The Kid is All Right (S25, E06-536)

I still remember when Bill Clinton was cool.  ...no I don't, I'm lying.

Plot Summary
After forgoing the opening sequence for a lengthy homage/reference to the Disney short Music Land, the episode begins with Lisa being, once again, depressed because she is, once again, alone.  However, once again, Lisa finds a glimmering ray of hope when she befriends, once again, the new kid in school, fellow 2nd grader Isabel Gutierrez who shares Lisa's love of literature.  The two team up to do a school report on Franklin Roosevelt when Lisa notices Isabel's portion is a rather conservative take on the otherwise well-liked President.  Lisa learns that Isabel is a rather hardcore Republican, shocking even more so to her given Isabel's Latin heritage.

Lisa talks it over with Marge who tells Lisa that Isabel is likely just going through a phase, like Marge did back in the 80s.  Back at school, Lisa learns Isabel's mother told her daughter that Lisa is going through a 'liberal phase'.  Despite their political divide, Lisa and Isabel decide to forgo all that and remain friends.  That is, until the upcoming class president elections.  As Lisa decides to run for the position she learns she'll be going up against - yep - Isabel.  This garners the attention of the Republican party (Mr. Burns, mostly), who desperately need a Hispanic voice like Isabel in their stead, but Isabel refuses their outright help, so the Republicans decide to help Isabel out "behind the scenes", mainly filling the school with pro-Isabel propaganda to hurt Lisa's campaign.

Desperate Lisa, once again, turns to Bart for help.  Bart gets Lisa's campaign back on track, but as Bart shows Lisa a captured video of Isabel falling off a training wheeled bike, Lisa (once again) backs off the 'dark path' and decides to simply run against Isabel fair and square.  In a debate, Lisa tries to tell the audience about the simplicity of being a liberal, and that those ideals were in place during America's best times.  Lisa has a dream a short time later where she's visited by the ghosts of other democrats who lost big in elections, indicating Lisa is gonna be next in line despite her big speech.

In the final debate, though, Isabel decides to, again, eschew politics and decrees that even if Lisa wins, it'd be no big loss for her because Lisa's her friend and that the race for class president shouldn't be politically charged anyway.  Lisa shares the sentiment, but Isabel ends up winning anyway.  Later, Milhouse reveals that an exit poll shows that 53% of the class would vote for a liberal candidate, just not Lisa.  Lisa is content with that.  In 2056, Lisa and Isabel are, once again, against one another, this time for what I assume is President of the United States, and an elderly Homer is proudly watching alongside his Music Land parody self.

Quick Review
I have really mixed feelings about this episode.  There were some really good jokes and bits in the episode that I felt worked really well, and that if those bits were the only elements within, the episode could've gotten the highest score I would've given in several seasons.

However, there's just so much that goes wrong, too.  The opening sequence was tough to sit through, for starters.  And then, of course, the episode is heavy with the political themes, thankfully it wasn't anything too bad, though moments when Lisa and/or Isabel would clamor on about the greatness of their specific ideology I couldn't help but cringe.  With no side plot to possibly help out, I'm left with an episode that, while having some good moments, is just too far dragged down by its political elements to be worth giving a good score to.

Final Score: 6.3