The Toucan

The toucan is a colorful fruit-eating bird with a large bill. The toucan ran up a really large bill by charging a huge quantity of fresh fruit on his credit card. The toucan, who is retired and lives on a modest fixed income, missed a few payments. As a consequence, few if any credit card companies are willing to extend credit to a toucan.

True, this is discriminatory. Just because some toucans are not credit worthy, that is no reason to be suspicious of the financial trustworthiness of all toucans. And yet, that’s how it seems.

The Justice Department is looking into charges of discriminatory treatment. This, however, seems to be a long ongoing investigation that provides no immediate relief to the struggling toucan.

Meanwhile, the GOP and Fox News has been charging that toucans are dangerous aliens (from Central and South America) that are supplanting the place in society that rightly belongs to American birds. And they have many Americans fearful that the toucan is exposing us to the avian flu.

The poor bird, hounded by creditors and slandered by aggressive pundits, is desperate to flee to friendlier turf. But with short stubby wings, the toucan is unable to fly far.