over a comb, part 36
Is there anything less edifying than a phallus-waving contest between a lame-stream journo and a self-regarding hacker who is actually a minor asset for jerk-off lackey of Doug Stamper who in turn is a jerk-off lackey of Frank Underwood? Probably, but I can't think of one. After Lucas Goodwin bored us with tales of how he had written stuff that stuck it to The Man (save it for your failed Pulitzer bid, lame-o), Gavin the cybergeek went nuts. "You've never faced a hundred years in prison, you self-righteous prick. Most of my friends are locked up and rotting away 'cause they poked the bear one too many times. Why? They wanted to expose government surveillance, the Prism programme, embezzlement, abuse, fucking torture, lies. You're a journalist? You're a journalist? Who gives a shit. We're fucking soldiers."
Excuse me? Poking the bear? That'd better be a metaphor, otherwise you're facing a class-action ursine lawsuit, laughing boy. Sorry, Gavin, but you have a cuddly pet called Cashew. In a cage. What kind of warrior are you again?
So farewell then Lucas Goodwin, stereotypical journo patsy
The foregoing came seconds before Lucas got his comeuppance. He had got in over his gorgeous locks, the poor poppet. Lured by hacker freak Gavin, he tried to do something cyber-naughty that I don't pretend to understand in a warehouse teeming with computer servers, and was promptly pinned to the floor by FBI goons before being taken downtown and arraigned for geek-related terrorism. Who now will get the poop on Peter Russo and Zoe Barnes's murders? Who now will be able to take down evil Frank Underwood? Nobody, that's who, unless hard-boiled hack Janine Gorsky comes back from Ithaca and becomes America's answer to unflappable Orla Guerin. Which, however you look at it, seems unlikely.
Long Island wine. You're kidding, right?
There was a lovely moment where badass majority whip Jackie Sharp, who has been tasked with securing the Democratic vote on the entitlements amendment while Frank Underwood was yucking it up at some Civil war re-enactnment and making deals with Chinese billionaire sex perverts, rounded on two Congressman who expected her to bankroll their favoured projects in order to secure their allegiance. In fact, she wouldn't pay for a Long Island waste treatment plant. Why? Because Long Island wines "taste like piss compared to what we have in Napa". Instead she demanded loyalty for its own sake. Good for you, most terrifying of Jackies. Hilariously, in real life, Long Island Democrat Representative Tim Bishop has now complained about this House of Cards slur, fuming to the press: "We have exceptional wines." Or course you do. And our English champagne is superb too. No really, in both cases I'm being serious.
Quotes you won't find in The Prince, redux
• "I personally take no pride in the Confederacy. Avoid wars you can't win, and never raise your flag for an asinine cause like slavery." Southern-fried Frank on a three-day Civil war re-enactment shindig, poor lamb.
• "Stick a knife in its heart and put an apple in its mouth, I won't shed a tear." Frank to Feng during a fearfully butch stand off over who cares less about human suffering. Monsters!
