Okay, hang on, now I’m really confused. And it’s all NBC’s fault.

In what may be one of the most earnest November Sweeps stunts in recent memory, the network ran a televised debate between two fictional candidates on “The West Wing” last Sunday—live. Clearly, NBC is desperately trying to re-energize the veteran series. Apparently I’m not the only one who misses the marvelous alliteration of “West Wing Wednesday.” Sweeps stunt aside, the show’s ratings have taken about a 30 percent hit since it moved to Sundays.

But NBC has created a ratings scheme just so crazy that it might work.

What we may be seeing here is a new evolution of the Reality TV genre at work, one which, rather than relying on hyperbolizations of pseudo-reality, aspires to some seamless fusion of the real and the really-well-written instead. Every topic addressed in last Sunday’s debate between candidates Vinick (Alan Alda) and Santos (Jimmy Smits) seemed unnervingly contemporary in its relevance, from war and oil to health care.

And here’s the weirdest part: the faux “debate” was moderated by Forrest Sawyer, one of television’s more appealing talking heads. So, okay, Sawyer exists in “The West Wing” world, but then so do made-up countries like Qumar (which, for those of you playing the home game, is supposedly in some southern portion of actual Iran, but then I never exactly aced geography, so who knows?).

NBC’s entirely dedicated to this phony election. Boasting fully interactive campaign sites for each candidate, the network is also conducting some primitive polling to determine which candidate viewers prefer, with some internet sites even breaking the numbers down by demographics too.

It’s all a bit over-the-top, and it’s unclear what purpose all this attention to detail serves, other than to confuse poor viewers like me. But I’ll tell you one thing, Santos would make a swell President, which is why I’ve decided to vote for him come Election Day.

Wait, did Election Day already happen? Dammit, NBC!