Kryptonite

 I watched Superman every week on the family television and followed the adventures of Clark Kent (who in phone booths and back alleys transformed himself into Superman from a meek mild-mannered reporter for the Daily Planet newspaper); Lois Lane, who loved Superman and looked derisively at weak-kneed Clark who always managed to vanish when Superman would appear to the rescue; Jimmy Olsen, innocent and oblivious cub reporter; and the blustering and oblivious editor of the paper, Perry White. Superman could leap tall buildings in a single bound and was more powerful than a locomotive. He could fly faster than a speeding bullet and bend steel in his bare hands. Now that was a man! Ah, except for Superman’s vulnerability to kryptonite. That deadly ore from Superman’s planet of origin could lay the Man of Steel very, very low. This is not the place to address psychoanalytical theories concerning the dangers of pieces of home. The time is out of joint.

     But most of the time the Man of Steel seemed invincible. His x-ray vision could peer through walls to discover criminals at work or discover Lois or Jimmy tied to an explosive that would blow them, well, back to where Krypton used to be. Superman would catch bullets in his hand before they hit a body and he could lay himself down atop a bomb and absorb its destructive power saving the city once again. Ah, but there was that kryptonite.

     So I’m thinking of Superman today while I watched that fool Trump rip off his face mask and declared that though he had contracted the corona virus he had to go back to work because he is our leader. (I wanted so much to use the past tense of the verb!!) He said don’t be afraid of the corona virus but there are 210,000 people who will not be able to attend to his cheerleading cry. Despite the fact that he knew in March that coronavirus was more deadly than any flu, he did nothing. Without his mask Trump has risked and continues to risk infecting anyone who comes in contact with him—the White House has been decimated—though admittedly, whoever has already come in contact with that extremely dangerous man has risked serious loss of intelligence and any semblance of an awareness of ethics and honest behaviors.

     Actually, unlike Superman, I don’t think Trump would ever risk anything in  the precious maintenance of the invincible image he would project: he is a narcissistically disordered individual and is dangerous. Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain. I am the great and powerful Oz! At 250 pounds Trump is certainly never going to leap tall buildings in a single bound. Like Superman he is susceptible to kryptonite, but unlike Superman, Trump isn’t wise enough to keep away from it or to protect the others for whom this iteration of kryptonite is deadly.