Calling the Kettle Black

Consider the poor kettle. It does its job very well – fill with water, place on stove, light fire. In a few minutes the kettle bubbles with boiling water. Task accomplished.

Same with the spider frying pan. Heat it up, insert food with natural oils and the cooking is over in a few minutes. Both utensils are cast iron. Black with use and absorbed oils. Seasoned for a lifetime of continued use.

Now enters the Attorney General. Nominated for the position for his lifetime of service in the Congress of the United States. He was a public prosecutor before then. And a knowledgeable lawyer. He has the credentials for being AG. His friends in the Senate agree and approve the nomination.

The AG is now in office. He is ill suited for the job in some respects – conservative socially and culturally. He is a church going Baptist and does not believe in abortion. He is a southerner and recoils at the truer meaning of equality; surely it doesn’t mean accepting blacks as full-fledged citizens like his own family members? And immigrants? Golly, we have nothing but trouble from these late comers to our shores. Can’t we control their intake numbers?

So the AG confronts established policy and legal precedent and upends the cart of social justice based on his personal belief system. Delighted he is that his boss, the president of the United States, thinks as he does. The fan base is pleased, too. But wait! There’s trouble brewing with talk the president colluded with Russia before and during the presidential campaign and on election day in the voter computer systems. Because he was a part of the campaign apparatus, he recuses himself from this messy legal issue. And that’s as it should be.

But the president disagrees. He feels stabbed in the back; his AG was supposed to protect his back, but now he is recused. He appoints his deputy to exercise the AG authority in appointing a special prosecutor. That Deputy does his job and appoints a very effective and credible prosecutor. The AG has no skin in this game. The president fumes.

And boy howdy does he fume. He verbally attacks and insults the AG for not doing his job. He pretends to believe that the AG can un-recuse himself and fire the special prosecutor. He can’t, but the president wants this. Meanwhile the president continues to demean the AG who hangs on by a thread and weathers storm after storm tossed his way by the angry president.

This tale is repeated for any staffer in the White House who, appointed by the president to serve him, disappoint his expectations. Omarosa is one. Comey is another. And day by day other names are added to the list. They either are fired or forced to resign. One after the other.

The black kettle accuses the other black kettles and spiders and pots of being black. It is what he asked for, and he is the blackest of all. Dark from misuse and burning issues. And yet he attempts to blacken the reputation of the others, all the time poisoning the transaction by his own dark reputation.

The president stands before time and nation nude of his principles and fully bare to his prejudices and self-serving narcissism. This is America of 2018. This is the president a minority placed in office. This is the kettle calling the kettle black.

The mirror reflects a truer image. Dare we look at it?

August 16, 2018