"30 Rock:" Mr. Donaghy Goes to Washington

Thursday's season finale of "30 Rock" finds Jack (Alec Baldwin) estranged from GE/NBC/Universal/Kmart and trying his hand at politics in the waning days of the Bush Administration - "It's time for my Freedom Search©," he tells Liz (Tina Fey) on his cell phone, as a security guy in the background snaps on a rubber glove.

As gung-ho as Jack may be, he has entered a land of abject malaise: The offices appear to have been looted; since there are no pens to be found, government employees are left to scratch memos on Post-It Notes with straight pins. Jack's boss (Matthew Broderick, who manages to make stultifying blandness fairly hilarious), Cooter Burger (a moniker bestowed upon him by the nicknamer-in-chief) an interim chief while the acting chief is on trial on sundry corruption charges, strives to maintain an upbeat demeanor - when Jack asks about a leak in the ceiling spilling copious amounts of water onto the desk below; Cooter insists there's no leak: "I'll show you the study," he offers.

Jack wants out, but as we all know, no one leaves the Bush Administration unless they really screw up. So Jack cooks up a monumentally inept plan.

There's some inspired comedy in "30 Rock's" depiction of a dissolute, desiccated and rudderless government run to ruin, populated by toadies given to kneejerk banalities. When Jack, trying to rally the troops, declares, "Rome wasn't built in a day," one gormless career hack replies, "Well, that's one theory."

Meanwhile, Liz fears she's pregnant and, in the requisite subplot that just doesn't work, Kenny the Page (Jack McBrayer) is in a monumental struggle to get his application to serve as a page at the Summer Olympics in Beijing in on time.

Here's hoping the keep Jack stranded in Washington a bit longer when the show returns next season, because they're tapping a rich comic vein there. And here's hoping Liz quickly forgets her vow at the end of the episode, because what she proposes is a reliably proven killer of quality TV.

- "30 Rock:" 9:30 p.m. Thursday, NBC Channel 4.