In years past I read The Lord of the Rings trilogy by J. R. R. Tolkien. His work is literature that changed my life, with painterly scenes that I’ll never forget. Tolkien’s ideas and ideals are still warm within my psyche. Worth noting too, Peter Jackson captured the power of the Middle Earth saga in cinema scenes shot in New Zealand.

This passage quoted from Tolkien depicts a segment of the quest with the small band of outgunned and outnumbered opponents of the Dark Lord Sauron standing beneath the walls of his outpost, Barad-dûr. Aaragon King of Gondor waits outside the gate to “negotiate” with the emissary of the Dark Lord.

I cannot help but relate all of this to the Trump-Musk relationship. Trump is ensconced toad-like in the White House. Elon Musk, his emissary (without any statutory authority) has decimated the Federal workforce agency by agency. As a chainsaw wielding, laughing figure, Musk serves, mouthpiece of a wanna-be Lord, Putinesque, supreme power in his person…

Help wanted! Seeking our Aragorn to dissect this toad-of-chaos !

“Come forth!” they cried.
“Let the Lord of the Black Land come forth!

Justice shall be done upon him.
For wrongfully he has made war upon Gondor
and wrested its lands.

Therefore the King of Gondor demands
that he should atone for his evils, and depart then for ever. Come forth!”

There was a long silence,
and from wall and gate no cry or sound was heard in answer.
As they waited Aragorn’s hands went to the elf-stone
that hung from his neck, gifted to him by Arwen in Imladris,
and his thoughts dwelt of she whom he loved.

But then there came
a long rolling of great drums like thunder in the mountains,
and then a braying of horns that shook the very stones
and stunned men’s ears.

And thereupon
the middle door of the Black Gate
was thrown open with a great clang,
and out of it there came an embassy from the Dark Tower.

At its head there rode a tall and evil shape,
mounted upon a black horse, if horse it was; for it was huge and hideous,
and in the sockets of its eyes and in its nostrils there burned a flame.
The rider was robed all in black, and black was his lofty helm;
yet this was no Ringwraith but a living man.

The Lieutenant of the Tower of Barad-dûr he was,
and his name is remembered in no tale; for he himself had forgotten it,
and he said: “I am the Mouth of Sauron.”

With him came only a small company of black-harnessed soldiery,
and a single banner,
black but bearing on it in red the Evil Eye.

Now halting a few paces
before the Captains of the West
he looked them up and down and laughed.

“Is there anyone in this rout with authority
to treat with me?” he asked.
“Or indeed with wit to understand me? Not thou at least!”
he mocked, turning to Aragorn with scorn.

“It needs more to make a king
than a piece of elvish glass, or a rabble such as this.
Why, any brigand of the hills can show as good a following!”