Brand Recognition

On the eve of the Republican National Convention, a.k.a. The Finest Dumpster Fire The World Has Even Seen, the RNC is busy preparing themselves for what looks to be a complete clusterf*ck. Donald Trump seems to have selected Indiana governor, christian soldier and blandest man alive, Mike Pence, as his running mate. Many prominent Republicans are not even attending the convention, preferring to distance themselves from Mr. Trump. Given this, the Republican party has decided to officially assent to the rise of Trump by re-branding the party with a brand new logo which more properly reflects its current ideology: a steaming pile of patriotic shit (note the dead elephant’s trunk sticking out on top).

On the eve of the Republican convention, the GOP has revealed its brand new logo which more accurately represents its current ideology: a steaming pile of patriotic shit.
On the eve of the Republican convention, the GOP has revealed its brand new logo which more accurately represents its current ideology.

Pander Express

It’s the first week in July and the good news for most of America is that there is only four months left in the farce that is Con-a-thon 2016. Polls show that Hillary has opened up substantial leads in the battleground states, which has given most sane Americans a reason to breathe a sigh of relief.  But there is a reason for pessimism. Let’s face it folks; Hillary is far from perfect and has lots of baggage. We’ve felt that she’s moved to the right and is for all intents and purposes a moderate Republican and Noam Chomsky seems to agree. Her coziness to Wall Street is why so many left leaning Democrats and Independents (like us) ‘felt the Bern’ this past year.

Hillary and Bill Clinton also have a history of pulling stupid gaffes at inopportune times. Of course, Bill’s infamous affair with Monica Lewinsky during his presidency stands out as the biggest blunder.  Bill Clinton almost hurt his wife yet again recently. He reportedly met with current Attorney General Loretta Lynch in secret during a layover in Phoenix recently with the FBI’s investigation of Hillary’s private email server looming.  Fortunately, for Hillary, the FBI found her to be ‘extremely careless’ but should not be charged of any wrongdoing.

In addition to Bill pulling boners (pun intended), Hillary has had a huge problem of appearing disingenuous to the American public. Recently, she talked about income inequality while wearing a $12,000 pantsuit. Several months back, while blatantly pandering to moderate Republican, she credited the Reagans for bringing awareness to AIDS, which is the exact opposite of what they did.

Throughout the debates and the primaries, Hillary and Bernie Sanders clearly distinguished themselves as the only adults in the room. If Hillary is to win the election, (and we here at the Bucket sincerely hope that she does now that Bernie Sanders is out), she’s going to have to cut down on the gaffes and change her duplicitous persona. She needs to aggressively attack Trump and the Republicans every chance she gets. She needs to play to win and not play not to lose, like her predecessors Al Gore and John Kerry. Fortunately, she seems to be doing that so far and Trump seems to be doing a pretty good job of self-destruction as well.

No doubt the Republicans will continue their witch hunt and character assassinations of Hillary. They’re already throwing a tantrum about the FBI findings. But it seems that fortunately, for her and America, she’s inherited some of Bill’s Teflon coating.

Hillary Clinton blatantly panders for moderate Republican votes, while the ghost of conservative icon, St. Ronald Reagan, makes a funny about the fallacy of trickle down economics, much to the delight of doting ghost wife, Nancy.
Hillary Clinton blatantly panders for moderate Republican votes, while the ghost of conservative icon, St. Ronald Reagan, makes a funny about the fallacy of trickle down economics, much to the delight of doting ghost wife, Nancy.

The Sun Is Setting On John McCain

Arizona’s Senior Senator John McCain keeps losing more and more respect by the day. Recently, he made headlines by boldly claiming that President Obama was ‘directly responsible’ for the Orlando shootings. In trying to clarify his fallacious statement he completely forgot that it was George W. Bush who created the power vacuum in the Middle East by invading Iraq, which allowed not only Al-Qaeda to thrive but also allowed the ISIS movement to be born.

Then McCain turned the ‘crazy’ knob to eleven and endorsed Donald Trump. If you remember, last year Trump questioned McCain’s war hero credentials and criticized McCain for getting captured. Now, almost a year later, McCain is going to endorse the man who insulted him. This (and his stubborn refusal to vote on a new Supreme Court justice) is apparently why support for his Democratic opponent, Ann Kirkpatrick has surged in recent polls, and even has her ahead in one. Our advice to Senator McCain(like he’s asking us): you’ve had a good run, but it’s time to retire to one of your seven or eight or twenty houses you own and start shooing kids off your lawn and away from your precious gold. We have no doubt you’ll be great at it.

Senator and crusty old coot, John McCain, blames Obama for the Orlando shooting and promptly endorses Donald Trump for President.
Arizona’s Senior Senator and crusty old coot, John McCain, demonstrates why he should retire from politics and start a successful new career of keeping kids off his lawn and away from his gold.

 

Rewind: Stay The Course!

From the unfrigginbelievable file…

It was just announced that none other than ol’ Dubya, George W. Bush, has come out of retirement to help GOP Senators who are having trouble with their failing campaigns this fall because of the toxicity of the Republican nominee for President, Donald Trump. Isn’t that like calling in an arsonist to put out a fire? It’s amazing that just ten years ago, most sane Americans were thinking the Republican party couldn’t get much worse than good ol’ Dubya and the Bush administration. For those of you with anemic memories who actually have forgotten how horrible George W. Bush was, here’s a short list and a longer list to remind you that he’s the worst President since Herbert Hoover.

Of course, conservative Republicans being conservative Republicans, can never admit that they’re ever wrong about anything. So rather than change direction, they just plow over the cliff and into the abyss. Good luck with that Dubya thingee, GOP.

Here’s a photo-toon from our December 7, 2005 issue.

President Bush shouts his mantra 'Stay the course!', while joyriding his Republican made vehicle, America, off a cliff with Vice President Cheney, Secretary of State Rice and Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld.
President Bush shouts his mantra while joyriding his Republican made vehicle, America, off a cliff with Vice President Cheney, Secretary of State Rice and Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld.

Paul Ryan: Man Of Integrity

The so called GOP stalwarts, who have so brazenly yelled what a monster Donald Trump is, are falling one by one to the bullying charms of this authoritarian megalomaniac. Bold men like Mitch McConnell, Lindsey Graham, Ted Cruz, Marco Rubio are now sycophantic bootlickers of the orange haired menace. The latest to cave in meekly to the Donald: Republican Speaker of the House, Paul Ryan.

We’ve never really taken to Mr. Ryan. During Con-a-thon 2012, when he was Spiff Romney’s vice-presidential candidate, we noted the several times he just flat out lied or was a complete hypocrite. (Here, here and here.)

Nothing’s changed really. For months, he claimed he wasn’t interested in taking over Speaker of the House for John Boehner and then suddenly …BOOM… he’s Speaker of the House. So I guess this latest development shouldn’t come as any surprise. Paul Ryan has been boldly stating (or conning) these past several months that he just can’t support Donald Trump. But after a ‘very important’ meeting this past week, Ryan now endorses Trump. What a man of integrity! Why shucky darn…with guys like Trump and Ryan leading the way, changing their points of view every time the wind blows, America’s sure to be great again in no time.

Jug eared Speaker of the House, Paul Ryan, shows what a man of integrity he is by supporting someone he can't stand like Donald Trump much to the delight of one of his plutocratic overlords.
Speaker of the House, Paul Ryan, shows what a man of integrity he is by supporting someone he can’t stand like Donald Trump much to the delight of one of his plutocratic overlords.

Trump: Jesus’ Twin?

One of the more perplexing things about the rise of Donald Trump is the support he’s getting from the evangelical christians. We thought for sure they would support supposed ‘savior’ Ted Cruz, but they have overwhelmingly come out in support of someone who is thrice married; a hedonist, morally bankrupt and has at best a sketchy knowledge of the bible. We’re atheists here at the Bucket and we probably know more about the bible than Trump. Samantha Bee recently gave a hilarious analysis of the religious right evangelical’s seemingly hypocritical viewpoint. It’s definitely a lip diddler for us, folks. But then again, we can’t figure out how the hell Donald Trump is the GOP nominee for president.

Capitalist Jesus, who is also very Republican, admires his ideological twin, Donald Trump, for his greedy, egomaniacal, petty, self-aggrandizing, misogynistic, bombastic, materialistic, deceitful, callous, bigoted, and oppresive nature.
Capitalist Jesus, who is also very Republican, is stoked that his ideological twin, Donald Trump, looks to be the GOP nominee for president.

GOP: It’s All About The Size Of The Hand…And The Penis

The GOP hit a new all-time low last week; and that’s saying something because they’ve been nothing but abysmal ever since the travesty that is Con-a-thon 2016 started last summer (Geez has it been that long already!). Yes, middle school students running for student body president are officially more mature than the grown-up Republicans running for President. It started when Marco Rubio, a.k.a. Marcobot 2016, intimated that frontrunner, megalomaniac Donald Trump, might be less of a man because he had small hands. Well Trump, being a manly man, wasn’t going to let that comment slide and suggested in the next Republican debate that he was all that and more. Really???!!!! The Republicans are comparing dick sizes????!!!! IN A  PRESIDENTIAL DEBATE????!!!!! No folks, this isn’t an episode of the Jerry Springer show or a bunch of drunks in a local tavern. These are supposedly legitimate adults who want to run this country, the most powerful in the world,…and they’re talking about the size of their penises.

We’re wondering what the last great Republican President, Dwight D. Eisenhower, would have said about today’s pathetic GOP.

GOP frontrunner, Donald Trump, assures the ghost of Ike that despite having small hands, his penis is huge.
The ghost of the last great Republican president, Dwight D. Eisenhower, warns Americans of the two greatest dangers to their liberty: an unchecked military-industrial complex and a man with a small penis.

GOP & KKK’s White Knight

Super Tuesday has come and gone and the Trump Express keeps rolling on, much to the chagrin of every sane, responsible American. Trump won seven states in Tuesday’s primaries and is positioned strongly to get the Republican nomination in the colossal clusterf*ck that is Con-a-thon 2016.

Endorsements keep coming in as well for the Donald. Among the endorsements this past week, was one from former Louisiana Representative David Duke, who also used to be a Grand Wizard of the Ku Klux Klan. In an interview on CNN, Trump passed up a chance to disavow Duke, saying that he didn’t know Duke. The thing is that Trump does know who is Duke is and he manipulated the media in typical Trump (and conservative) fashion – deny, blame others and blow his own horn.

In the joke that was Con-a-thon 2012, we posted an article about a possible brokered convention where a ‘white knight’ candidate would come rushing in to save the GOP.  Well, that ‘white knight’ is here in Con-a-thon 2016 for the Republicans and the KKK alike and his name is Donald Trump. Don’t let the media reports fool you; if Trump keeps winning and shows that he’s “the people’s choice”, then you better believe that the so-called ‘establishment’ will endorse him. Power is power and the moneyed elite will love having one of their own at the controls in Washington. Face it; Donald Trump is the face of the modern Republican party. Welcome to Hell, America!

Master of the Con, Donald Trump masterfully denies knowledge of the KKK while inviting them to his penthouse.
GOP frontrunner and Master of the Con, Donald Trump, deftly deflects knowledge of the Ku Klux Klan while simultaneously keeping open lines of communication with the white supremacist group.

The Ice Queen Goeth

The New Hampshire primaries were this past week and Bernie Sanders and Donald Trump were the big winners on the Democratic and Republican sides respectively. Of course, it also meant that the Republican clown car just got roomier in the continuing sham that is Con-a-thon 2016.

Carly ‘Ice Queen’ Fiorina,  New Jersey boss Chris Christie and some guy named Jim Gilmore decided to suspend their presidential campaigns this week. It was expected that Fiorina would go soon since she wasn’t even invited to participate in the last Republican debate. Her numbers have dropped since her support of a fraudulent video against Planned Parenthood last year. Chris Christie didn’t receive an expected bounce from his thrashing of Marco Rubio in last week’s debate, so he went back to Jersey. And as far as Jim Gilmore goes, he never really had a chance. He wasn’t even in our original photo-toon of the the Republican clown car (see above link). He’s continually polled at 0% so he finally smelled the coffee and said goodbye.

Who’ll be the next to go? We think the eternally sleepwalking Ben Carson will be the next outcast from the clown car since he doesn’t even know when to come on stage (Donald Trump didn’t either for that matter). Stay tuned folks! The six remaining Republican clowns are sure to provide more comedy in the coming weeks.

The latest outcasts from the Republican clown car include Ice Queen Carly Fiorina, Jersey boss Chris Christie and some guy named Jim Gilmore.
The latest outcasts from the Republican clown car include Ice Queen Carly Fiorina, Jersey boss Chris Christie and some guy named Jim Gilmore.

The Ever Popular Mount Bushmore

There’s a reason that Jeb Bush is now the least popular Republican presidential candidate in the farce that is Con-a-thon 2016. It’s because he’s absolutely so out of touch that he thinks that getting his brother, ex-President, George W. Bush will actually help his campaign, saying that Dubya is ‘very popular’. Yes, in Jeb’s little world they’re replacing all the sculptures on Mt. Rushmore with replicas of Dubya and renaming it Mount Bushmore.

In Jeb Bush's world, Mount Rushmore will be remade into Mount Bushmore to honor his super, duper popular, ex-president  brother George W. Bush.
In Jeb Bush’s little world, Mount Rushmore will be remade into Mount Bushmore to honor his super, duper popular, ex-president brother George W. Bush.