A happy ending to #PieGate

Posted 12/15/17

This past week, the press secretary for President Trump, Sarah Huckabee Sanders, brought pecan pies to the press room at the White House to share with reporters, ending what some called “PieGate.”

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A happy ending to #PieGate

Posted

This past week, the press secretary for President Trump, Sarah Huckabee Sanders, brought pecan pies to the press room at the White House to share with reporters, ending what some called “PieGate.”
If you’ve watched any of these press briefings before, they can get pretty contentious. The press secretary standing behind the podium has to explain and defend often-controversial policies and statements from President Trump, extemporaneously fielding questions from an adversarial and often belligerent press corps. Oh, and it’s always broadcast live throughout the planet to millions and millions of people.
Earlier this year, Sarah Sanders posted on twitter a picture of a pecan pie, with the following caption: “I don’t cook much these days, but managed this Chocolate Pecan Pie for Thanksgiving at the family farm!”
With everything of course being controversial these days, the peanut gallery, also knows as the Twittersphere, cried that the pie was fake. American Urban Radio network reporter April Ryan decided to bravely take on the cause and tweeted the following on behalf of the non-believers:
 “I am not trying to be funny but folks are already saying #piegate and #fakepie. Show it to us on the table with folks eating it and a pic of you cooking it. I am getting the biggest laugh out of this. I am thankful for this laugh on Black Friday!”
Sarah Sanders good-naturedly later replied with photos and picture of the ingredients (eggs, butter, pecans, sugar, etc.) in front of a Christmas backdrop. “It’s pie time! With or without bourbon, @AprilDRyan?” “OK, I want to see the pics and the video. I will check tomorrow but won’t eat it!” replied Ryan.
Ok, all well and good. These are serious times of course, and they’re both playing along about this phony controversy to bring some levity to the tension and animosity-filled political arena.
Then on Thursday, Sarah Sanders kicked it up a notch – she brought some actual pies that she baked herself to the press room and gave them to April Ryan. Now most women with three children at home will tell you that that’s a job in and of itself. Sanders is a mom to young kids and holds one of the most difficult and high stress jobs in the world, and she took the time to bake pies for a professional adversary. An olive branch, if you will. Nice, right?

If you watch the video of the exchange, it was a little awkward but Ryan was generally receptive. “I look at this as an attempt from you to reach out to all of us, not just to me.” Sanders responded “I look at this as a great time [Christmas], it’s a time to be generous, hospitable, which I try to do every day.”
So, happy ending, right? For the press and for the press secretary maybe, but not for the Greek chorus on Twitter.
Ninety percent of the comments under the video of the pie exchange were negative. “Yeah, she posts all these pics of the pies in process. That means nothing about those pies she brought in to the press corps #DontEatThatPie.” “Oh the fakery” someone else tweeted.
Others suggested Sanders baked something scatological in the pie (which we can’t print here), similar apparently to a plot point in the movie “The Help.”
Seriously, people? A kind gesture by an extremely busy mom who happens to hold down one of the most stressful jobs in the world, wanting nothing in return, and the best some people can come up with is “Oh the fakery”?
There’s an old Russian fable about two farmers that are granted one wish by a magic genie. The first farmer wishes for and is granted 100 acres of fertile land and 50 healthy cows grazing on it. The second farmer, instead of wishing for his own land and cattle, uses his one wish to poison his neighbor’s land and kill all his neighbor’s cows.
If I were to be granted one wish this Christmas, it’d be that some of these Scrooges who couldn’t think of anything nice to say about “PieGate” will have some person who they don’t normally like or agree with do something really nice for them. Maybe they’ll have the same Christmas epiphany that Ebenezer and the Grinch had, and understand that even if some of us will never agree on certain issues, that we can all still be kind to one another. It might not be the “true” meaning of Christmas, but it’s definitely in the same ballpark.
We hope you keep kindness in your heart this Christmas season and are rewarded in kind.
Merry Christmas!

Mike Koolidge lives in Rochelle and hosts the regionally syndicated radio program The Michael Koolidge Show (www.koolidge.com) heard daily on ten radio stations statewide, including Rockford’s 1440 WROK from 9 to 11 a.m. live every weekday morning. Public officials and citizens can reach the show anytime at radio@koolidge.com or 815-561-7130.