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.
While many Americans need desperate relief from the disastrous effects of the on-going coronavirus pandemic, what do the Senate Republicans do? They hold confirmation hearing for their super religious handmaiden justice candidate, Amy Coney Barrett. In the first week of hearings, Ms. Barrett certainly did nothing to allay Democrats’ fears about her abolishing abortion rights, LGBTQ rights, voting rights, delaying the election, eliminating Obamacare and blocking any kind of legislation for regulating climate change. She repeated didn’t answer Democrats’ questions pertaining to these subjects. Propagandists over at Fox Propaganda Network openly proclaimed that her notebook was blank, meaning she was so sharp she didn’t need notes. Well, when you don’t answer any of the Democratic Senators’ questions, we guess you don’t need any notes. As far as we’re concerned, her brain was as blank as her notebook and her sanctimonious, holier-than-thou stare.
But there is little the Democrats can do. Ms. Barrett’s confirmation is pretty much a done deal and it will probably put her on the bench right before Election Day. Gee, how convenient! And Republicans keep stating over and over that they’re worried about Joe Biden packing the court if he gets elected when that’s exactly what they’ve done for the past twenty years. Al Gore won the popular vote in 2000 and yet George W. Bush got to pick two conservative justices (Roberts and Alito). Hillary Clinton won the popular vote in 2016 and yet Donald Trump got to pick three conservative judges (Gorsuch, Kavanaugh and now Barrett), not to mention Mitch McConnell refusing to hold confirmation hearings for Merrick Garland, who should rightfully be occupying a seat on the Court. So that’s five conservative judges where there should have been five left leaning or moderate judges; all stolen by Republican shenanigans the past twenty years.
We’ve got a lot of problems with Ms. Barrett’s confirmation and the main reason is because she is obviously very religious and will no doubt let her religious brain washing influence her decision making. Confession time: Editor-in-chief Dex Rexter was raised catholic (and is happily far removed from that ‘cult’, as he calls it) and knows very well the holier-than-thou type that Ms. Barrett obviously is. When Ms. Barrett refused to answer questions and gave the world her blank stare, this is a typical reaction of everyone who was raised catholic and is questioned about their beliefs. All christians are taught to have the victim mentality, meaning that whenever they are questioned about their beliefs or faith, they envision themselves as martyrs; St. Sebastian tied up, pierced with arrows or St. Joan of Arc being burned at the stake. The questions don’t matter because in her brain washed mind, she is doing God’s work and everyone who rightfully questions underlying motives are just heathens slinging their arrows and swinging their torches. This God Delusion (see Richard Dawkins), is enormously dangerous for sane, logical, rational people with education based on scientific facts and reasoning. We’ve mentioned this before; the people who wrote the bible knew nothing compared to what we modern day humans know. The biblical 1st century database is minute compared to the colossal 21st century database chock full of scientific facts and data. Why anyone would still let dogma written before the 19th century influence their lives is beyond comprehension. The only behavioral rule people need to follow isthe law of reciprocity or the golden rule, which pre-dates the foundations of judasim, chrisitianity and islam. The ten commandments are just the golden rule stated ten times.
So there you have it. The modern day handmaiden Amy Coney Barrett will stomp all over Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s legacy and more than likely mark the return of back alley abortions, make it tougher for people to afford healthcare, ignore and vilify scientific consensus and make it difficult for any person who is different (translation: anyone who isn’t a straight christian) to get a break in America. Of course, if she is confirmed before election day, she may even rule, with her fellow religious, conservative zealots on the bench, that Donald Trump will somehow get to stay President even though he and all his Republican sycophants are getting slammed in the polls and could be in for a blood bath on election day. Like we’ve said before; get ready for the Holy Corporate Empire, folks.
However, the real star of the VP debate was the fly that landed on Mike Pence’s head midway through the debate. But this fly was no ordinary fly. This scene stealing ‘Super Fly’ stayed put for almost two minutes while Pence rambled on with his propaganda and drivel. It’s become an internet sensation. We here at the Bucket noticed that the image of the fly on Mike Pence bore an uncanny resemblance to a fly on a pile of shit. The similarities are remarkable. We’re sure some alt-right, QAnon nut job will come up with some conspiracy theory that good ol’ Super Fly was some kind a miniature drone built by the Democrats in order to make Mike Pence look bad. Sorry, conservative wing nuts; old Puritan Pence is quite capable of looking bad all by himself.
Once again the Trump administration has trolled the world, this time with its response to the coronavirus breakout which has infected 90,000 worldwide. The stock market has also had a roller coaster ride the last two weeks, with daily swings of at least 800 points seemingly every day. We mentioned a few posts ago, we think the media is sensationalizing things just like they did in the past fifty years with the swine flu, MERS, SARS and Ebola. You know the old corporate media adage: if it bleeds, it leads; if it can scare, then we care. With every one of these breakouts, which were supposed to be the next plague, scientists were able to get things under control – using science – and a true pandemic crisis was averted. Education, prevention, proper hygiene, listening to the scientific experts and lack of panic are key elements in battling any potential medical emergency.
We’re also positive that Trump could care less about the coronavirus or its victims. His only concern is how to use it politically so he can get re-elected. So, if the breakout does actually become a pandemic, then he can blame Puritan Pence. If the breakout turns out to be like Ebola in 2014, then he can blame the media for over-hyping the situation, which he’s already doing. Either way, Trump has set himself up not to be the fall guy, in typical Trumpian fashion; nothing is ever his fault. And more importantly for the power hungry, authoritarian GOP, his path to re-election is clear and unobstructed. No wonder the conservative Republicans love him; they’ve never accepted responsibility for anything in the last sixty years, other than tax cuts to their plutocrat overlords.
The big story this week was the Oval Office budget meeting between America’s CEO/Dictator Donald Trump, Vice President and modern day Puritan Mike Pence and Democratic House and Senate leaders Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer. We’ve had our doubts about both Pelosi and Schumer because they’re both corporatists who do their fair share of cozying up to moneyed interests and they’ve shown in the past a willingness to cave in a little too quickly to Republican demands (like many other Democrats have done in the past twenty years, i.e. the Iraq War, Patriot Act, etc…).
Vice President and modern day Puritan, Mike Pence, recently grabbed headlines away from Donald Trump, which isn’t easy to do nowadays. First, Pence cast the deciding vote on a bill which paves the way for defunding Planned Parenthood. Donald Trump just signed it into law. Pence is a full fledged evangelical zealot, whose religious intentions seem to be taking America back to the seventeenth century. This bill is an affront to women everywhere, but that doesn’t seem to matter to conservative christian males, who still base their views of women on the antiquated views postulated in the bible. The picture of the people (all white males) who decided women’s healthcare, which has become viral, shows that these troglodytes view women as mere possessions, who should only do household chores, have babies and shut up.
The second incident has to do with an interview Pence did back in the 2002 where he stated that he would never have dinner alone with a woman who wasn’t his wife. While many in the corporate news media defended Pence, claiming how gallant and gentlemanly this is, we here at the Bucket tend to think otherwise. We haven’t come to our atheism and our aversion to evangelical christians without experience. This is blatantly about Pence not wanting to tempt himself, which the article linked to above, addresses. There are many christians who are so sexually repressed that they can’t even say the words vagina or penis without turning twenty shades of crimson and dying of embarrassment. In their minds, sex or anything having to do with sex should not be discussed and any kind of modern thinking on contraception and birth control is wrong.
What makes Pence so dangerous is that compared to Trump, he seems reasonable. He’s becoming normalized by the media and he’s anything but normal. He is a right wing, radical, christian zealot. If he has his way, women’s rights, will be turned back a generation…or more. We wouldn’t be surprised if Puritan Pence resurrects public shaming of women who have had an abortion or may even want an abortion; akin to making Puritan women wear a scarlet letter on their frocks. Behind that genteel smile, is a perfidious plot to take away women’s rights and return them to the kitchen, barefoot, pregnant and silent.
The Vice Presidential debate was last night and as predicted is was pretty lackluster. What kills us is that many ‘pundits’ think Pence won the debate because he merely denied that Donald Trump said all the horrible, rotten, despicable things he has actually said during the course of the last year of this clusterf*ck that is Con-a-thon 2016. Since when did lying your ass off win you a debate? Oh that’s right, he’s Republican and the corporate news media is conservative. Hell, Republicans were claiming victory two hours ahead of the debate.
The Vice Presidential candidates for the Democrats and Republicans couldn’t be more different from their respective running mates. Mike Pence is pretty much a modern day Puritan and the complete opposite of the bombastic and coarse Donald Trump. Tim Kaine is a walking Disney character and his squeaky clean demeanor is in contrast with the popular perceptions of Hilary Clinton as untrustworthy. Amazingly, the same adjectives are being used to describe both candidates: bland, boring, dull and our favorite, milquetoast.
We think the upcoming debate between the two candidates could be one of the biggest snooze-fests ever. Of course, it will probably be one of the most polite political events ever, too. We do have a bit of advice for the Democrats. If the Democrats don’t want another Dukakis-in-a-tank moment, do not use Kaine as an attack dog. Use Biden, Bill Clinton, Bernie Sanders or Obama to rip Trump a new one. Kaine is a nice guy. Let him be a nice guy. When he tries to be mean…it just looks bad.
Thanks to the disastrous Trump campaign, we’re given on a daily basis such a plethora of gaffes and blunders to choose from, the satire just writes itself. Take for instance, Mike Pence recently stating that name calling has no place in politics; this from the Vice Presidential candidate of a man who’s made his living for the last year calling his opponents childish nick names like Lyin’ Ted, Little Marco and Low Energy Jeb Bush. We think ol’ Puritan Pants is a bit irony impaired.
Well, the RNC has come and gone and it’s been every bit a clusterf*ck as predicted. Some highlights(or lowlights): Melania Trump plagiarized Michelle Obama’s 2008 DNC speech – Trump’s campaign denied then admitted the fraud; the so called anti-Trump movement never really gets going; Pence bores everyone to sleep; a tepid endorsement from Paul Ryan; and the smuggest Senator alive, Ted Cruz, still licking his wounds from his defeat in the Republican primaries, refuses to endorse Donald Trump. When your top celebrity endorser is Scott Baio from Joanie Loves Chachi, you know it’s bad. To top it off, Trump delivered a lie filled acceptance speech in an effort to make his supporters shit their pants in fear. Wow! What a sucky, sucky, suck ass Party!
But one thing that is incredibly disturbing is the platform adopted by the Republicans. It looks like it was written by extremist, far right wing, evangelical christians. You might as well call the Republican Party the Puritan Party now. Among the more dismaying platform points: appoint anti-choice Supreme Court justices; legalize anti-LGBT discrimination; pass an anti-choice constitutional amendment; end funding for Planned Parenthood; repeal environmental protection laws; ignore climate change; expand fracking and burying nuclear waste; privatize Medicare; cut food stamps; require bible study in public schools and (the worst one in our opinion) make christianity the national religion. Apparently,the Republicans want to go back to the ’50s…the 1650s! The Republican party platform also bears a strong resemblance to our fascist checklist we posted several months ago. If there was any doubt before there is no doubt now; with this party platformthe Republican party has gone into hard core fascist mode.