Tuesday, November 04, 2014

Election Day 2014

I voted today...haven’t missed an election since I (regrettably) helped elect Tricky Dick...the first time. And, as some of you know, when I am King, the rest of you won’t miss elections either.

Clemens Crossing Elementary School, Election Day (4 November 2014)

I’m about to watch the returns...alone. I guess it is better that Beck is on the road so she doesn’t have to endure my yelling at the TV all evening. Here are a few reasons why it will be hard to control myself tonight...along with illustrations from a favorite medium – comics.
(Note - each comic title will link you to the cartoonist’s web page)

This has been the most expensive mid-term election ever. After all, corporations are people and money is speech. One wonders why nearly $100 million has been poured into North Carolina to elect a senator that will make $174,000 a year. Remember, we are not a democracy. We are a republic that elects our representatives. All that dough is there to ensure you elect someone who will NOT represent the voters. The winners represent the people who bankroll them.

Baldo by Hector Cantu & Carlos Castellanos

I wish I could be kinder to today’s media. Yes, good newspapers still do some critical reporting and fact-checking when a candidate tells a whopper but not enough people read the papers anymore. More people watch TV. And if that’s where we get all our important information, we’re in trouble. They should name the Fox and Friends morning program, “What the Black Guy did Wrong Today Show.”

Candorville by Darrin Bell

My beef is with the alleged, liberal, ‘Lamestream’ reporting. The networks give the candidates air time and televise their debates...and what do we get? Sound bite nonsense. When some hack says, “Washington doesn’t have a taxing problem, it has a spending problem”, the media must forcefully ask what should be cut. “Here’s your chance, Candidate Blowhard, to tell your voters here and now what you would do to fix that spending problem. What will YOU cut?”

When some right wing nut says the president has violated the law and the Constitution and should be impeached, the media needs to ask what the formal charges are. It’s as if we tolerate the crazies and don’t want to press the GOP leadership on what their wacko’s are doing. Instead, we hear lame retorts like, “Well, both sides have their extreme elements.” Really? Where are these left-wing loonies? If there were any, you’d think Faux News would have put them front and center by now. I believe the all-important Fourth Estate is absolutely essential to the success of our great country. We need them to tell us when the scoundrels are messing with the system. When they don’t (or can’t), the country is worse off.

Candorville by Darrin Bell

I am not a Democrat. Democrats are pussies. As a party, they are inept, corrupt and loopy. The economy is improving. Unemployment is lower than it’s been in years and gasoline prices are plunging. Do they tout that record and try to take credit for it? Not much. They have squandered their majority in the Senate and let the GOP control the agenda. The president is disengaged and his final two years are going to be awful to watch.

I am not a Republican. I used to lean that way...when they were rational. As a party, they are inept, corrupt and evil. It’s beyond curious how they keep winning elections by bashing government. Why would we elect someone who hates government to run government? I don’t get it.

Non Sequitur by Wiley Miller

Republicans don’t want to govern. They want to rule. As we have seen in many states, once they are in charge, all they do is give more money to the rich, allow creationism in the science classes and pass vagina laws and voter suppression measures. Taking away American citizens’ right to vote is what the ‘Freedom Party’ is all about...and the Democrats let them do it.

Candorville by Darrin Bell

Finally, Alison Lundergan Grimes deserves to lose. The Kentucky Democrat candidate for the U.S. Senate refused to admit she voted for the president...the black, foreign-born, socialist, anti-Christ. She was a Democratic convention delegate, for cryin’ out loud. She should have said, “Of course I voted for Obama. He’s a Democrat. I’m a Democrat. How could I vote for the other guy and endorse that toxic, anti-everything-that’s-not-white-and-Christian platform the GOP ran on?” Stand up for what you believe, Girl!

There. I feel better now.

Merry Election Day to all and to all, a Good Night.

Prickly City by Scott Stantis