Archive for Corporate States of America

Trump & Jeebus: Peas In A Pod

One of our features here is Capitalist Jesus where we present Jesus dressed in his best suit and tie ensemble commenting how wonderful capitalism and right wing conservative christianity is. Because nothing is more christian than the unregulated greed and selfishness brought on by unregulated capitalism. Like we’ve said before, unregulated capitalism is just indirect cannibalism. We’re killing each other for fun and profit.

Which reminds us of TFG, a.k.a. former twice impeached American CEO/Dictator and petulant man child Donald Trump. We posted a photo-toon of Capitalist Jesus back in 2016 when TFG started running for President which pretty much sums up how hypocritical modern evangelical christians in the GOP are when it comes to supporting this pathological liar. Since Con-a-thon 2024 is basically a repeat of Con-a-thon 2020 and Trump ran during the Con-a-thon 2016, our job here is pretty easy. Since the Republican Party is rinsing and repeating with the stupidity of Donald Trump, we can rinse and repeat with our photo-toons because one thing hasn’t changes since 2016: Donald Trump is still a greedy, egomaniacal, petty, self-aggrandizing misogynistic, bombastic, materialistic, deceitful, callous, bigoted and oppressive asshole.

Capitalist Jesus, who is also very Republican, is stoked that his ideological twin, Donald Trump, looks to be the GOP nominee for president.
Capitalist Jesus, who is also very Republican, is stoked that his ideological twin, Donald Trump, looks to be the GOP nominee for president.

God’s Little Puppet

Mike Johnson has only been Speaker of the House for a short period of time and it already looks like he may not be long for the job. This bible-thumper actually reached across the aisle and came up with a funding bill to avoid a government shutdown which left the raving lunatics of the GOP foaming at the mouth.

We have no sympathy for this person. He’s an open christian nationalist who wants nothing more than to turn this country into a theocracy. Not only that, he’s a creationist and believes in the rapture. Like we’ve said before, if you believe that nonsense you should be permanently banned from the corridors of power. He has openly opined that he thinks God wanted him to be Speaker. Sound familiar? George W. Bush said that God wanted him to be President and now evangelical whack jobs have produced a propaganda video proclaiming that God created TFG to be America’s ‘Caretaker’.

We think that sanctimonious Mike Johnson bears a striking resemblance to another little bible thumper from the ’60s: little Davey from the Davey and Goliath stop motion claymation puppet show that preached the bible to kids every Sunday morning. Little Davey, along with his dog Goliath and his holier-than-thou family shoved their religion down every child’s throat. Just watch some of these old shows, especially the ‘lost episode’ about the Polka Dot Tie. The cringe is massive. And now America has a little Davey second in line for the Presidency. May Zeus help us all!

Republican Speaker of the House and christian nationalist Mike Johnson bears a striking resemblance to animated clay bible thumper Davey from the Davey and Goliath show of the 1960s and even has vowed to shove his religion down everyone's throat just like Davey.
Republican Speaker of the House and christian nationalist Mike Johnson bears a striking resemblance to animated clay bible thumper Davey from the Davey and Goliath show of the 1960s and even has vowed to shove his religion down everyone’s throat just like Davey.

Jan 6th: Traitor’s Day

January 6th marks the three year anniversary of the Capitol riots, Treason Day, Insurrection Day or Traitor’s Day – all names are fitting. It’s been three years since that infamous day and not one of the instigators like Paul Gosar, Ted Cruz, Josh Hawley and Marjorie Taylor Greene have been held accountable and are still roaming free. And the biggest offender, TFG, is the leading candidate for the Republican nomination for President, which will undoubtedly turn into the office of President-for-Life, if he somehow gets re-elected this year. Sure, many of the rioters have been sentenced, but many have been given light sentences given the gravity of their offense – trying to overthrow the government!

We’re reposting our Insurrection photo-toon from our previous posts because it pretty much says it all. But like we’ve said before, this was an attempted coup to overthrow a legitimate election with almost zero voter fraud, no matter how much the Republicans claim there was! This was a dress rehearsal. If we don’t punish those responsible, the next time . . . and there will be next time, the rioters will be successful and America will cease to be a democracy!

Despite overwhelming evidence that the Jan. 6th riot was an attempted coup, the Republicans continue to gaslight the American people by saying that it was just a nice, friendly tourist visit.
Despite overwhelming evidence that the Jan. 6th riot was an attempted coup, the Republicans continue to gaslight the American people by saying that it was just a nice, friendly tourist visit.

Rewind: The Earth Speaks

2023 marks the 20th anniversary of the BilgeBucket Gazette. Our first issue was on May 19, 2003 and we’ve been shoveling it to the public, just like the corporate media, ever since. We changed our format to a WordPress blog in 2011 so all of our earlier material was archived. We’ve been reposting many of those archived articles, headlines, photo-toons, BilgeBucket Lists and other content over the past twelve years. In honor of our 20th, and because we’re sick of the current state of affairs in the world, we’ll be reposting more items from 2003 through 2009 throughout this year.

This repost isn’t from 2003-2009 but it is very appropriate given the latest turmoil in the Middle East. We originally posted it to honor Earth Day but we feel it covers the deadly conflicts that constantly seem to erupt in that region as well. The Middle East: it could very well lead to the death of the Earth. Way to go, humans!

This photo-toon is from our April 22, 2012 post.

The Earth comments that humans will be the death of it
The space station astronauts took this rare photo of the Earth commenting on the latest violent conflict to erupt in the Middle East.

Rewind: SEGUMUCA Nation Redux

2023 marks the 20th anniversary of the BilgeBucket Gazette. Our first issue was on May 19, 2003 and we’ve been shoveling it to the public, just like the corporate media, ever since. We changed our format to a WordPress blog in 2011 so all of our earlier material was archived. We’ve been reposting many of those archived articles, headlines, photo-toons, BilgeBucket Lists and other content over the past twelve years. In honor of our 20th, and because we’re sick of the current state of affairs in the world, we’ll be reposting more items from 2003 through 2009 throughout this year.

The big news this past week is all the nineteen defendants in Georgia’s RICO case have turned themselves in and had their thugshots taken including the head thug TFG, who predictably is trying to profit off of it by offering merchandise to grift his followers. It’s been a horrible eight years since TFG first came down the escalators to announce his candidacy and the American people’s sanity has gone down the drain because of him. The petulant, megalomaniacal man-child has dominated the corporate media because the corporate media loves him. Even liberal sites cover him because he boosts their ratings. If there’s one thing that has become self-evident during the Trump era is that greed, avarice, materialism, ratings, followers and likes are the most important things in the world now, which is probably why democracy is on the brink of destruction.

We’re reposting a photo-toon from our May 17, 2016 post where we lamented our predicament with candidate Trump and unfortunately things have worsened since then. Our analysis then still rings true today. Most Americans who have been raised on the belief that capitalism is the only sensible economy for this planet, look to the self-aggrandizing, megalomaniac billionaire, who has had three trophy wives and scores of material possessions like houses, cars, planes, etc… and say “Hey! I want to be like him.” That’s the American way.  Add to the fact that conservative evangelicals now view Trump as a better role model than Jesus and we’ve got a hell of a problem on our hands. So what do we do? We’ll just repeat our final paragraph from that post for simplicity’s sake.

We think it’s time that all Americans do a bit of self-introspection, especially conservatives. Conservatives generally don’t do this because in the conservative mindset, they are always right, hence no need to look at oneself in the mirror. Questioning your actions is bad and a sign of weakness. One must do what has been traditionally done forever and ever. And don’t even think of apologizing; that is absolute weakness and worthy of death. But is Donald Trump really who were are as a nation? Are we really like Trump? Are we a SEGUMUCA nation: a nation of Selfish, Egotistical, Greedy, Ultra-Materialistic, Ultra-Competitive Assholes? (Catchy eh?…[sound of crickets chirping]…hellllooooo) Isn’t it time we put the people’s health and welfare, the public good and the environment above profits and selfish, greedy materialistic desires? Maybe if we do that, we won’t look in the mirror, see Donald Trump snarling back and say to ourselves, “Holy Shit! How did we get so fugly!”

Uncle Sam recoils in horror as he looks in the mirror and sees that he has become a Selfish, Egotistical, Greedy, Ultra-Materialistic, Ultra-Competitive Asshole.
Uncle Sam recoils in horror as he looks in the mirror and sees that he has become a Selfish, Egotistical, Greedy, Ultra-Materialistic, Ultra-Competitive Asshole.

Rewind: Dubya’s Duplicity On Iraq

2023 marks the 20th anniversary of the BilgeBucket Gazette. Our first issue was on May 19, 2003 and we’ve been shoveling it to the public, just like the corporate media, ever since. We changed our format to a WordPress blog in 2011 so all of our earlier material was archived. We’ve been reposting many of those archived articles, headlines, photo-toons, BilgeBucket Lists and other content over the past twelve years. In honor of our 20th, and because we’re sick of the current state of affairs in the world, we’ll be reposting more items from 2003 through 2009 throughout this year.

Currently the Republicans are trying to gaslight their way to trying to get TFG elected in 2024 by claiming that all those indictments are a nothing burger. One might think that their duplicity is new, dating back only to the rise of Trump. But the GOP’s dishonesty goes way back. Remember Nixon(Watergate), Reagan(Iran-Contra) and both Bushes(Gulf War, Iraq War, Afghanistan War)? Volumes of lies, deception and propaganda to go around. Since most Americans seem to have the memory of a gnat (somehow, people actually approve of Dubya now), let’s revisit a fairly recent event of GOP gaslighting in 2006 when Dubya tried to spin our reasons for continuing the clusterf*ck in Iraq. The Bush administration repeatedly used the phrase ‘stay the course’ in the early phases of the war and then promptly did an about face, actually gaslighting the people saying that they didn’t use the phrase. That’s so Republican!

Here’s an article, selected quotes and lil’ Dub Toon from our October 28, 2006 edition.

Bush Revises Iraq War Rationale Again

President Bush recently held a press conference stating that the war in Iraq is all about oil and the new reason for staying the course in Iraq is that we need to save civilization. Previous reasons included finding weapons of mass destruction, liberating Iraqis from dictator Saddam Hussein, establishing democracy throughout the Middle East, training the Iraqis to police their own country, making sure the new Baghdad KFC and Pizza Hut’s were safe, and because ‘Uncle Dick and Rummy said so – so there’.

“You see my fellow Americans,” said President Bush. “If them Iraqians actually start using some of that oil under their country that’s rightfully ours – because we’re Americans –the price of gas will skyrocket. Everybody was bellyaching about the price of gas this past summer, but if you think that was bad, wait until we leave Iraq and let the Iraqians run things. We must stay to keep gas prices low. You could say we came for the WMDs and stayed for the oil. Hey! That’s pretty funny.” Bush then chuckled to himself for two minutes.

Vice President Cheney emerged from his secret undisclosed lair, brushed the President aside and said, “Out of my way monkey boy! This isn’t about oil at all. This is the last chance for Western Civilization as we know it. It’s up to me and Rumsfeld to save the world. We’re the only ones who know how to exploit the region for fun and profit. I ask you my fellow Americans. Do you really want to take food out of the mouths of innocent Halliburton employees? That’s why we must win the war in Iraq and you must elect Republicans in this upcoming election. Because if you don’t, the next thing you know, we’ll be riding in ox carts, eating dates and drinking camel’s milk. Terror. Terror. Terror. Fear. Fear. Fear. God Bless Me and Rumsfeld!”

Joan LeBlanc of the international watchdog organization, Citizens For Peace, said “This is just another example of the lies and distortions this administration doles out to the American public on a daily basis. The truth is we are stuck in Iraq, thanks to this administration’s incompetent decision to invade in 2003. If we stay we will continue to be caught in the middle of sectarian violence. If we leave, Iraq will devolve into full scale civil war. We are damned if we do and damned if we don’t. The genie is out of the bottle and it won’t be going back in any time soon. Pandora’s box is opened. The can of worms is not only open, the worms are spilling out all over the place. The scab has been picked and the wound is infected and oozing with pus. Well, I’m out of cliches. I’m done.”

However, American citizens seemed okay with the White House’s latest explanation. Senior citizen Ruth Thomason of Des Égout, Mississippi said, “I believe the Vice President when he tells me we need to stay in Iraq to save civilization. I also believe in Santa Claus, the Easter Bunny and the tooth fairy with whom I’m very upset. She hasn’t left me any money for my teeth in the last sixty years and I’m beginning to get a bit miffed.”

Fred Granger of Tuckerville, Illinois said, “Well I was damn mad at the President about everything. Damn mad, I tells ya! I was even going to vote an all Democratic ticket this election. But then the price of gas dropped. Can you believe it’s almost $2 a gallon? Well, all’s forgiven Mr. President. I’m voting Republican.”

Tom Carter of Dorfman, New Jersey said, “I know the Republicans have completely botched the situation in Iraq but I’m comfortable with their incompetence. Go GOP!”

June Amerson of Julesberg, Washington said, “I’m voting for the Republicans because they’re strong on terrorism even though that report that came out says terrorism is much worse in the world since we invaded Iraq. Wait a second. Let me think about that. No wait. Thinking is too tough. Republican it is!”

“We will stay the course. “

George W. Bush
08-30-2006

“We will stay the course, we will complete the job in Iraq. “

George W. Bush
08-04-2005

“And that’s why we’re going to stay the course in Iraq. And that’s why when we say something in Iraq, we’re going to do it.”

George W. Bush
04-16-2004

“And my message today to those in Iraq is: We’ll stay the course.”

George W. Bush
04-13-2004

“And so we’ve got tough action in Iraq. But we will stay the course.

George W. Bush
04-05-2004

“We will stay the course until the job is done, Steve. And the temptation is to try to get the President or somebody to put a timetable on the definition of getting the job done. We’re just going to stay the course. “

George W. Bush
12-15-2003

George W. Bush's pants catch on fire after his latest prevarication about never saying 'staying the course'.
“Stay the course? Nuh uh! I never said stay the course!”

Rewind: Supreme Corruption

2023 marks the 20th anniversary of the BilgeBucket Gazette. Our first issue was on May 19, 2003 and we’ve been shoveling it to the public, just like the corporate media, ever since. We changed our format to a WordPress blog in 2011 so all of our earlier material was archived. We’ve been reposting many of those archived articles, headlines, photo-toons, BilgeBucket Lists and other content over the past twelve years. In honor of our 20th, and because we’re sick of the current state of affairs in the world, we’ll be reposting more items from 2003 through 2009 throughout this year.

In our last post we recycled a photo-toon showing how corrupt the Supreme Court had become since the 2010 Citizens United decision which gave the rich unfettered power to influence politicians. We had a link to an old post with another photo-toon about the Supreme Court’s corruption which we’ve decided to repost as well.

We’ve already talked about Clarence Thomas’ luxury trips courtesy of conservative billionaire Harlan Crow. It’s come out now that Justice Thomas has been influenced even more by an elite circle of plutocrats. Surprise, surprise! Lawrence O’Donnell gave an excellent commentary about Thomas the other night which is pretty much right on the money, pardon the pun. Is it any wonder that so many Americans have no faith in the Supreme Court. Like we’ve said before, the current Supreme Court is supremely corrupt and the justices who have accepted gifts from wealthy benefactors should resign if they are truly interested in maintaining a judicial system based on ethics and morality.

Poor Plutocrats everywhere are rejoicing now that their corporate lackeys on the Supreme Court have given them control of America.
Plutocrats everywhere are rejoicing now that their corporate lackeys on the Supreme Court have finally given them a voice in the running of America.

Rewind: Judge(s) For Sale

2023 marks the 20th anniversary of the BilgeBucket Gazette. Our first issue was on May 19, 2003 and we’ve been shoveling it to the public, just like the corporate media, ever since. We changed our format to a WordPress blog in 2011 so all of our earlier material was archived. We’ve been reposting many of those archived articles, headlines, photo-toons, BilgeBucket Lists and other content over the past twelve years. In honor of our 20th, and because we’re sick of the current state of affairs in the world, we’ll be reposting more items from 2003 through 2009 throughout this year.

Over the last three years, especially since Roe v. Wade was overturned last year, information has been revealed showing that our supposedly ethical, apolitical and morally superior Supreme Court judges may not be so noble. Apparently, all six conservative judges have ethics scandals where they have been influenced by wealthy conservative benefactors thus jeopardizing the impartiality of the justices or compromised by conflicts of interest with business deals. It was just reported that Judge Samuel Alito took luxury fishing trips with a billionaire conservative donor. Judge Clarence Thomas took luxury vacations and received tuition payments for a relative from conservative plutocrat Harlan Crow. Judge Neil Gorsuch had a suspicious property sale to a prominent law firm head nine days before his confirmation hearing. The FBI revealed that its pre-confirmation investigation into Judge Brett Kavanaugh was a complete sham. Judge Amy Coney Barret had a shady real estate deal with a religious group that filed numerous briefs before the court. Judge John Robert’s wife made over ten million dollars as a legal consultant. Even liberal leaning Sonia Sotomayor refused to recuse herself in a case with a book publisher who paid her three million dollars for a book deal.

The die was cast for what’s happening now with the Supreme Court back in 2010 when the Citizens United case was decided which basically stated that corporations are people and that these rich entities may give unlimited amounts of money to politicians and government officials in the pursuit of political power. We’ve had a few posts and photo-toons over the years indicating that the Court was now for sale to plutocrats (here and here). Our first one was a photo-toon on August 13, 2011 which basically portrayed the Supreme Court as being for sale to the highest bidding corporation that we decided to repost because it is very appropriate considering recent revelations. As we’ve noted before, the Roberts court a.k.a. the American Taliban, is a complete joke.

Supreme Court Justice John Roberts wears the new NASCAR inspired corporate logo robes because corporations are people, too - very, very , very rich people
Supreme Court Justice John Roberts wears the new NASCAR inspired logo robes which will now be worn by all conservative justices.

Finally . . . Justice

We interrupt our 20th anniversary retrospective for some great news. It seems that the Grand Jury in New York has chosen justice and indicted the twice-impeached, former CEO/Dictator of the United States Donald J. Trump on his illicit payments to cover up his affair with porn star Stormy Daniels. While we’d prefer he get indicted for trying to overthrow a legitimate election and inciting an attempted coup, we’ll gladly take this. Will TFG actually have to serve time in prison. Probably not, but we can always hope and dream can’t we. We’ll have to wait and see but then again we’ve become accustomed to waiting haven’t we.

We’ve altered a photo-toon from our July 21, 2017 post to show that Trump may actually have to pay the piper for once in his overprivileged, corrupt life.

For once in his overprivileged, corrupt life, twice-impeached former CEO/Dictator and petulant man child Donald Trump will actually have to pay the piper.
For once in his overprivileged, corrupt life, twice-impeached former CEO/Dictator and petulant man child Donald Trump will actually have to pay the piper.

Rewind: WMDs In North Dakota?

2023 marks the 20th anniversary of the BilgeBucket Gazette. Our first issue was on May 19, 2003 and we’ve been shoveling it to the public, just like the corporate media, ever since. We changed our format to a WordPress blog in 2011 so all of our earlier material was archived. We’ve been reposting many of those archived articles, headlines, photo-toons, BilgeBucket Lists and other content over the past twelve years. In honor of our 20th, and because we’re sick of the current state of affairs in the world, we’ll be reposting more items from 2003 through 2009 throughout this year.

Here’s our very first article from our May 19, 2003 issue. Back then the Republicans had just invaded Iraq on the false claim that they had Weapons of Mass Destruction. This gave rise to the imperialistic Bush Doctrine which states that the United States has the right to invade a country if they are suspected of having WMDs or being a threat in any way, which opens up a host of possibilities for abuse of power and violation of civil liberties. But that doesn’t matter to the authoritarian Republicans as Bush Press Secretary Ari Fleischer proved by repeatedly doing his impersonation of a Stasi agent telling people they should watch what they say. So basically, the Republicans haven’t changed since 2003, they’re just exposed thanks to Trump and the attempted Jan. 6th insurrection to overthrow the government.

Bush Says North Dakota Has Weapons of Mass Destruction

President George Bush said today in an emergency press conference that he suspects North Dakota may have weapons of mass destruction and that he will push for complete disarmament or he will invade.

“Our intelligence has detected missile silos in North Dakota,” said Bush. “They have become a menace to the world. Their leader is worst than Hitler! I’ve seen footage of people being fed into wood chippers. If we do not stop them, a nuculyar castastr…catatat…boom-boom could happen. If they do not disarm, we will invade in twenty four hours.”

Jarrod Dayson, an alert reporter from Newsblog then reminded the president that North Dakota was in the United States and that the missile silos housed American nuclear weapons. Press Secretary Ari Fleischer, then interrupted the president, whispered into his ear and rushed him from the stage. He then commandeered the press conference explaining, “I apologize for the president’s latest statements. He awoke early from his nap and was having nightmares after watching the movie Fargo last night. North Dakota is a wonderful state and Governor Hoeven is not worse than Hitler. He was just repeating statements that he heard Bill Clinton say when he was president. Thank you.”

Fleischer then barred Dayson from any further press conferences stating in an irritated tone, “How dare he question the president of the United States! He must be for terrorism!” Forces from Homeland Security appeared and ushered Dayson on a plane to Guantanamo Bay.