Jeffrey Sterling’s story set off all sort of buttons with me.

Sterling, 34, is a black man and, now, a former CIA agent because when it was time to give him the posting on the Iran Task Force for which he seemed qualified, his bosses found all sort of reasons for not sending him overseas.

It came down to this, according to Sterling: His bosses didn’t think a black man could do the job. His supervisor on the Iran Task Force told him that a “big black man speaking Farsi” would have “stuck out” and thus couldn’t be a discreet spymaster. No George Smiley he.

That’s what set the buttons off for me. How many times have black folks jumped through the hoops that we’ve been told to jump through before finally reaching the place we’ve tried to reach and then been told: “Oh … you’re black.” So no place in the entering college class. No job. No apartment in the condo development.

When Sterling’s supervisor told him he couldn’t be posted overseas to recruit other nationals as spies for the United States because of his color, Sterling said he asked the supervisor: “When did you realize I was black?”

I don’t know what other factors may have impeded Sterling’s advancement in the CIA. But the race thing sticks in my craw. And the comments of one of his supervisors sounded like what so many white supervisors have said about blacks who chose to leave jobs rather than limit themselves to what their supervisors would have them be. He said Sterling’s departure from the agency was “unfortunate” and that he was “a talented officer.”

The supervisor went on: “We were quite pleased with Jeffrey’s performance in a number of areas. Unfortunately, there were some areas of his work and development that needed some improvement.” Raise your hand if you’ve heard that one before.

Sterling is an up-by-the-bootstraps type of guy, the only member of his family to attend college, a lawyer, for God’s sake! When he joined the CIA’s Iran Task Force, he was surprise! surprise! the only black there.

His experience led him to say this to The New York Times: “I think they bring minorities in the door to maintain appearances and so they can say they are diverse. But that’s just a facade.”

It’s a facade that too many blacks and women, too have gone along with. We con ourselves into thinking we have arrived, knowing that at most we are drawing a paycheck while playing “the spook who sat by the door.”

At least we can strut around in our neighborhoods and at family gatherings, telling tales about our “success.” Much like the maids and butlers and janitors and factory workers who, way back when, would drive down South in flashy cars to impress their more rural kinfolk and regale them with tales of the Promised Land up North.

If those kinfolk ever visited them, they were in for a rude awakening into the reality of life up South, as some of us have called the North.

It’s high time that those in positions to break the mold, to work outside the box, to push the envelope take your pick see that a “big black man speaking Farsi” can be as good a spymaster as a George Smiley or a Caspar Milquetoast white dude from Peoria.

Those of us on the losing end of that “the world is not yet ready for you” thing are losing patience with those who say we have to bide our time. Hello, world, we’re here to stay!

E.R. Shipp’s e-mail address is eshipp2002@hotmail.com.