TV Complaint

I hate it when people on TV make really stupid decisions.  I’m binge watching (really, once you’ve got Netflix, is there any other kind of watching?  One show follows another so fast, there’s not even an advertisement between, and you’re watching the next episode, the denouement of the cliff-hanger ending, and you’re into a new episode before you know it.  It’s like somebody constantly topping up your drink)  a show called Salvation, which starts with an interesting concept.  Bright college student, computer geek and astronomy nerd, discovers an asteroid is going to hit the Earth in about 6 months time.  So, the pressure builds each episode as they’re a little bit closer.
We’re down to 80 days now and panic has set in, a terrorist group is sort of holding the world hostage as they work on solutions to destroy or divert the asteroid, bright science boy is kind of torn between aforesaid terrorist group and the billionaire genius who’s hired him (Basically, Elon Musk, but crazier) (terrorists are working on a solar sail, billionaire is working on a rail gun), and there are two factions vying for control of the government.
It’s that last part that I’d like to address.  So, the current president, who is supposed to be good and the audience is meant to like her, even though she looks far too much like Dianne Feinstein to be sympathetic, is battling with the vice-president, who was president for a while, while everybody thought DiFi lady was dead, and it’s come down to a Supreme Court decision, but then a suicide bomber tries to take out the swing vote (who’s going to uphold the status quo) and he’s in the hospital in an induced coma, and they’re all saying they have to bring him out of the coma long enough to cast the deciding vote, even though it might kill him and hordes of crazed citizens have surrounded the hospital.
So, I’m wondering, if she needs a safe vote, why doesn’t she just make an emergency appointment, somebody she knows is loyal, because that would be a hell of a lot easier, and you don’t have to unnecessarily risk the life of an old man, and they could easily cover it PR wise, you know, swift response to terrorism and all that.
Just a stupid decision, really, so there would be a dramatic hospital scene, a tearful wife, a dramatic speech, and then a helicopter blowing up on the roof.
Also, the bit where they shut down the internet.  You could see from the get go that was going to backfire.