The Art of the Con

Yesterday we got to read about how the number of Republican senators holding out on the Trump reverse Robin Hood tax cut bill began to drop precipitously. Evidently, they all either were convinced that the Donald was going to address their needs or they were too afraid to hold out any longer. I would offer a third possibility: they really never gave a rat's patootie about whatever it was that had inspired them initially to oppose the tax bill.

John McCain: back when he gave his famous thumbs down on Trumpcare, he claimed that he was deeply concerned about the welfare of the institution of the Senate and the lack of open debate in a participatory, deliberative and bipartisan process around the bill's passage. Now? Not so much.

Susan Collins: she claimed to be concerned about the forecast 13 million who will likely lose health care coverage as a result of the tax bill destroying the individual mandate. Now? She believes, actually believes, that this issue will be addressed later by Trump in some still to be determined process at some still to be identified time.

Bob Corker: a self-proclaimed budget hawk who would not support the tax cut bill if it so much as added one penny to the deficit. Now, thanks to some fuzzy, still-to-be-specified trigger mechanism, he believes that Trump and the GOP will agree to raise taxes should the voodoo economic forecasts of rapid economic growth not generate sufficient tax revenue.

Ron Johnson: the gentleman from cheesehead state has insisted that the the tax bill do better by small businesses. He received the same vague promises of being made right and then folded like a card table and got in line with the rest of the GOP.

The point is that none of these folks ever really seriously considered opposing this tax bill, which is the Republican Holy of Holies, a massive regressive redistribution of income and wealth to the most privileged, entitled and well-off. The American electorate finally gifted them with the harmonic convergence to advance their real agenda of unbridled greed and corruption - total control of two of the three branches of government with the third quickly falling in line with a slew of hard-right nominations to the federal bench.

It's all a con, and we'll all be left holding a losing hand.

Bad Santa Goes to Washington

Looks like the Donald has officially pitched in his lot with Roy Moore. What shall we call them? Here are my top choices:

1. Tweedle Scum and Tweedle Scummier
2. Predator vs. Pedo-phalien
3. Grabber and Groper
4. ...You get the idea

I guess it's only logical. Trump needs that Senate seat to remain Republican, and in this age of win at any cost, democratic norms be damned, why should we be surprised. It's a bit hard for me to take the Senate Republicans' efforts to come up with ways that they won't actually have to seat Moore, should he win, and make no mistake, he most probably will win. Some Alabamians are even considered moving out of the state, which will make it an even more concentrated version of its present self: racist, homophobic, and pedo-friendly.

So, great. The Democrats either get to win a seat that they hadn't expected to win or they get to hang Roy Moore all over the Republicans. I cannot say that either option really offers me much hope. But then I'm not really what actually does. After all, given the gerrymandered Congressional districts, it's highly unlikely the Democrats will take back either house of Congress, and even if they did they've been proving themselves thoroughly incapable of articulate a clear alternative message to Trumpism. So I'll just keep my ink cartridges ready for more opportunities to generate some laughs, smirks and giggles. Hope you keep coming back for more.And now, the toon:

Christmas Comes Early for the Donald - Part I

I think it's not just Santa. We all know who's been naughty and who's nice. And we all know one spoiled rotten grabby little boy who ain't going to be nominated TIME Magazine person of the year. Instead, he's going to get to get what he deserves: a stocking full of coal. That's the same big coal he's promised to bring back, despite basic economics telling anyone with half a brain that coal is dead. But Trump and his supporters never let a little reality get in the way of pursuing their glorious path to go right off the cliff in making America great again all the while claiming that their "winning."

I don't know about you, but I sure as heck haven't seen too much winning lately that Trump & co. can claim as their own. But why should that surprise any of us. For Trump, it's really always been about losing. He squandered the lion's share of his inheritance from his father instead of actually making something of himself. He had to declare bankruptcy multiple times because he was a failure as a businessman; everything he touched turned to lead. All the while, he was fleecing anyone who was stupid enough doing business with him. In fact, maybe that's his real bottom line. He knows he's a loser - always has been, always will be - but as long as he can make all of the other schlubs lose just a little bit more than him, then he can salvage some small speck of self-worth.

Sad!

Here's the toon.

Pardon me, who's the turkey?

Good to see that the Donald decided to keep the annual pardon of the Thanksgiving Turkey at the White House, although that's something President Mike Pence might have to do for him sometime soon, but maybe that's just wishful thinking - no, not the part about Mike Pence becoming president, or even Donald Trump getting pardoned. I was just, you know, hoping that maybe, just maybe, Donald Trump might get impeached, preferably sooner than later. Is by tomorrow asking too much?

I imagine there will be a whole flock of Trump administration turkeys that will need a pardon once Bob Mueller finally wraps up his investigation. Or maybe that's more wishful thinking. Anyway, it's late, my brain is at low ebb. Hope everyone enjoys a a wonderful Thanksgiving holiday, and whatever you do, don't think of Trump while eating your turkey. You don't want to ruin your appetite.

Christmas Comes Early to Trumpland

Now that Congress is halfway to achieving the Republican Party's dreams - making the U.S. one of the most entrenched plutocracies in the world - all of the Trumpistas must be waiting with bated breath. I mean, what goes better with white supremacy but a Gini coefficient that would make our friends in pre-liberation South Africa blush? And to think that so many of the very people who will suffer the most as a result of this abomination of fiscal recklessness are the very ones who voted Sir Grabsalot into the White House. Karmic justice or just another day in the Oval Office for the Greatest Con Show on Earth?

Well, maybe, just maybe we'll luck out and some of these wobbly so-called moderate Republicans will find it in their hearts to find an ounce of morality and refuse to join the rest of horde of hard charging Koch (Brother) suckers and vote against the bill. If I were a betting man...well, what happens in Vegas, eventually gets exposed. So, all that being said, let's just hold thumbs, as our chums in South Africa would say, and hope for the best while expecting the worst.

Remember, these Republicans are the same bunch who are keeping quiet as church mice (sewer rats?) while Trump engages in some ill-advised Schadenfreude over recent revelations of Al Franken's frat-boy behavior from 11 years ago.

But I digress. Here's the toon...

The Golden Pig

Ol' Roy Moore. He just doesn't know when to quit. As more and more women are coming out with similar accusations of sexual harassment, he chooses instead to double down and to sic his trolls and shysters on them. And, for good measure, he's threatening the media outlets that are reporting on the victims' claims with lawsuits. Now that is a guy I want upholding the Constitution and making the laws of the land.

And then there's our Predator-in-Chief, who has remained largely, uncharacteristically mum about all of this, because really what can he say? Fer Pete's sake, his own political party is running away from Moore as fast as it possibly can while telling Moore to step down, please step, pretty please? And all of these Trump Enablers are making a big show of just how mortified, horrified, petrified they are with Moore's behavior. So, uhm, where was that gallant sense of righteousness a little over year ago when the Hollywood Access tape was released, showing the Donald bragging about being able to grab and grope women with impunity?

Real paragons of integrity, this lot. Glad to know that they, or a portion of them anyway, draw the line on molesting children. Now, of course, they have no problems whatsoever letting the Children's Health Insurance Program expire or deporting the dreamers or robbing poor, working and middle class kids of opportunities to access higher education by pulling the plug on much-needed tax deductions on student loan interest. But child molestation, well, that's another story, and the subject of another blog...coming soon!

When Donny Met Roddy

It's late, and I should be turning in for bed but I'm milking this dial-up speed Internet connection while overseas to post my latest toon. It's only fitting that the Donald wind up his Asian trip with a visit to his alter ego, Rodrigo Duterte, the President of the Philippines, and a self-proclaimed murderer who is now a widely reviled mass murderer.

I think Donald has dic-tator envy, just like he has with his first man crush, Vladimir "Tutti Frutti Pooty" Putin.

The Donald is probably wondering what it would be like if only he could order Jeff Sessions to round up all them Muslims, Mexicans, transgender folks and whoever is in his hate parade for that day and then wipe them all out with the stroke of a pen. Ah, that would be grand, wouldn't it? Then he could boast to his bud, Roddy, that he used his awesome power to unleash the same heartless, amoral cruelty that Duterte has used to go after...mostly innocent children, sick addicts and, maybe, on a good day, the occasional small-time retail drug dealer.

Two brothers from another mother? More likely two self-obssessed sociopaths bent on dragging their respective countries into a living hell.

Republican Rebrand? How about Rehab

Hi Sportsfans,

Well, now that the floodgates have opened, decades' and decades' worth of the slime has begun to ooze out. Powerful, (again, and I will not tire of mentioning this, mostly white) men are finally being held to account for their abuses of power and of their victims' rights. And just when you thought it couldn't any sicker or ickier - I mean, c'mon Louis C.K., really? - the Washington Post revealed that Roy Moore, Republican candidate for the U.S. Senate, preyed on a 14-year old girl along with several other adolescent girls.

This is the same guy who lost his job (twice) as the Alabama Supreme Court Chief Justice. In the first instance, he refused to remove a statue of the eleven commandments from public property. Yes, you read that right, eleven commandments, including the one he and his twisted god of self-serving narcissism sneaked in when nobody was watching: "Thou Shalt Not Get Caught."

And, as if that weren't bad enough, Roy an' the Good Ol' Boys in the 'Bama and the national Grand Ol' Party are all doing their best to deny, minimize and rationalize away what were obviously the immoral actions of a deeply sick individual. Rolling out every reprehensible PR tactic they can, they are re-traumatizing these women who stand to gain nothing except maybe, one would hope, the satisfaction of having used their voice to speak truth to a powerful, perverted pedophile.

I hope that the people of Alabama wake up, realize what is at stake, retrieve their lost sense of right and wrong, and remove this sick pedo from the ballot. I hope that they choose not to elect this scumbag. If they do otherwise, while it wouldn't be surprising, it will only serve as another example of just low they and all the other conservatives in the U.S. have sunk to justify their generations-long embrace of white supremacism.

Be a Lover, Not a Trumper

The VA elections? Beginning if the end? Probably not, but as Sting and the Police sang 35 years ago, "it’s a humiliating kick in the crotch" for the Donald. His reaction was predictable: try to walk back his endorsement of Gillespie, who did his best to be a Trump mini-me, transforming himself from a swamp-dwelling establishment-serving Republican reptile to a cross-burning, Confederate statue-loving white supremacist. Wait, oops. My bad. They're both one and the same. One is with filter; the other without. Po-tay-toe, po-tah-toe. Whatever.

Anywho, I’m glad to see the good guys put a “W” on the board.

La luta continua! So let’s get back to work.

Going Mental

The mass shooting massacre in Texas that took place this past Sunday reminds us of just how much our government is in the deep pockets of the arms industry. The Republican Party is bought and paid for. The Democrats are all too scared of the arm's industry enforcer, the NRA, and too wishy washy to come to a consensus on how to confront this menace.

Instead of any real reform coming out of our political process we get subjected to an endless series of meaningless motions, repeated in true Groundhog Day fashion. The various actors assume their predictable positions, give their same tired old lines, and then hope that everyone stops paying attention after a few days. That's exactly what happened after the Sandy Hook massacre in Newtown, the Emmanuel AME Church mass murder in Charleston, and the recent slaughter at the country music concert in Las Vegas music. And, as you all know, this list is far from complete.

This sequence is almost as sickening to watch as the replays of the actual events themselves. None of the victims ever thought they might be in danger of losing their lives, because they all believed they were in safes where they could let down their guard and simply enjoy their lives. Not in Trump's America. No-siree, the problems isn't guns. Guns, in case you didn't know, are the answer.

So what exactly is the problem? Well, according to Trump, the problem is a mental health issue...at the highest level, he says. Right, exactly. It starts with that worthless, swirly combed over sack of potatoes he calls a head. THAT is our country's biggest mental health issue, one for which, sadly, there is no cure.

Donald Does Asia

"Donald Trump visits Asia." What other four words strike more fear in one's heart? How about, "No meds; no parental supervision"? Okay, that was five words, but you get the point. I'm waiting for him not so much to embarrass himself and our entire country. That's a given. Rather I'm terrified that someone or something will piss him off enough that he'll ask for "the football" and give the unchecked, unbalanced order that some country (you know which one) "be met with fire and the fury like the world has never seen."

For all we know, he'll probably wind up nuking the Japanese, because some poor presidential chef might refuse to ruin Trump's Kobe beef steak by overcooking it, as per Trump's well-known preference. Anything could happen with that lunatic, such are the levels of his staff's self-serving enabling, coddling and knee-knocking deference to his psychoses.

I'm trying to think of something that will give us all some hope that what I've just written isn't even in the realm of possibility. Maybe it's the jet lag - just arrived in Burkina Faso last night - but I can't. Oh well, I guess I'll just have to hope for the best while knowing that just when you think things can't get much worse with this administration, there's always one more swish in the toilet bowl. Thanks, Donald, for doing all that you do when do what you do. .

No Country for Old Reptiles

It's been a veritable deluge of skeeziness with the recent outing of so many cases of powerful (mostly white, it must be said) men whose crimes and misdeeds are only now being revealed after years of either paying off or otherwise silencing their accusers. Of course, last year was a banner year, too, after we sent Donald Trump to the White House to become our very own predator-in-chief. It's no surprise then, because what we're seeing is nothing new. There's only more public awareness about the endemic hyper-sexism, male chauvinism and sexual and gender based-violence, all of which have always been parts of our society and culture.

And I couldn't even manage to fit in all of the other skeeze-bag terrible lizards who deserve to be included in this cartoon - Roger Ailes, Bill O'Reilly and even NPR's own Mike Oreskes among others - all of which demonstrates that this has nothing to do with partisan politics but instead "body part-is-in politics." But then, what do we expect? These are big lumbering beasts with itty-bitty, teeny-weeny...brains...so I imagine their judgment probably isn't so good with all the blood rushing to their itty-bitty, teeny-weeny...anyway, you get the idea.

Let's all hope and pray that they go the way of the dinosaurs, extinct, sooner than later.