corporatism – Page 24 – BilgeBucket Gazette

The Media Con Is On!

An amazing thing happened here in Arizona recently. Self proclaimed democratic socialist and Democratic candidate for president, Bernie Sanders, drew 11,000+ people to his rally in Phoenix, Arizona. Let us repeat that. Liberal Bernie Sanders drew 11,000+ people to his rally in red state Arizona. That’s more than the 4,200 than conservative, billionaire blowhard Donald Trump drew when he was in Phoenix. (Of course, Donald Trump, being the egotistical, bombastic salesman that he is, claimed that 15,000 people attended, even though the Phoenix Fire department said it was 4,200). You’d think the so called ‘liberal’ media would be all over the Sanders rally, exclaiming 24/7 that a liberal drew record crowds in a red state. That night the local, mostly conservative media outlets gave it only a passing mention, but instead devoted several minutes to the Donald’s comments about Arizona Senator John McCain not being a war hero. We checked CNN the next day and nary a mention of Sanders amazing rally. But they sure had coverage of Donald Trump’s mouth.

Ladies and Gentlemen, the neocon media con is on! We’ll be posting more on this elaborate and concerted effort by monied interest to bamboozle the American public into voting for the Republican candidate of choice of the corporate oligarchy that runs this country. Right now Donald Trump is doing his crazy billionaire schtick to make the other Republican candidates look sane by comparison. Our corporate overlords’ hope is that by next summer, Jeb Bush or Scott Walker will be looking like the only reasonable choice, especially if the media gives little coverage to sane, responsible people like Bernie Sanders or Hillary Clinton.

Liberal Bernie Sanders recently drew a crowd of 11,000 people in red state Arizona, but the big news is the inane blathering of megalomaniac, billionaire blowhard, Donald Trump.

Republican Clown Car 2016

Guess what everyone? It’s time for another presidential election. Didn’t we just finish this crap? Well, with a scant 16 months left before the 2016 presidential election, it’s time for CON-A-THON 2016… and we’ve already got 16 Republican presidential candidates. That’s right! 16!!!! You’d think that all this choice would be a good thing. But we’re talking about the modern Republican party. We’re not sure who coined the term, but the most accurate description of this collection of colossal egos has to be the Republican Clown Car (They’re also available for birthday parties and bar mitzvahs). Early polls are indicating that Jeb “Don’t Call Me Bush” Bush and perennial blowhard and teabagger favorite Donald Trump, are leading the polls. But if you peruse our archives for Con-a-thon 2012, you’ll see that there was a new flavor-of-the-week back then, too. One week it was Newt Gingrich; the next it was Herman Cain; and the next it was Rick Santorum, who apparently hasn’t learned his lesson that he’s not appealing to a wide swath of Americans. Oh well…this circus and extraordinary waste of money is sure to be amusing for the next 16 months. Really???!!! Another 16 months of this shit???!!!!

The Republican Clown Car for the 2016 Presidential election, also known as Con-a-thon 2016. — Ladies and Gentlemen: Introducing the Republican Clown Car for Con-a-thon 2016.

The Real Boss In America

The Trans-Pacific Partnership is a huge, free trade agreement with the U.S., Canada, Mexico, Japan and eight other Asian-Pacific countries. It’s just about a done deal thanks to the Republican Congress who wants to shove this through as fast as possible and a pliant President Obama, (sometimes known as the Compromiser-in-Chief), who is proving that he is as big a corporatist as Bill Clinton, Reagan and the Bushes. While proponents tout that this pact will lead to economic growth, development and job creation (NAFTA anyone?), opponents are sounding the alarm that the agreements contents are being kept secret because it’s really a gigantic gift to give multinational corporations to do whatever the hell they want including off-shoring more American jobs, exposing the U.S. to unsafe food products and empowering corporations to smash our environmental and health safeguards.

If any American had any doubt that representative democracy is dead in the U.S., take a look at the secrecy involved between the corporate world and congress to get this thing passed on the fast track. There is nothing democratic about the passing of this new deal and it pretty much confirms that America is a corporate oligarchy. Corporate States of America or Holy Corporate Empire; either one sufficiently describes America today. We also think there may be another reason why Obama wants to the same thing as Boehner, Cruz and other CONgressional Republicans, which is illustrated in the following photo-toon.

Obama proclaims he supports the TPP because he's a corporatist, doesn't want to be impeached and he wants to please his corporate masters. — America’s corporate, elite plutocrats applaud the fast tracking of the TPP by their political lackeys to prove to every one on planet Earth who really is the boss in America.

Capitalism? More Like Cannibalism

It’s obvious that our nation is not a functioning representative democracy anymore. Thanks to the recent Supreme Court Citizens United and McCutcheon vs FEC decisions, we can safely say that the United States of America is a corporate oligarchy, where only the wealthiest corporations have a say in what happens to America. So contrary to what the Republican say, big government isn’t the problem; corporate America controlling the government is the problem. After all, Republicans and Democrats nowadays are just corporate lackeys; doing their corporate overlord’s bidding for campaign contributions. It is truly sad to see that America is as corrupt as a banana republic. The whole idea behind the Republican’s ‘government is the problem’ con is to fool the masses into thinking that relaxing government regulations and oversight on corporations is a great thing for freedom when in fact it is the worst thing that can happen. Let’s be honest and frank here; capitalism breeds greed, avarice and selfishness. These traits are counter to everything a supposedly ‘christian’ nation holds dear. Without regulations, humanity’s greed runs rampant and our economy and society truly becomes a rat race. It’s shocking that just living basically and simply today costs an arm and a leg. People everywhere in the past ten years have gone under. The middle class has all but disappeared. In order to survive, people have to raise rates, fees and prices to exorbitant levels just to break even. Just taking a beloved pet to the vet can bankrupt a person. It’s gotten to a point where you have to wonder whether it’s capitalism anymore or cannibalism. Is this really what we want for our society?

Modern capitalism has taken on a more cannibalistic approach. — Capitalism: devouring the humanity from humans since the Middle Ages.

CEO Dan Price Gets It

It’s only April but we here at the Bucket already have a nominee for Person of the Year. CEO Dan Price of Seattle’s Gravity Payments, a credit card processing company, lowered his pay by a million dollars and raised the pay of his workers so that the minimum wage at his company is $70k a year. Finally, a CEO that gets it! Since the ’80s, when Reaganomics brought upon massive deregulation, CEO salaries have skyrocketed so that now the average difference between CEO and worker salary in America, is around 257:1. For comparison purposes, in other countries, gaps range from between 28 in Poland to 148 in Switzerland (this report also reports the American gap at 354:1). This move by Dan Price is a breath of fresh air. Now if only more CEOs would follow his lead, workers would finally be able to have a living wage. They would have more money to not only afford the basics but also buy other items, which will in turn help boost the economy. Kudos to Dan Price!!! We salute you!!!

Billionaire President and CEO of Juggermart, Lawrence T. Juggers, says Dan Price is wrong and that CEOs need to treat employees like the scum they are. — Billionaire President and CEO of Juggermart, Lawrence T. Juggers, demonstrates why most Americans view today's CEOs as being greedy assholes.

Cheney: Lying War Criminal

Dick Cheney recently reared his ugly head again. YAY! In a Playboy interview, he said that President Obama was the worst president of his lifetime. So not only is he a lying sack of manure, he’s senile as well. Amazing how he conveniently forgets the eight years he spent as Vice President/War Criminal to one of the most egregiously inept Presidents to ever step foot in Washington. WHAT A DICK!!!

We started a policy here several posts ago that whenever Dick Cheney appeared in the press spouting his lies, we’d repeat his biggest one on Iraq. This is precisely the same strategy taken by the Bush Administration and the Republican Fear and Noise Machine, a.k.a The Republican Propaganda Network, a.k.a Fox News; to repeat things ad nauseum until the sheeple get it. Every person in America needs to see this video because it proves that at least one very influential person in the Bush Administration knew the Iraq War would be a quagmire and went ahead with it anyway saying instead that we would be greeted as liberators. Bush and Cheney are liars and need to be prosecuted! PLEASE…take time out and view this video!

Cotton, Cotton; This Guy’s Rotten

We’re all familiar now with the name of Tom Cotton, the brash young Senator from Arkansas who stupidly authored a letter signed by 47 idiotic Republican Senators to the leaders of Iran behind President Obama’s back thus putting his negotiations with Iran on a possible nuclear deal in jeopardy and also committing treason. Well the wing nut Teabaggers in the Republican leadership are already trying to clear the way for a Cotton presidency in 2020. Yes, Cotton makes Teabagger darling Ted Cruz look good by comparison. Maybe that’s what the Republican plan is: to keep coming up with more insane candidates to make the previous lunatic look sane by comparison. Shut down the government; run for President. Commit treason; run for President. Just another day in the wacky, wonderful world of the GOP!

Senator Tom Cotton, checks with his insanity mentor, Ted Cruz, to see if he 'dun gud'. — Author of the Iran Letter, Arkansas Senator Tom Cotton, checks with his insanity mentor, Ted Cruz, on his job performance.

Speaking of stupidity, Ted Cruz has announced his candidacy for President in 2016 but apparently didn’t have the foresight to secure the domain name tedcruz.com. Yes, what a great leader he’ll be. Here’s a screenshot of the site tedcruz.com as of today. Hilarious!

Liberal Media My Ass!

Back in December we posted about how obnoxious the Republicans were being about President Obama’s immigration executive order. We also posted about their claims of Obama being an imperial president despite having the fewest number of executive orders of any two term president going back one hundred years. One thing we failed to mention is that none of the four major news networks decided to cover the President’s executive order. Let me repeat that; NONE. ZILCH. NADA. NULL. Hmm… we think that’s a fairly odd way for the ‘liberal media’ to behave. We would think a ‘liberal’ media would televise every moment of a supposedly ‘liberal’ president’s important executive order concerning immigration reform; touting it as the greatest event ever. But, not one of the four major news networks, ABC, NBC, CBS or FOX(big surprise), covered the event.

Now the Republican Noise and Fear Machine has its sights set on probable 2016 Democratic Presidential candidate Hillary Clinton. They’ve already been whining about the Benghazi non-scandal. Now they’re crying about Hillary Clinton using a personal server for government email correspondence as Secretary of State. We’re not trying to sugarcoat Clinton’s handling of her email; she blundered. But it’s no worse than when good ol’ Dubya lost millions of emails in 2007, which the supposedly ‘liberal’ media conveniently glossed over. Or the fact Colin Powell and Karl Rove have used personal email for their own purposes. Or that former Florida governor Jeb Bush, the leading Republican candidate for President in 2016 and Dubya’s brother, had some email problems of his own, using personal email to discuss troop deployments and security issues.

Could it be that the ‘liberal’ media is just a great big con job by the biggest, most well funded, propaganda artists since Joseph Goebbels’ propaganda machine in Nazi Germany? Nah, come on! Just like their stupendously stupid letter to Iran, the Republicans are just joshing with us. Pretty funny, eh?

President Obama takes time to thank the 'liberal' media for their generous coverage of his important immigration executive order back in November 2014. — President Obama takes time to thank the ‘liberal’ media for their generous coverage of his important immigration executive order back in November 2014.

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.

Bibi’s Boner …Or Boner’s Bibi

The big news of the last week is that Israel Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu gave a speech to Congress. It’s not rare that foreign dignitaries address Congress. But what is rare is when leaders of the opposition party, in this case the Republicans, arrange for it without the President’s knowledge. Yes, Speaker of the House and Chief Oompa Loompa, John Boehner (pronounced bo-ner), secretly arranged for Netanyahu to come speak to Congress to push for opposition of President Obama’s upcoming nuclear agreement with Iran. In some circles, the covert negotiation of a foreign leader or government by an unauthorized citizen is known as treason. As Jon Stewart pointed out in his always hilarious analysis, if the Democrats had invited the President of France behind George W. Bush’s back in the lead up to the Iraq War, the Republicans would have been screaming bloody murder. Despite this treasonous act by Boehner and the other Republicans in Congress, President Obama calmly and effectively explained afterward why he thinks Netanyahu, who, like Republicans, has been beating the war drum consistently for a quarter of a century, is wrong. One can only describe this move by the Republicans as colossally dickish, but what else is new.

New United States President, Israeli Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu suggests a war with Iran as successful as the Iraq War as treasonist John Boehner approves. — The Republican’s newly anointed President, Israeli Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu, proclaims his intentions for war with Iran with giddy approval from Treasonist of the House and Chief Oompa Loompa, John Boehner.