COYOTE by Bret Harte

A nice, trusting, gullible American "couldn’t help but believe" Obama as he spoke about 9/11 and the terrorist attack on the USS Cole. Why? Obama sounded so sincere and dad so wanted to feel better about his son’s death. This is what’s wrong with our country - blind, ignorant trust. Ignorance also refused to recognize leaders that ignore the ‘black’ problem in America ( pun intended). By a ratio of 4777 to 727 per 100,000, blacks are in our jails. 38% of a population of only 13% are in jail. A third of black children born in 2001 have a chance of incarceration. Why have the ‘new deal,’ the ‘great society,’ ‘the new frontier’ or the ‘great society’ not helped? Why have blacks only succeeded when they have helped themselves? Our culture, our societal norms and our moral imperatives have hindered them. Our government has been the problem, not the solution.

Blown out of the prairie in twilight and dew,
Half bold and half timid, yet lazy all through,
Loath ever to leave, and yet fearful to stay,
He limps in the clearing, an outcast in gray.

A shade on the stubble, a ghost by the wall,
Now leaping, nor limping, now risking a fall,
Lop-eared and large jointed, but ever alway
A thoroughly vagabond outcast in gray.

Here, Carlo, old fellow,- he’s one of your kind,-
Go, seek him, and bring him in out of wind.
What? snarling, my Carlo! So even dogs may
Deny their own kin in the outcast in gray.

Well, take what you will,- though it be on the sly,
Marauding, or begging, - I shall not ask why;
But will call it a dole, just to help on his way,
A four-footed friar in orders of gray!

Harte compares the coyote to a begging friar; why not compare blacks on the fringes of our society to hungry coyotes. Hungry for what? Oh please!