power – BilgeBucket Gazette

Wake Up America! (Part ∞)

Recently, twice impeached former American CEO/Dictator and megalomaniac man child Donald Trump, who is dealing with 91 felony charges against him said something really disturbing. (As if everything from 2015 to present day hasn’t been, amirite?) TFG said at one of his suckfests that he would encourage Russia to invade any of our NATO allies who didn’t pay their bills. That’s right, folks: Trump openly and proudly aligned himself with the ruthless dictator Vladimir Putin and his corrupt autocratic oligarchy. Europe and especially Ukraine needs the United States support now more than ever. They don’t need one of the main candidates for President sucking up to a cold-blooded despot like Putin.

This isn’t the first time he’s flagrantly kissed Putin’s ass on the world stage. Who can forget his meeting with Putin in summer 2018 at Helsinki, where he groveled in front of him looking like he was Putin’s bitch. He has fawned repeatedly over his idol and even stated he trusts Putin more than our FBI. He’s even called for Putin to hack Hillary Clinton’s emails back during the 2016 election.

We’re reposting a photo-toon from August 10, 2018 because it illustrates perfectly the hypocrisy and buffoonery of today’s Republican party. How the hell is Donald Trump still the GOP’s candidate for President when if any of his predecessors would done what he did they would have been rightfully condemned for their actions? Wake up America!!! The orange fraud has performed all three of these actions! He should not only be barred from running from President, he should be deported to Russia so he can live in eternal bliss with his man crush, Vladimir Putin!

Can you imagine the outrage if Eisenhower said he trusted the KGB more than the CIA or if Reagan fawned over a 'strong and powerful' Gorbachev or if Obama received help wining his elections from Putin. — Modern day Republicans conveniently look away from Trump’s outrageous actions that would have gotten previous presidents universal condemnation.

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

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 logo robes which will now be worn by all conservative justices.

Rewind: WMDs In North Dakota?

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.

Coward Of The Country

Ted Cruz. Just saying the name brings a mixture of laughter and revulsion that is hard to describe. Over the past decade, he has cemented his status as the most hated American politician and yet . . . he’s still in Congress, just like other contemptible Republicans Lindsay Graham, Mitch McConnell, Thom Tillis, Susan Collins, etc…. But Ted Cruz, who started out as a Teabagger darling, is especially slimy. We’ve made many photo-toons about Cruz’s reprehensibility over the years but his recent actions have only reinforced his status.

Take his part in the Capitol riots on January 6th. He purposefully lent legitimacy to unfounded claims of voter fraud with fellow GOP corporate lackeys Josh Hawley and Tommy Tuberville (sounds like a kid’s show clown) opposing the legal election of Joe Biden. Then during Trump’s second impeachment trial, these seditionists voted that the petulant man child was innocent despite a 57-43 verdict and Mitch McConnell stating that the orange-haired megalomaniac was certainly responsible for inciting the riot. But Cruz is culpable. He could have promoted unity but instead insisted with his election fraud shenanigans thus egging on the easily triggered Trump troglodytes.

Cruz’s cowardice isn’t surprising considering that he opening ridiculed Trump in the 2016 presidential campaign, performed a 180 and smooched his gargantuan ass when he got the nomination despite Trump calling his wife ugly and saying his dad helped kill JFK.

But Cruz took his vileness to new levels in the past week. Texas suffered one of its worst winter storms on record with temperatures in the normally balmy state dipping down into single digits and snow accumulating across the entire state. Not only that, the power went out because the gas and coal plants weren’t weatherized properly, so people had to deal with rolling blackouts. Some even had to burn furniture or live in their cars. But Ted Cruz had a great solution . . . at least for him. Instead of showing leadership to his constituents, he did the very Republican thing of saying let them eat cake and flew off with his family to Cancun. Wow! The stupidity of this action is enormously stunning! What makes it even more damning for Cruz is that Alexandrea Ocasio-Cortez, who isn’t even from Texas, managed to not only raise millions of dollars for victims but also flew down and helped out. Way to go AOC!

Yes, Ted Cruz has proven himself to be many things; Senator, sycophant, seditionist, traitor and coward. Which begs the question – how and why the hell is he still in Congress?

Ted Cruz: Senator, sycophant, seditionist, traitor, coward.

Trump: Bat Shit Insane

Another day, another bat shit insane action by America’s CEO/Dictator and petulant man child Donald Trump and his army of mindless sycophants. This time, Trump performed head revolutions worthy of the demon from The Exorcist. At the beginning of last week, Trump proclaimed that the ultimate authority laid with him in the reopening of America’s businesses, in shut down due to the coronavirus pandemic currently ravaging the world’s human population. This predictably produced much backlash from people who like the Constitution, law and order, democracy, science, logic and reason. Like Dr. Fauci had said previously, Trump just can’t tell the virus when it has to stop; we don’t set the timetable. So, on this past Thursday Trumpty Dumpty made an announcement stating the ultimate authority on reopening the economy should lie with the governor of each individual state.

You would think that Trump thumpers, being states rights advocates and all that, would have rejoiced. But nooooooooo! Reminiscent of the teabagger movement from ten years ago, armed idiots took to the streets on Friday in states such as Michigan, Ohio and Kentucky proclaiming loudly to all that they will not follow shutdown orders; that it violates their constitutional rights. To make matters ridiculous, our megalomaniac dear Leader tweeted for these ‘very responsible people’ to LIBERATE their respective states, effectively nullifying his statement of the previous day. These aren’t the actions of a level headed, clear minded, logical leader. These are the actions of a bat shit insane, narcissistic asshole who has no regard for human life.

There has been more than 40,000 lives lost in the last two months due to COVID-19. Our leaders should be taking this seriously. The goal should be reopening the country when we have proper testing available so more people won’t fall victim to the virus. But what does Florida governor Rick DeSantis do? He reopens beaches around Jacksonville while Florida is still getting slammed by the virus. The conservative Republicans values have been exposed for all to see and. . . surprise, surprise. . . the only thing they care about is money, wealth and power.

America's Impeached CEO/Dictator and petulant man child Donald Trump demonstrates the bat shit insanity that has endeared him to his equally bat shit insane followers. — America’s Impeached CEO/Dictator and petulant man child Donald Trump demonstrates the bat shit insanity that has endeared him to his equally bat shit insane followers.

Plutocrats Rule; All Others Drool

One of the big pieces of news recently outside the ever expanding vortex of the House impeachment inquiries is the announced candidacy of Michael Bloomberg running for President as a . . . wait for it . . . a Democrat. Yes, that colossal, egotistical billionaire plutocrat. former Democrat-Republican-Independent-Democrat mayor of New York City and corporate media mogul has decided in his infinite wisdom that only another plutocrat with a gargantuan ego can possibly defeat America’s CEO/Dictator and megalomaniac man child Donald Trump. He’s already bombarding the Internet, television stations and all other media outlets with salvos of ads touching all the Democrat’s talking points and, like Trump, has a bottomless pit of money to spend on the campaign.

But will Bloomberg really be a champion for the middle class, something Trump promised he’d be in 2016 and then gave massive tax cuts to the wealthy in 2017? We’re incredibly skeptical of Bloomberg. We’ve commented many times on how Bloomberg and the other plutocrats in America’s oligarchy or the 1% actually run this country. Now the plutocrats are scared that they might actually have to pay their fair share in taxes, something they’ve been avoiding thanks the generous tax cuts offered by every administration since Reagan. The tax cuts from the Republicans in 2017 have massively helped the 1%ers become richer. But as usual, it hasn’t trickled down to the rest of us. Farmers are in crisis mode right now thanks largely to Trump’s trade war. But the realistic possibility of social democrats Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders winning the Democratic nomination is scaring tycoons like Bloomberg witless. Even computer magnate and greedy dickhead Bill Gates (worth $107 billion) whined recently that if he has to pay one hundred billion in taxes, that would be too much. For the math impaired, he’d still have seven billion dollars even if he did have to pay one hundred billion. Awwwww — poor Bill! He’d have to live on just seven billion dollars. How can any person do that? We here in the middle class have no sympathy for the greedy assholes who proclaim that they can’t live on a few measly billion dollars while most Americans struggle to live paycheck to paycheck.

We agree with others who say that the best way Mr. Bloomberg can help out this country is by buying Fox News, a.k.a. the Republican Propaganda Network. That lie machine has been pumping out disinformation, deceptions and crackpot conspiracy theories for almost a quarter of a century and is the main reason we have a cult of evangelical Trump followers running our democracy and rule of law into the ground. Bloomberg and fellow Democratic plutocrats Tom Steyer and Andrew Yang could pool their resources and do it easily. This would be the best use of the plutocrats’ billions: ridding this nation of the real fake news once and for all.

Plutocrat Michael Bloomberg announces that only another billionaire with a colossal ego can defeat Trump much to the delight of other plutocrats, oligarchs and members of the 1%.

Soulless Capitalism

Facebook’s CEO Mark Zuckerberg recently came under fire for stating that he won’t fact check political ads in the upcoming 2020 election thus clearing the way for possibly more election interference from foreign agents. The Mueller report clearly stated that dubious foreign entities played a part in the 2016 election by disseminating false information on social media sites and even hacking into some election systems in Florida. To her credit, Elizabeth Warren challenged Zuckerberg by purposely running a fake news ad on Facebook to draw attention to what a serious problem this is for democracy.

We shouldn’t be surprised though. We’ve commented before about how unregulated capitalism (a.k.a. no laws to check corporations or corporate power) breeds colossal amounts of greed, avarice, selfishness and corruption. We’ve become a SEGUMUCA nation. More people than ever are trying to get rich quick using whatever possible method, even if it’s illegal. Just watch some episodes of American Greed. It’s enough to make you sick. Capitalism is nothing more than indirect cannibalism.

So Mark Zuckerberg is no different than Donald Trump or any greedy capitalist serving in his administration(Wilbur Ross, Steve Mnuchin, etc…) or unethical Republican in the House or Senate who looks the other way while Trump commits crime after crime. They worship the almighty buck and will support all others with the same money-grubbing, materialistic mindset. These callous automatons are only interested in our data so they can make more money off of us schmucks in the middle class who do all the work. And right now, these greedy, soulless capitalists are in complete control of this nation.

Truth and justice don't matter to today's capitalists like Mark Zuckerberg; they're only interested in your data and your money. — Truth and justice don’t matter to today’s capitalists like Mark Zuckerberg; they’re only interested in your data and your money.

Moscow Mitch; Or Moscow’s Bitch

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, a.k.a. Turtle Boy, has been in the headlines a lot lately. Apparently poor little Mitchy doesn’t like his new nickname, ‘Moscow Mitch’, given to him for his refusal to pass election security bills that would ensure Russia doesn’t interfere with the 2020 elections like they did in 2016. Why would anyone, especially a United States Senator, want a hostile foreign nation to interfere with our democratic elections?

Well, Turtle Boy knows that without Russian help, Republicans have no hope of winning. Ever since 1988, Republicans have only won the popular vote in the presidential elections once – that’s right folks – one time(2004). The only reason they’re even competitive in the House of Representatives is because districts are so gerrymandered by GOP controlled states that Republicans have a distinct advantage over Democratic candidates. Even Robert Mueller warned of Russian interference in his recent testimony before the House Judiciary Committee. The Russians hacked elections in all fifty states in 2016. Furthermore, Moscow Mitch knew about it and still did nothing to stop it in 2016 and he will continue to nothing about it because Moscow Mitch places the Republican party above country.

Moscow Mitch also has dubious ties to Russia in that Kentucky has gotten some pretty sweet deals from Russian oligarchs. Yes, Moscow Mitch has sold out his country for fun and profit and yet he has the audacity to accuse Democrats and media outlets of ‘modern day McCarthyism’. How is this dipshit still getting elected despite an approval rating in the thirties in his home state of Kentucky? Maybe its because voting machine companies donate heavily to his coffers. That’s right, ladies and gentlemen; Corporate America has fixed it so Moscow Mitch gets elected time and time again because . . . you know. . . corporations are people, too. Thanks Supreme Court!

So, poor wittle Turtle Boy better get used to being called Moscow Mitch because he will be called Moscow Mitch up until he loses his seat next November. But fear not; after he loses, at least Moscow Mitch can move to Russia to stay with Vladimir Putin and his Russian oligarch pals.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, a.k.a ‘Turtle Boy’, whines about his new nickname 'Moscow Mitch' while his boss Russian President Vladimir Putin suggests a more appropriate moniker. — Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, a.k.a ‘Turtle Boy’, whines about his new nickname ‘Moscow Mitch’ while his boss Russian President Vladimir Putin suggests a more appropriate moniker.

The British Trump

The United States isn’t the only country being overrun by right wing conservatives seizing control of the power structures. Many countries throughout the world have seen hard line conservative parties gain power and predictably are establishing authoritarian measures to make sure they stay in power. This past week, conservative Boris Johnson became the new Prime Minister in the United Kingdom. Johnson has been described as the British Donald Trump . . .you know . . . narcissistic womanizer with not a bit of intelligence. We thought that the U.K. went off the deep end when they voted for Brexit. With Boris Johnson taking the helm, we’re pretty sure the sun has set on the British Empire.

So, what is behind the rise of all these right wing, authoritarian conservative gaining power throughout the western world? Could Russian President Vladimir Putin have something to do with the rise of authoritarianism and the decline of western democracies? We’re thinking, yes. Modern day Russia is basically a corrupt oligarchy, where only the rich and powerful have a say so in how the country is run. Since the fall of communism and the Soviet Union in the early ’90s, Russia has gone through some pretty rough years which has given rise to the oligarchs. Putin was pretty peeved that his country lost the Cold War. But the former KGB operative is intelligent and very clever. Over the past twenty years, he and the deep pocketed Russian oligarchs have systematically used capitalism as a weapon against the western capitalist democracies and, as we’re seeing now, to devastating effect. They know that one common trait among all capitalistic countries is greed; the life’s blood of capitalism. There are any number of egotistical, power hungry people in western democracies who’d sell out their own mother for money, wealth and power. Trump’s connections to Russia are well known despite his protests and denials. Boris Johnson also has conflicts. Other countries have also shown a susceptibility to make corrupt deals with Russia.

In his testimony to Congress this past week, Robert Mueller explicitly warned that Russia interfered in the 2016 election and is on it’s way to mucking up our elections in 2020. And the Mueller report also states that Trump openly welcomed Russian interference (there are videos of Trump openly asking Russia to hack Hillary Clinton’s emails). Russian oligarchs have used corrupt, crony capitalism to amass their considerable fortunes and they will spare no expense supporting the best hackers available in undermining our democratic institutions. And yet Mitch McConnell blocked legislation that would provide protection against hacking in the upcoming election. We guess Turtle Boy knows that the Republicans can’t win again without Russia’s help.

So Britain now has it’s own Donald Trump. We here at the Bucket see Putin as a James Bond Super Villain who dispenses helpful hints for those wanting to remake western democracies into Putin-style oligarchies. All you have to do is buy off wacky haired, egotistical, narcissistic, populist, capitalist megalomaniacs like Boris Johnson and Trump, who love money, fame and power. Oh, and don’t forget those wacky haired communist leaders like Kim Jong Un.

Russian President and James Bond Super Villain, Vladimir Putin, recently dispensed a helpful hint for those wishing to control the world: buy off men who are narcissistic megalomaniacs with wacky hairdos.