Barrie Antoinette: “Let Them Eat Catfood…”

L'Ancien Régime. "Let them eat catfood."

"Life Among the Nobililty: The Swing" by Gregonard...

Well, Barrie Antoinette–excuse me, President Barry Obama, delivered his proposal for a budget and yes, indeed-y, there was the much hated-by-the-constituency-but-loved-by-Wall-Street “chained CPI”. According to one writer, Barry has called the Republican bluff–they have said they will brook no tax increases unless something is done about “entitlements”–you know, the money you’re entitled to because, well, you GAVE it to the Fed to invest throughout your working career! Well, the Prez has proposed chained CPI–the cost of living mal-adjustment that assumes that if you can’t afford steak, you’ll buy chicken and everything is still jake. Or if you can’t afford Chicken of the Sea, you’ll buy canned skipjack mackerel. And if you can’t afford canned mackerel, you’ll just go to Friskies.

The theory is that the Republicans will be so scared of losing their seats that they will do anything to avoid agreeing to this proposal. Except for one thing–who’s REALLY gonna get the blame for this? Why, the guy who proposed it, of course. President Obama. You know, the guy who DOESN’T HAVE TO RUN FOR ELECTION AGAIN?

Why all this “save Social Security” nonsense when it is solvent for the next 30 years? Why all this “entitlement reform” bullshit when Social Security has nothing to do with the budget? For that, we have to go back eight years (and actually more) to when President BUSH proposed “privatizing Social Security.” That’s right, this one has a long history–and the reason for privatizing SS was? So the money boys, the banks, the oligarchy, the plutocracy, could get their hands on that money and drain it from our senior citizens faster than any drug addict by stealing your Grandma’s Social Security check.

But wait–how does the chained CPI do THAT? Remember back then–the seniors, the AARP, everybody and their brother decided that the cost-of-living adjustment (COLA) was good enough to keep them going so please do not do us the favor of letting us make bad investments, please. So the money boys–whom Barack Obama is as beholden to as any Republican, any blue dog Democrat, hell, almost every “progressive” Democrat as well–said to themselves, “If the COLA is good enough, then let’s screw the COLA. Then they’ll be clamoring to let us invest the money for them.”

And that, kiddies, is how the sky turned blue. So remember, when Grandma, when Ma and Pa, when YOU start having to eat catfood, it wasn’t just Congress, it wasn’t just Obama…

It was the banks, too big to fail, too big to jail, who wanted your money.

“Allons enfants de la Patrie, le jour de gloire est arrivé!”

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An Anniversary Nobody Really Cheered About

Well, at least we kept Peoria from being nuked by Saddam Hussein...

Please Note: the Anniversary Cake is Yellow

Last week, we saw the passing of the 10th Anniversary of the Iraq war—ooops, excuse me, Congress never declared war, so, ummmm, what do we call it?

When the airplanes struck the Twin Towers and the Pentagon, somewhere amid the horror of what I was seeing rose an additional realization, “Oh, my God, we’ve just had our Reichstag Fire.” I could see with horrifying clarity that this would be the defining moment that turned the United States from its democratic principles to something totally antithetical to the dreams of our nation’s Fathers. We have resisted the impulse of creating concentration camps for Moslems–we incarcerated many, but mostly exiled them for visa transgressions. We have created gulags where we gathered a mostly hapless group of alleged terrorists whose major crime seems to have been being in the wrong place at the wrong time when the wrong person wanted to collect a reward. We HAVE built massive PRISONS, but these are privately run camps to provide slave labor and corporate profit and anyone can enter. We passed the grossly obscene “Patriot” act through which almost any crime can be considered to be an act of terrorism–when the need arises.

Our incursion into Afghanistan almost looked legitimate. We claimed the head of, what was his name, Osama bin Laden? Yes, he was there, later on he claimed credit for “9/11″, which our government was already doing within minutes of the tower falls–since it had pointedly ignored the warnings from the intelligence community of terrorist actions inside the US. He was there, but the Taliban government had the nerve to ask for evidence before they would consider handing him over. So like a western posse, we went in and cleaned up the corruption in Rock Ridge and hunted down bin Laden until we were just yards from his hiding place in the mountains when…

Wait, what? The real danger is from Iraq? The country which had been under UN sanctions for a decade? Whose dictator, Saddam Hussein, couldn’t even afford to buy shoes for his army? HE had weapons of mass destruction? Yes, we had the ominous YELLOW CAKE requests–which turned out to be forgeries. We had George Bush and Tony Blair smirking their way into war. We had Dick Cheney and Condi Rice promising us mushroom clouds of doom if nothing was done immediately. We had a mountain of evidence that Colin Powell presented at the UN. I remember listening to him and being absolutely convinced by the man’s sense of sincerity… until the next morning, when I realized that all that evidence had no context. That if you believed it was something bad it was, but those conversations about hiding things could have just as easily been hiding the porn when the inspectors arrived.

And so we went off and destroyed a country within weeks. Killed several thousand Americans and maimed 10s of thousands. Killed 100s of thousands Iraqis and destroyed the infrastructure of the country. Wasted around two trillion dollars (when asked about the loss of a trillion dollars from the Pentagon budgets, Donald Rumsfeld remarked, “I’ll have to look into that,” and didn’t) which the Tea Party is now trying to collect from the poorest among us. For which sinful errors of judgment or outright acts of war-mongering for profit no one has been held accountable.

Many of us felt powerless to do anything to stop it. Only after the deed was done did I decide that I could do a political cartoon series against these criminals. I was scared too–protesting the war COULD have been considered an act of terrorism according to the Patriot Act.

HAPPY F$%^&*G ANNIVERSARY.

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If the Africans Brought to America Had Been Given Guns…

Little Johnny goes to school, guns a-blazing

You should see the family going to church on Sunday...

Congratulations President Obama on the start of your second term. The first piece of advice I will give you for you to ignore is: Don’t negotiate with terrorists–stand your ground on the debt ceiling!

I pretty much ignored the Newton massacre before the end of last year–although I had plenty of ideas that my better half pronounced, “TOO SOON!” Fortunately, plenty of people–most of whom have guns–have kept the story alive–by their IDIOCY! It took several days before the NRA had gotten its collective head out of its nether orifice far enough to respond. The answer to gun violence in schools? MORE GUNS! Set up armed guards in every school building and school yard. I’m surprised David Keene didn’t add issuing kevlar vests to every student and teacher–perhaps because in Newton since the killer shot almost everyone execution style. But it’s definitely a thought.

It has been suggested before that teachers and principals be issued sidearms to keep the peace at the frontier–AKA nursery, grade, middle and high school. There’s some justification to this with kids being given handguns to come to class for safety. After all, the teachers should be allowed to return fire. You might argue that it would take far too long and cost far too much to train teachers how to handle a shootin’ iron. Nonsense, just sit them down for one of the AMC John Wayne/Clint Eastwood marathons and they’ll be ready! At least as ready as the three gun experts who managed to shoot themselves and a few other people by accident at gun shows this past weekend!

Larry Ward, founder of Gun Appreciation Day, held on the 19th, has persuasively argued that holding it just before Martin Luther King Jr. Day is something that Dr. King would have approved, if he hadn’t been assassinated. After all, if the African immigrants to America had been given the right to bear arms, there might not have been slavery. I’m sure the labor entrepeneurs who brought them over would have been happy to provide them with musket, balls and powder. And I do mean balls.

Now let me see. Armed guards are needed in schools. Guns are allowed in several state legislatures, but they already have armed guards. Several states allow guns in saloons–we’ll need armed guards there–and churches too. My question is, “Who’s going to pay for all these armed guards?” I’ve asked my local tea partiers who loudly said, “Not ME! You’d have to raise taxes to pay all those armed guards!” Well, there’s just one solution, which will appeal to the business owning crowd, I’m sure. Privatize the police forces! It only makes sense–people who don’t have any property don’t need it protected! Open up police services to be bought by the lowest bidder and allow private citizens to pay a yearly fee for police protection.

Now we don’t want to completely take protection away from people who can’t afford a yearly contract. They can obtain police services on a per incident basis at a modest rate. All major credit cards and Paypal accepted. Yessirree Bob! I’m sure that will be the most equitable solution. Just what the Founding Fathers envisioned!

Don’t forget to pack heat with lunch, dearees!

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All you really need is heart…

Dick Cheney wakes up in the hospital to discover a side effect of his transplant--he's suddenly developed a "heart"

"You've got to have heart..."

Two stories of note this week: the shooting of Trayvon Martin–which actually occurred a month ago today–and Dick Cheney’s new bundle of joy. I’ve always found myself to have a reluctance to draw cartoons about things that are sad. Things that make me angry on the other hand are fair game. And the shooting of Trayvon Martin makes me sad. But the reaction of the Fox News types is worth derision.

On one hand, you have Geraldo Rivera admonishing the dead kid about wearing a hoodie because it looks too “gangsta.” And then you have New Gringrich admonishing the President about noticing the kid was black. No two ways, Fox, it’s either racist or it ain’t. Add to this the “stand your ground” fans backing up shooter Zimmerman saying that he was only doing his job–self-appointed and told by the 911 operator not to pursue–and you start to wonder if their heads are in so far, will these guys ever see daylight again?

Fortunately, Melissa Harris-Perry took care of Geraldo, and the electorate looks like it will be taking care of Newt. And Paul Krugman reveals the truth about American Legislative Exchange Council, the corporate shills behind the “stand your ground” laws.

Which leaves us Dick Cheney. The sight of all the people wishing him well with prayers for a speedy recovery—including those who’ve accused him of being a war-profiteer, a war criminal, and responsible for the sinking of the US reputation to historic lows by ‘OK’ing tortures the Japanese were hanged for after WWII—warms my heart. This is the mark of a civil society. We do live by the Golden Rule: Do not do unto the previous Administration as you would not have the next Administration do unto you.

Now a churlish man would be making comments about Mr. Cheney’s heart transplant like “Where’d they find one that small?” Or, “This one is perfect, Igor, MWAHAHAHAHAHAHA!” Or, “Wow, the old one really was made of stone–this will fetch a high price on EBAY!” But we won’t do so. Instead, we’ve decided to honor Mr. Cheney with some verses of a song:

Dick had to have heart,
Cheney really needed heart.
They kept saying that you didn’t have one.
But here’s one for a fresh start!

You never lost hope,
When they kept on saying nope,
Like with those weapons that could never be found,
Those visions were sound, your critics dopes.

Don’t you think of Halliburton,
And the profits from the war,
You will only feel some hurtin’,
And who knows what you’d outpour
to an enhanced interrogation!

So pick up the phone,
And when you hear the dial tone,
Tell your friend that you are sorry you graced
with buckshot his face,
it wasn’t smart,
Now you’ve finally got heart.

No applause please, the patient is convalescing.

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Happy New Year! As the bugle sounds, the horses are approaching the starting gate….

Mitt Romney ties himself in knots explaining his tax situation

Heck, most people could have a comfortable living on the taxes from his speaking engagements....

Happy New Year 2012–and Gung hay fat choy! As luck would have it, I have had a dental issue over the weekend and will be rushing off to the dentist today. A lot seems to have happened over the vacation, particularly in the GOP “Choose the Next Idiot” Sweepstakes. Hey, who’d've thought that Ricky Butt Butter–excuse me, Santorum–would still be in the race! Michele “I don’t care how much evidence you’ve got, I’m going to believe the next random person off the street who agrees with me” Bachman, Herman “the most profound things I know I heard on Pokemon” Cain, Rick “What was that other thang?” Perry, and John “What am I doing in this party?” Huntsman have all dropped out. This leaves the afore-mentioned Mr. Frothy Mix, Ru, I mean Ron Paul, Mitt “You want to bet $10,000? I have it in my back pocket” Romney, the Pillsbury Dough Boy Newt Gingrich, and recently added darkhorse Stephen Colbert…

And they’re off–it’s Mitt Romney in the lead and the Pillsbury Doughboy with Santorum in the rear! How many more of these damn debates are we going to have to live through? I think the GOP has overplayed its hand. It WANTED everyone to think that these debates were to choose the NEXT PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES. But by the time of the election, all we’ll remember is, oh, this guy who cancelled my TV program.

There IS something serious that’s going on, though. I’m talking about efforts to stultify the internet. The people of the internet have won a skirmish–the purveyors of SOPA and PIPA were scared away temporarily, but you know they’ll be back, and with bigger guns blazing. I’ll keep letting you know what things we can do to thwart the corporate stranglehold as I hear of them (but right now everything’s taking a back seat to my toothache).

I’m going to be experimenting with some new formats and character designs this year like the chibi Mitt Romney sequence just above. Hey, big headed excitable characters–I think that fits politicians to a T.

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