They’ll Know We Are Christians By Our Discrimination And Intolerance

The nation’s outrage over Indiana’s recent law guaranteeing ‘religious freedom’ and condoning discrimination and intolerance is growing. Boycotts have been announced. Even corporations have announced that they’ll be changing their business relations with the state; which is very serious because this nation is a corporate oligarchy and business is the golden calf here. So you think with all the economic pressure coming to bear on Indiana, do you think conservative christian stalwart, Governor Mike Pence, is going to relent? Hah! No way! He stands firmly behind his decidedly non-christian behavior. Not only that, other leading candidates for the Republican nomination like Jeb Bush and Ted Cruz have announced support for Pence. Because you see, admitting that you’re wrong on anything is not something that conservative christian Republicans do. But as the christians have always stated throughout history(see Spanish Inquisition, Meso-America conquest, Native American conquest, Pacific Islander conquest, Galileo’s scientific discoveries, etc…), it’s not discrimination or intolerance when we do it; it’s God’s will. It reminds us of that old song we learned in church “They’ll Know We Are Christians By Our Love”, which has been conveniently updated in our photo-toon to reflect the state of modern christianity.

Capitalist Jesus, who is also very Republican, approves of Indiana Governor Mike Pence's new slogan "They'll know we are Christians by our discrimination and intolerance".
Capitalist Jesus, who is also very Republican, approves of Indiana Governor Mike Pence’s new slogan “They’ll know we are Christians by our discrimination and intolerance”.

Insert Knife; Twist Knife

Just when you thought the Republicans couldn’t be more obnoxious, they surprise you and pull off an even more colossally dickish move. In a move right out of Julius Caesar, our Senate Republican Brutuses sent a letter to Iran signed by 47 Republican Senators (7 Republicans, to their credit, didn’t sign) saying that even if the Iranians reach an agreement with Obama, there’s no guarantee that it will be ratified by the Congress. So basically, the Republicans have gone behind the President’s back once again with a foreign power, undermining the President’s authority. They have committed treason for the second time in a week. Here’s a list of the 47 imbeciles who have committed treason against America. Even Iran’s Foreign Minister Javad Zarif dismissed the letter as “mostly a propaganda ploy” and also challenging Republicans on their understanding of constitutional law and of the U.S. Constitution.

Here’s some other reviews on this astronomically assholish move. The New York Daily News said, “We strenuously condemn their betrayal of the U.S. Constitutional System”. The American Conservative said, “Ignorant…Unwelcome and Potentially Harmful. The Washington Post said, “Farcically condescending in word and tone”. The Kansas City Star said, “A nearly unprecedented attempt by one party to meddle in the foreign diplomatic affairs of the United States.” The Detroit Free Press said, “A profound and dismaying disrespect for the office of the Presidency.” We think you get the picture, but go ahead and read why this is “one of the most plainly stupid things a group of senators has ever done”.

It’s pretty obvious that the Republicans are doing everything possible to undermine the President. Many Republicans have openly said they’ve wanted Obama to fail ever since he’s gotten into office.  Can we expect to see a push for impeachment in the next year? As Teabagger darling Sarah Palin would say, “You betcha!”

President Obama proceeds cautiously with negotiations with Iran on their nuclear program, while Senate Republicans like John McCain, Mitch McConnell and Ted Cruz prepare to stick their knives in and commence to twisting.
President Obama proceeds cautiously with negotiations with Iran on their nuclear program, while Senate Republicans prepare to stick their knives in the President’s back and commence to twisting.

Ebola Is Coming! Ebola is Coming?

Remember those halcyon days before the election when the Republicans and, not coincidentally, the supposedly ‘liberal’ media were blathering on and on about how immigrant children were amassing at the border ready to flow into America and take everyone’s jobs; and ISIS was amassing at the border ready to take hostages and behead Americans; and of course the biggest threat of all, the Ebola virus was amassing at the border ready to infect Americans and cause a hideous and painful death. Not surprisingly, these fear tactics worked like gangbusters on the American sheeple. Lo and behold, Congress and the Senate are now filled with Republicans. Nowadays, there’s rarely mention of these menacing invaders ready to take freedom from every American. Surely, Ebola will resurface next year, when the Republicans need to scare the public into voting for Jeb Bush or whoever the Republican Presidential candidate is.

Rednecks discuss how Republicans scared away the Ebola virus and will now make everyone rich.
Some red state Republican voters discuss the brilliance of the GOP fearmongering campaign during the 2014 election, which not only scared away the Ebola virus but will certainly make everyone rich.

 

Imperial President? We think NOT!

We mentioned a few posts back that the Republicans have been whining that President Obama is acting like he’s a king or an imperial dictator. As usual, the GOP’s bluster is at odds with the facts. President Obama has had the lowest number of executive orders to date of any two term president in the last one hundred years. Here’s a handy dandy chart detailing the numbers and showing that Obama definitely is NOT an imperial president. He needs 97 just to catch ol’ Dubya and he needs 187 to catch St. Ronald Reagan, the patron saint of conservative Republicans everywhere. So the next time you hear a Republican whining about Obama being a king, just waive these numbers in their smug, little faces.

President Obama has had the lowest number of executive orders to date of any two term president in the last one hundred years.
'Imperial President' Barack Obama needs just 97 more executive orders to catch the 'bestest president ever' George W. Bush.

 

GOP Scaring Up Votes

The knob on the Republican Noise and Fear Machine has been cranked all the way up to 11 this summer and fall in their desperate attempt to scare Americans into voting for conservative Republican candidates this year and give the Republicans a majority in the Senate and the House. This is the standard GOP tactic and has been used successfully many times in the past to get the American sheeple for vote Republican. What can a rational, thinking person possibly do to combat these horrifying, terrifying, frightening, scare tactics, you may ask? We could start by remembering the words of FDR; “We have nothing to fear but fear itself”. There’s really only one solution to this conservative Republican fearmongering: just say NO… to Republicans!

Republican ghouls McConnell, Cruz, McCain, Krauthammer and Boehner are scaring up votes from the electorate this Halloween.
America’s favorite Republican ghouls have been out this Halloween season literally scaring up votes from the electorate.

The Holy Corporate Empire

Here’s a good article about how America has become a corporate theocracy. Of course, it didn’t happen overnight. Its been happening gradually over the last 60 years; kind of like turning up the heat gradually on a pan of boiling water so the frogs inside the pot don’t even realize they’re getting boiled. Sinclair Lewis famously said something similar to the statement, “When fascism comes to America, it will wrapped in the flag and carrying a cross.” Religions, especially christianity, are authoritarian by nature; the sheep follow the shepherd and do was he says; which is dangerous when the shepherd is a corporatist wolf, only interested in making profits off his duped sheep. Make no mistake; this holy corporatist state is the new fascism and the people implementing it are extremely authoritarian and will not tolerate any dissent.

Before World War II, you could tell a fascist because they usually wore a military uniform, service cap or helmet and jackboots. However, today’s fascist, thanks to wily marketing and propaganda tactics, is much more palatable to the average citizen. Today’s fascist wears a spiffy business suit with a flag lapel pin on one side and a cross on the other. And they’ve always got a sparkling, toothy smile(see Mitt Romney).  If today’s holy corporate fascists have their way, if a business or corporation doesn’t like who you are or what you believe in, they will be able to deny you basic health services, employment or just plain service.  That’s hokum, you say. But look at the decisions handed down by the religious, conservative activist dominated Supreme Court in the past 5 years. Corporations are ‘people’ who can give as much money as possible to political lackeys who will do their bidding and these corporations can impose their will on you in the name of religious freedom. Fascism has arrived in America in a nice, friendly, tidy combination of business, economics and religion that hates science, logic and reason. Goodbye United States of America; Hello The Holy Corporate Empire!

Fascism has a new uniform; Resistance is futile
Goodbye United States of America; Hello Holy Corporate Empire!

GOP Insanity Plea

Just when you thought the Republicans couldn’t get any more irrational… Speaker of the House and Chief Oompa Loompa, John Boehner (pronounced bo-ner), has decided to sue President Obama for doing his job. According to the increasingly mentally unbalanced Republicans who control the House of Representatives, they see President Obama’s perfectly by the book executive orders as overreach of his authority. This despite the fact that President Obama has far fewer executive orders than any of his predecessors. We like that President Obama has finally given up trying to be the Compromiser-in-Chief and that he has said that he is doing his job because Congress is not doing theirs. Booom! There it is!  But the House GOP may have taken the final step for placement into the loony bin when they demanded action from Obama on the influx of immigrants into the southwestern USA after suing him for taking too much action. Talk about wasting taxpayers money! So let’s get this straight: Obama is damned for taking action and he’s damned for not taking action. Yep! Get the straight jackets ready. Boehner and Co. are officially lip-diddling insane.

Chief Oompa Loompa, John Boehner, explains that President Obama is damned if he does and damned if he doesn't.
Speaker of the House and Chief Oompa Loompa, John Boehner, dressed in his stylish new straightjacket, explains why people need to vote the Republicans out of Congress this November.

Let The Children Suffer

Hold onto your hats everyone. Conservative christian Republicans are upset at President Obama! Shocking right? Unaccompanied immigrant children have been crossing the border in record numbers this year and who’s fault is it according to the right wing christians? Obama’s of course, even though the surge is related to law to curb child trafficking passed in 2008 and signed into law by….George W. Bush. What should we do with all these children? Conservative christians have been screaming loudly about the only obvious solution…send the little varmints back. What a great christian attitude! That’s certainly what Jesus would have done…or at least Capitalist Jesus would have done it. Just let holier than thou Bill O’Reilly explain it to you. The new updated Jesus message on little urchins now reads ‘Let the Children Suffer’.

Capitalist Jesus says that the immigrant children should go back to Mexico or rot.
Capitalist Jesus, who is also very Republican, updates his message on little urchins to now say 'Let the children suffer'.

Rewind: Bush Administration Logo

It’s shocking to us here at the Bucket how horrible people’s memories are. A recent poll of 1400 people revealed that more people think President Obama is a worse President than George W. Bush. Were these people unconscious during Bush’s eight years in office? The Bush administration routinely practiced crony capitalism with favored corporations and the Bush tax cuts to the 1% made most Americans poorer and brought America to the brink of disaster. Not to mention the trillions of dollars spent on clusterf*ck quagmire wars of Afghanistan and Iraq. There were also 13 attacks on U.S. embassies causing 98 deaths during the Bush years in addition to the 9/11 attacks which caused 3,000 deaths. Then he used the 9/11 attacks for political purposes over the next three years to keep the sheeple scared.  Oh and then there was the stacking of the Supreme Court with conservative ideologists and activists who have not only opened the door wide for unrestrained corporatism but have given corporations control over females reproductive rights and apparently freedom to push their religion down employees throat. And of course the Bushies denied any wrongdoing while only giving access to Fox News, a.k.a the Republican Propaganda Network. Alternet has a list of some of Bush’s more spectacular failuresFortunately, most historians’ memories haven’t faded and they continue to rank Bush as one of the worst presidents. Here’s a photo-toon from our February 18, 2007 issue which shows the Bush Administration replacing the presidential seal with a more appropriate logo reflective of their ‘moral’ values.

The Bush Administration has commissioned a new logo to more properly reflect the current administration's 'moral' values of Deceit, Denial and Dough.
President George W. Bush has commissioned a new logo to more properly reflect the Bush Administration's 'moral' values.

 

Supreme Jesters

Boy the Supreme Court is certainly showing its true colors the last couple of years. First they showed what supreme corporate lackeys they were by giving corporations ‘personhood’ and then they said these ‘corporate people’ could give as much money as they wanted politically to senators and representatives who will do their bidding. Now apparently, corporations also have religious rights, too. In a landmark case this week, the Supreme Jesters said in the case of Burwell v. Hobby Lobby, that corporations could opt out of paying for an employees birth control because it went against their religious beliefs. Wow! Who knew that corporations could have religious beliefs. Now corporations can make healthcare decisions for their employees. Talk about your death panels, eh Sarah Palin! This decision also provides a loophole for those who oppose Obamacare. Just state that a particular medical procedure goes against your religion and whoop there it is. What’s next? A company or business refusing service to a customer based on religious belief? It almost happened here in Arizona folks. The christians are going to shove their religion down your throat whether you like it or not. (Interestingly enough, Hobby Lobby will pay for vasectomies and Viagra.)

So are you outraged that now corporations are not only citizens with religious beliefs but also more important than women. You can fight back. You hit corporate America where it hurts most; in the pocket book. That’s why we say BOYCOTT HOBBY LOBBY!! There are tons of arts and crafts stores out there. America is all about choice (except when it comes to women’s reproductive rights). Choose to cause Hobby Lobby’s failure. We know that you are mostly consumer automatons and that it’s in your wiring to buy, buy, buy. Be strong! Resist that burning temptation to buy lace doilies or glitter or craft foam or iron-on appliques. Buy them at a locally owned shop! Again we say,  BOYCOTT HOBBY LOBBY!!

Hobby Lobby founder and sanctimonious asswipe David Green says that women should be barefoot and pregnant and making crafts much to the chagrin of intelligent women everywhere.
Hobby Lobby founder David Green and his wife, whose name isn't important, preach their christian philosophy to ignorant, heathen women boycotting their store.