My younger, smarter brother used to doodle on letters he'd write back in the days before e-mail. Some of the cartoons were actually good, and a few were really quite brilliant, like the one I'll show you, if you'll turn the page.
Don Hilton Bowden (1946-1999) never provided commentary to his drawings, but I will.
The platypus is the essence, the primordial embodiment. He has a flaw, as have we all. However, the tracks he leaves, his personal social record, disguises this shortcoming; he has a pegleg right, his stilts place that missing limb on the left. Time follows along and makes the tracks whole and complete again.
I go looking for true life allegories, and then I wonder, where is there an example which doesn't follow this matrix? Take Reagan. The stilted left-leg limp was given as, he is "disengaged" or "incurious" or "inexperienced." These alibis were provided by the broadcasters to avoid insulting the voter who identified with the big goof. Because that was Raygoon's problem: he was dumb as a sack of rocks.
Now the Republican FOB (Friends of Buffoons) come along and attempt to resurrect the boob as statesman. And they have largely succeeded; today the rump roast of the party and his silly little shill intone the wisdom of Dopey Dutch at every opportunity. (It's doubtful they'll do any more for Dubyah than try and forget.)
You can follow the trend down all the days. Today Sarah Simple is "inexperienced" and "incurious" and "disengaged." (The obvious dementia of the old retread is not even mentioned.)
Meanwhile, back on the block ... This worker in another office I knew, he was disruptive and incompetent. They transferred him to a remote branch so he could do less damage. "Guess I was making too many waves," he figured. Afterwards, if he had any friends and had they cared to remember him fondly, they might say, "Old Fred, boy was he a maverick!"
So it goes.