Tag Archive for bible

The Golden Calf Still Bleats

America’s twice impeached former CEO/Dictator and petulant man child Donald Trump, a.k.a. TFG, is still bleating to his MAGA Moron followers how persecuted he is with some of his sheeple touting him as the new Jesus. We delivered a post back on April Fool’s Day in 2017 which pretty much sums up what Donald Trump is.

Since nothing has changed about this charlatan since then, our analysis still applies: If you make under 100k a year and you vote Republican, you are voting against your own self interests and you are a sucker and a fool. Or to put it in biblical terms, you are worshiping a modern day golden calf and that calf’s name is Donald Trump.

Donald Trump - Modern Day Golden Calf
The biblical myth of the golden calf has resurrected itself in the form of American CEO/Dictator Donald Trump.

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.

Rewind: R U Rapture Ready?

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 recent turmoil in the Middle East between Israel and the Palestinians have the got the conservative evangelical christians thumping their bibles salivating for the end times and the rapture when all good christians will be slurped up to heaven (which is presumably somewhere in Earth’s atmosphere although no satellite photos have shown its precise whereabouts).


Of course, anytime anything goes wrong in the Middle East (which is pretty much every day) the christians scream about the end times and how Jesus is coming again. Back in July and August of 2006, the Lebanon War between Hezbollah and Israel had evangelicals sounding the alarm. But alas, the end of the world didn’t happen and nobody was raptured. The fact that at that time, legitimate news organizations like CNN would actually mention the rapture should make logical, intelligent and reasonable citizens very weary of any news organization that would promote such ridiculous bunk as the rapture. It’s kind of like entertainment shows that still feature astrologers and horoscopes. But then again, America elected Trump in 2016. Stupid is as stupid does.

This photo-toon is from our August 11, 2006 issue.

The escalation of hostilities in the Middle East has launched an obsession of talk about the Apocalypse, the end of the world and the Rapture on supposedly responsible news networks like CNN.
The escalation of hostilities in the Middle East has launched an obsession of talk about the Apocalypse, the end of the world and the Rapture on supposedly responsible news networks like CNN.

Rewind: Ashcroft’s Great Cover Up

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.

After George W. Bush somehow won re-election in 2004, his Attorney General, bible thumper extraordinaire John Ashcroft, decided to call it quits. As he left the Bush administration, we pondered in our November 21, 2004 issue over his greatest accomplishment (or embarrassment). This man is the only man to lose an election to a dead man in the Senate. Ashcroft championed the Patriot Act and warrantless wiretapping. But his prudishness was unbelievable. Ashcroft was just as uptight as ol’ Puritan Pants Mike Pence. Ashcroft spent eight thousand dollars to shield the Spirit of Justice statue in the Hall of Justice because it showed a boob and he didn’t want to be pictured in front of such a display. American Taliban, indeed! We have no doubt that Ashcroft probably bathes in his long johns so as not to offend himself. What a priggish tool!

John Ashcroft's greatest accomplishment during his tenure as Attorney General was his spending $8,000 dollars to cover up the disgraceful nudity of the Spirit of Justice statue in the Hall of Justice.
John Ashcroft’s greatest accomplishment during his tenure as Attorney General was his spending $8,000 dollars to cover up the disgraceful nudity of the Spirit of Justice statue in the Hall of Justice.

GOP Baby Factories – a.k.a. Women

The right-wing dominated Supreme Court has shown their true intentions about abortion rights by recently letting stand severe abortion bans in Texas and Mississippi. We’ve been screaming about their intentions for years here at the Bucket. States with Republican leadership ranging from bible thumping states like South Dakota and Alabama to our home state of Arizona have been slowly chipping away at abortion rights over the last twenty years. Religious zealots have seized control of state and federal government and forced their horribly archaic, first century viewpoints upon the citizenry of the country because these holy huckster bible thumpers still view the woman as nothing more than a baby factory. If these people were truly pro-life, they’d realize that the woman’s life should come first. But then hypocrisy does seem to be commonplace with these sheeple. They claim to be pro-life but then fervently support gun rights. They claim to be pro-life but then violently protest getting a life saving vaccine against a disease that has claimed over 800,000 people in the US and over 5 million word wide.

We’re re-posting a photo-toon from January 11, 2006 when ol’ Dubya nominated Samuel Alito to the Supreme Court. This was the beginning of the end because since then, Alito, Thomas, Kavanaugh and Coney Barrett (the Handmaiden’s Justice) have formed a staunch conservative religious bloc on the court that not only wants to force women through unwanted pregnancies but also to knock down the wall between church and state, thus forcing all of us to adhere to outdated, biblical philosophy whether we like it or not. Like we’ve stated before, we’re regressing rapidly toward America becoming the Holy Corporate Empire.

Supreme Court nominee Samuel Alito displays the only tool (a wire hanger)which will enable a woman to terminate a pregnancy once he's on the bench.
Supreme Court nominee Samuel Alito displays the only tool which will enable a woman to terminate a pregnancy once he’s on the bench.

Epitaph For Planet Earth

Greta Thunberg is making a big splash in the world and we couldn’t be more happy about this bold and courageous teen. She just recently scolded the world leaders to take climate change seriously or forever receive the wrath of the young people for their inaction. Kudos to her!!!

But she’s not the first advocate for climate change. Jimmy Carter actually talked the talk and walked the walk back in the 1970s but thanks to conservative patron saint Ronald Reagan, the nascent green energy movement was ridiculed and quashed before it even got started. Of course, many other intelligent people have stepped to the forefront over the last forty years pushing for alternative energy, only to be ignored and vilified by the powerful oil, gas and coal industries and their Republican (and some Democrats) lackeys in Congress.

A few posts ago we noted how so many modern-day conservatives were against conservation, thus making themselves colossal hypocrites. But it’s much more complex than that, of course. It’s the collective, monstrous egos of our planet’s most intelligent (allegedly) species, homo sapiens, that have done the most damage. When you put it in that context, each and every human being on the planet is responsible for the demise of life on Earth. We are all to blame and if we’re to rectify the problem, we need to all get on the same page. We all need a giant philosophical paradigm shift and that starts with the realization that unregulated capitalism is killing the planet and all the life on it.

Right now thousands of acres of rain forest are burning in South America. The vast Amazon is considered by many to be the ‘lungs of planet Earth’. Yet, it is believed many of these fires were set on purpose by humans; pro-business acolytes of Brazil’s fascist leader Jair Bolsonaro. This authoritarian right winger wants to expand logging, farming and mining industries at the expense of the health and welfare of one of the most vital and important ecosystems of planet Earth because he claims the rain forest belongs to Brazil and he can do whatever he wants.

But Bolsonaro is only doing what other third world countries do when they want to play the capitalistic game. They see the wealth of the exploitative, industrialized first world countries and they want some of that action. Or, he who has the most money wins the game. Of course, once you place living, breathing ecosystems and wildlife as a commodity to be bought and sold for profit, human’s greed and hubris take over with devastating results. There are numerous examples throughout history. Most scientists believe it was humans who killed off megafauna like the mammoth, giant sloth and the saber-tooth tiger. We’ve killed off the Tasmanian tiger, the dodo and the carrier pigeon in the last five hundred years. We almost drove the American buffalo to extinction in the 19th century. We’ve killed off over 60% of species since the 1970s. Greenland is melting at an alarming rate which places its wildlife in peril. Climate change is killing the Great Barrier Reef as is human pollution. A new study has indicated that since 1970, bird populations have fallen 29% or 3 billion fewer birds. All because we ‘intelligent’ humans greedily lust for an abstract commodity; monetary wealth.

But how and why did having money become the most important thing in our world? Because we’re humans, goddamn it! We’re superior creatures! What are we humans supposed to do with our time? Go hiking in the wilderness, relax and enjoy life? Boring!!! We must grow, grow, grow! Bigger, bigger, bigger! We’re taught from day one that we must utilize our superior brains every second of the day or else we’re failures. We can’t just sit around doing nothing. Or can we? If you ask any sane person what their idea of paradise is, they’ll usually respond some idyllic tropical island like Tahiti or some mountain retreat with little to no development and lots of nature or some small remote village where people live simply. So, why are we constantly destroying nature and building ugly concrete and steel structures and athletic stadiums which only last for twenty years? Because we can; as a monument to human ingenuity and greed.

But just because we can do something, doesn’t mean we should. Would it really be so bad to just not build a new multiplex shopping center? Would it be so bad to adopt a simpler lifestyle and enjoy nature and the great outdoors? Would it be so bad to tear down some of our ubiquitous, ugly strip malls and skyscrapers and plant urban forests and farms? Plant an urban garden where that stupid parking lot is. Have a nature reserve where that stupid golf course is. If we combine this with a global effort of birth control and contraception, we can get things under control again. We need fewer humans, not more humans on this planet. Humans, especially ones from industrial, consumptive nations are at the forefront of environmental devastation. We’ve created so much waste that we’re exporting it to third world countries with poor waste management systems. If third world countries become like first world countries, then our planet is truly doomed and we can all kiss our materialistic asses goodbye. We need to dial our greed back from 11. We need to curb our consumption and learn to be content with fewer material possessions and simpler lifestyles. This is the only planet we know of that supports life. We need to put the welfare of our planet before our own wealth, because without the planet, how can we enjoy the wealth? We need to stop worshipping the greedy, egotistical and avaricious and start respecting and caring for nature and our environment. Those paradises we yearn for are right under our feet; we just don’t recognize them because of all the concrete, asphalt and steel.

In an attempt to demonstrate how superior they are, humans are proving to be far more destructive to planet Earth than any asteroid.
In an attempt to demonstrate how superior they are, humans are proving to be far more destructive to planet Earth than any asteroid.

Non-CONSERVation CONSERVatives

America’s CEO/Dictator and distraction generator Donald Trump succeeded again last week in weakening environmental regulations which only benefit industry. We’ve commented ad infinitum about the Republican’s war on science and the environment (Browse through our There’s No Planet B category). They’ve made it no secret that they favor the polluting gas, coal and oil industries over alternative green energy. Just look at the rollbacks of EPA regulations in his first two and a half years in office. The system works like this: Trump distracts the public with mind boggling inane, insipid and stupid comments on Twitter. The compliant and unfocused media takes the bait hook, line and sinker. Trump’s Republican cronies dismantle all those ‘pesky regulations’ or laws which protect us and opens the doors for greedy, selfish, materialistic, capitalistic pigs to plunder the public lands at their heart’s content.

Last week, Trump weakened the endangered species laws considerably. The fact that humans have killed off a whopping 60% of animal species on the planet since 1970 doesn’t matter to modern conservative Republicans, many of whom are religious nutbags and believe that God made the world for us to plunder and that science is nothing but a hoax. According the Union of Concerned Scientists, the Trump has launched over 100 assaults on science so far, the same number Dubya accumulated in eight years. But the only thing that matters to these selfish capitalist pigs is profit in their bank account and stock portfolios. Mike Pompeo has even stated that the ice melting in the Arctic is a good thing because it opens more shipping lanes. That’s right, folks – screw the polar bear, there’s money to be made.

Part of the problem is that capitalism has taken over the globe. In order for capitalism to succeed, it needs rampant consumption by consumers. Of course, these leads to a rampant increase in junk, garbage and debris. With lax environmental laws, people can just dump their stuff anywhere. Our planet is being inundated with plastics, electronic waste and garbage of all types. So in other words, unregulated capitalism is killing our planet.

Like we’ve commented before, what makes this so aggravating is that so many conservatives are somehow against conservation. How can that be? They didn’t use to be. Republicans like Teddy Roosevelt supported some of our most powerful environmental laws. Richard Nixon established the EPA and signed the Endangered Species Act into law. By the very definition of the word, they should be all for conserving resources, wildlife and nature. Modern day conservative Republicans, led by the Trump administration, are nothing but hypocrites when it comes to the environment.

There are many good environmental sites out there. The Kiwireport has a pictorial of shocking pictures of environmental destruction covering the globe. Warning: some pictures are extremely disturbing, especially if you love wildlife and nature. We’ve used a few in our photo-toon below. We urge people to wake up and support fully conservation efforts in your region. Like the environmentalists say: think globally, act locally. The health and welfare of Earth, the only planet we know of that supports life, depends on it.

Somehow American conservatives are against conservation which makes them colossal hypocrites of the highest magnitude.
Somehow, American conservatives are against conservation which makes them colossal hypocrites of the highest magnitude.

Religion: Humanity’s Security Blanket

If you’ve read any post or articles on this site, you know that we’re atheists. Our world view is solidly connected to a 21st century database of logic, reason and scientific knowledge obtained by thorough scientific methods and inquiry. Adherents to religion on the other hand, seem solidly connected to 1st century, 6th century or x century databases that may have made sense in those antiquated times, but given our advanced knowledge of the universe surrounding us, are now woefully obsolete.

Proponents of religion also claim that only they have the answers to life’s questions. Inevitably it boils to certain individuals in the upper echelons of the religious organizations who want to completely control their adherents or sheeple. History has many examples of bloody wars between adherents of one ‘faith’ disagreeing with followers of another leaving nothing but death and scorched earth behind. Many religions state that God made man in his image and that God created the Earth with man as ruler over all other animals. This directly conflicts with scientific evidence uncovered in the last three hundred years which concludes that man created God (or Odin or Zeus or Iron Man. . .pick you favorite fictitious deity) in his image and has used God and capitalism to commandeer and take control of the planet for fun and profit. Even the authoritarian dictator Napoleon commented that “Religion is excellent stuff for keeping common people quiet. Religion is what keeps the poor from murdering the rich.” That’s why there are so many wolves in sheep’s clothing out there making a killing off of the gullible sheeple. There’s also a link between religion and vaccine refusal. So people are dying unnecessarily because the religious leaders are telling their flock to trust prayer (basically thinking good thoughts) over science.

We would think that modern day humans would see religion for what it is: a bloody, soiled security blanket to give us a warm fuzzy about capitalistic, materialistic life on this planet. All you really need to live an ethical and moral life is adherence to the golden rule or the law of reciprocity, which predates christianity or any other modern religions. Treat other people the way you want to be treated. You don’t need to tithe or give money to evangelical preachers so they can buy private jets to spread the gospel or ‘talk to God’. Just be kind and respect your fellow human beings and like Jesus (who was a human being, not a god) taught, share with others and help them when you can. Most major religions have this in their dogma. We’ll even go a step further and say respect animals and nature. The fact that so many evangelical rapture enthusiasts are salivating for complete destruction of the Earth, should be proof that they are insane. Why would anyone who loved God want to ruin his ‘ultimate creation’? And how can conservatives be against conservation? Given the knowledge we’ve obtained about the universe in the last three hundred years, the most important thing a human can do is maintain and preserve life on Earth. There is no planet B, folks. Since we’ve taken over the planet, it is up to us to preserve the life on it.

We’ve talked before that the best spaceship is our own planet. We need to stop being greedy materialists and live within our means. In the words of Henry David Thoreau, “Simplify, Simplify”. We need to listen to modern day scientists. They know what they’re talking about. We need to attenuate our consumption and more importantly reduce the human population using the ethical means of birth control and contraception. By doing this, we can lessen our carbon footprint, decrease our pollution and in general, return the planet to a healthy equilibrium. Ridding ourselves of the antiquated dogmas of religion and embracing environmental science will also go a long way to preserving all life on planet Earth.

Denizens of Earth continue to wrap themselves in the bloody, soiled security blanket of religion putting the health and welfare of the planet in jeopardy.
Denizens of Earth continue to wrap themselves in the bloody, soiled security blanket of religion putting the health and welfare of the planet in jeopardy.

Ban Alabama

As if we didn’t know their viewpoint already, the right wing, conservative, christian Republicans have officially declared war on women. Twenty five Republican males in that hot bed of compassionate christianity, Alabama, have decided to make abortion illegal, even in cases of rape and incest, thus placing it directly in conflict with the 1973 decision of Roe v. Wade and almost guaranteeing a decision in the Supreme Court where ‘compassionate’ christians of all denominations are hoping über-Catholic Brett Kavanaugh will overturn the abortion law and relegate women officially to second class citizens who are nothing more than baby factories just like they were in the bible, two thousand years ago.

This isn’t the first time the right wing christian zealots have tried it and it won’t be the last. South Dakota tried it in 2006 (we even mocked up a re-issued state quarter for them). Other states like Ohio, Kentucky, Mississippi, Georgia and Missouri have also passed Draconian measures to give precedence to the potential life of a fetus over the life of the mother who is actually alive and breathing air in the current, real world. The fetus is a part of the woman’s body and a living woman should always have control over her own body.

We’ve got a suggestion to all sane logical humans who are sick of these so-called ‘right-to-life’ hypocrites who say life is sacred but turn their heads to gun violence which kills thousands every day. Ban these states (how convenient is it that the Alabama state flag is a big red X). Don’t travel to any of these states. Don’t buy merchandise from any store in these states. Women should leave these states in droves. Let these fine examples of compassionate christianity rot. Conservatives proclaimed that they voted for Trump because he was in your face supposedly ‘telling it like it is’. Well, we’re telling it like it is, too. It’s the 21st century, not the 1st century! It’s time to update your database connections you sanctimonious, knuckle dragging troglodytes! Personally, we’d rather have Puerto Rico as a state than Alabama.

Dear Alabama lawmakers: The rest of the United States would like to ban travel and trade to your state until you start living in the 21st century.
Dear Alabama lawmakers: The rest of the United States would like to ban travel and trade to your state until you start living in the 21st century.

Wagging The Rapture Dog

The news is out that the Democrats are pushing for Robert Mueller to testify before Congress and the Trump administration and Republicans are not happy about that. Mitch ‘Turtle Boy’ McConnell tried using Jedi mind tricks in the Senate by repeatedly uttering “Case closed….Case closed.” And of course, America’s CEO/Dictator and delusional man child, Donald Trump, continued his pathological prevaricating on Twitter and on his right wing echo chamber Fox News, a.k.a. the Republican Propaganda Network. But there were some other disturbing developments on the international front that show that the Republicans might take an insane, catastrophic step in order to protect Trump from the fallout of Mueller testifying.

The United States has sent warships to the Gulf of Hormuz in response to ‘troubling’ actions by Iranians. National Security Advisor, war hawk and failed walrus impersonator John Bolton, has been beating the drums for war with Iran since the days of the Iraq War clusterf*ck, which Bolton still thinks was the right call. Now the delusional Bolton thinks starting another war in the Middle East would be another smashing idea and we’re sure the defense corporations are champing at the bit for a new avenue for profit. Therefore, Bolton and Trump are trying to create a Gulf of Tonkin incident so they can start a war with Iran.

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo also seems to be supporting the idea of war with Iran but for a different reason. Pompeo is one of those looniest of loony evangelical christians called a rapturist. In the warped mind of these nutbags, the end times are a-coming which means that all good christians will be slurped up to heaven while the rest of us ‘heathens’ will be left to toil on Earth. One of the pre-cursors for the end times, according to ‘biblical scripture’, is that Jerusalem is recognized as the capital of Israel, which Donald Trump did last year. Now, according to the end times mythology, a great war will occur and Jesus Christ will come again which will facilitate the ‘rapture’. Many prominent Republicans are rapturists including Pompeo, VP Puritan Mike Pence, former Teabagger darling Sarah ‘Ubetcha’ Palin, former Attorney Confederate General Jefferson Beauregard Sessions III, housing secretary Ben ‘Mr. Sandman’ Carson and energy secretary and brain fart expert Rick Perry. So, with a normal, logical, reasonable Secretary of State, war is usually and wisely avoided. But with this evangelical loon, conditions are being forced that would result in a catastrophic conflict in the Middle East. This would mean that biblical prophecy would be ‘proven’ correct and all the ‘good people’ (christians) will get their just desserts in heaven and all the bad people (the rest of us) will suffer in lakes of fire here on Earth.

Of course, these wack jobs fail to consider that the people who wrote the bible lived two thousand years ago and didn’t know jack about the Earth or the universe. We’ve mentioned before that religious people connect to a tiny bronze age database while scientific people connect to a colossal, 21st century database chock full of knowledge. We’ve gained so much knowledge about everything in the last four hundred years. To ignore science, scientific inquiry and scientific methods is sheer lunacy and any person advocating radical ideology based on two thousand year old babble shouldn’t be allowed anywhere near the corridors of power in this country. We guarantee to all those rapture loonies that unless you’re vaporized by a nuclear blast you’ll still be here left to toil on the Earth with the rest of us.

To distract from the possible testifying of Robet Mueller before Congress, American CEO/Dictator Donald Trump has decided to 'wag the dog' with multiple wars much to the delight of National Security Advisor and war monger extraordinaire John Bolton and Secretary of State and Rapture aficionado Mike Pompeo.
To distract from the possible testifying of Robet Mueller before Congress, American CEO/Dictator Donald Trump has decided to ‘wag the dog’ with multiple wars much to the delight of National Security Advisor and war monger extraordinaire John Bolton and Secretary of State and Rapture aficionado Mike Pompeo.