The far-right troglodyte court of religious zealots had a very busy week.
First, they ruled that religious private schools can receive taxpayer money. Naturally, this violates the separation of church and state which is in the Constitution.
Claiming they can actually comprehend the Constitution, SCOTUS’ next move was to allow people to carry concealed guns in New York City. I’ve been looking but I can’t find “concealed-carry” in the Constitution but I did find “well-regulated.”
Finally, SCOTUS did exactly what we expected them to do and that was to overturn Roe v. Wade based, not on the Constitution, but on their religious zealotry. If you’re a right-wing gun-humping religious zealot who wants to control women and tell them what they can and can’t do with their bodies, then you had a good week.
SCOTUS is overriding their function. They are legislating. Take the abortion case for example. They were hearing a case about banning abortions after a set number of weeks. Instead of just issuing a decision on that case, they created new laws. This is literally legislating from the bench.
The case they were hearing didn’t ask the court whether abortion is or isn’t constitutional, probably because most of the justices on the court have said that abortion is precedent and settled law.
The scary thing is, this is establishing a new precedent (irony abounds) for the court to strike down laws they’re not even hearing arguments about.
What will the Supreme Court strike down next that nobody’s asking them about?
Music note: I listened to a bunch of girl rock while drawing this (which took a while). I jammed to Paula Cole, Alanis Morrisette, the Cranberries, Melissa Etheridge, and Soul Asylum. Siri thinks Soul Asylum are girls.
Signed prints: The signed prints are just $40.00 each. Every cartoon on this site is available. You can pay through PayPal. If you don’t like PayPal, you can snail mail it to Clay Jones, P.O. Box 3721, Fredericksburg, VA 22402. I can mail the prints directly to you or if you’re purchasing as a gift, directly to the person you’re gifting.
Notes on my book, Tales From The Trumpster Fire: There are 19 copies of my book in stock, which go for $45.00 each, signed. Also, I have copies of my first book from 1997, Knee-Deep in Mississippi available for $20.00.
Tip Jar: if you want to support the cartoonist, please send a donation through PayPal to clayjonz@gmail.com. You can also snail it to P.O. Box 3721, Fredericksburg, VA 22402.
by a 53-47 vote, The United States Senate confirmed Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson to the Supreme Court yesterday, making her the first black woman in history to be on the court. Three Republicans, Mitt Romney, Susan Collins, and Lisa Murkowski joined every Democrat in voting for her.
There should have been more Republicans voting for Justice Jackson as she’s one of the most qualified judges to ever be nominated for the Supreme Court, if not the most qualified. The three Republicans who voted for her know full well that Jackson will cast votes they disagree with, but they also know she’s qualified and understands the Constitution. These are qualifications the rest of the GOP in the Senate don’t care about, or at least not when their racist cultist base is watching.
Sure, you had Tom Cotton saying she would have defended Nazi war criminals. You had Marsha Blackburn asking her to define “woman.” You had Ted Cruz on a tangent about racist babies. You had Lindsey Graham upset and flailing his arms around about something or others. And then there was Josh Hawley, the goon who gave a fist salute to terrorists, being the ringleader for the attacks painting her as soft on pedophiles. But where were the more rational members of the GOP during this?
I get there was no hope to get votes from Ron Johnson, Rand Paul, Marco Rubio, Tommy Tuberville, Chuck Grassley, or Rick Scott, even though some of them have voted for her in the past. But why didn’t Mitch McConnell vote for her? Voting for her could have helped his arguments for stealing Supreme Court seats and had made him look somewhat reasonable.
Why didn’t Louisiana’s Bill Cassidy and John Kennedy vote for her? Cassidy voted to impeach Trump so he’s somewhat reasonable. John Kennedy once rejected a Trump nominee for a lower court because he was unqualified…so why reject someone who is?
Others I could see crossing party lines to vote for her are Richard Burr, Thom Tillis, Ben Sasse, Rob Portman, Jim Inhofe, Pat Toomey, John Cornyn, Mike Lee, and Tim Scott.
Tim Scott is the only black Republican in the Senate. He’s acknowledged racism from conservatives at times, so why join the racists in rejecting the first black woman on the Supreme Court? I know he represents South Carlina, but he could have chosen to be a powerful voice in doing the right thing. His vote to confirm could have prompted more yes votes from his side of the aisle. Besides, he had voted for her in the past.
And Lindsey Graham…this guy previously voted to confirm Judge Jackson to federal courts…twice. In fact…a lot of these Republicans had supported Jackson in the past.
Which Republicans voted to confirm Judge Jackson to federal courts in the past? They are Lindsey Graham, Lisa Murkowski, Susan Collins, Chuck Grassley, Richard Shelby, Mitch McConnell, Mitch Inhofe, John Cornyn, Mike Crapo, Richard Burr, John Thune, John Barrasso, Roger Wicker, Jim Risch, Roy Blunt, Jerry Moran, Rob Portman, John Boozman, Pat Toomey, John Hoeven, Marco Rubio, Ron Johnson, Rand Paul, Mike Lee, Deb Fischer, Tim Scott…wait for it…Ted Cruz.
So what happened between these Republicans voting yes to voting no? Did they not do their research last time? Did Judge Jackson do something new and despicable between the votes? Or…hear me out…the cameras were on?
After the vote and while Democrats celebrated, the Republicans walked out of the chamber. They went from voting for her to voting no to being disgusted she was confirmed. Republicans are all a bunch of posers who won’t even consider doing what’s right if there’s a camera in the room. They all just want to grovel and appeal to their MAGA racist bases…even the black guy.
Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson won’t change the political makeup of the court. Conservatives hold a 6-3 advantage. But I hope President Biden gets another appointment. Hell, the orange ass-clown got three. I’m looking long-term. I hope the future brings us Democratic presidents who get Supreme Court nominations who will stop Republicans from putting justices on the bench dragging this nation backward.
Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson is a step in the right direction.
How disgusting do you have to be to be proud it’s on your record that you voted against the first black woman on the Supreme Court?
Signed prints: The signed prints are just $40.00 each. Every cartoon on this site is available. You can pay through PayPal. If you don’t like PayPal, you can snail mail it to Clay Jones, P.O. Box 3721, Fredericksburg, VA 22402. I can mail the prints directly to you or if you’re purchasing as a gift, directly to the person you’re gifting.
Notes on my book, Tales From The Trumpster Fire: There are 19 copies of my book in stock, which go for $45.00 each, signed. Also, I have copies of my first book from 1997, Knee-Deep in Mississippi available for $20.00.
Tip Jar: if you want to support the cartoonist, please send a donation through PayPal to clayjonz@gmail.com. You can also snail it to P.O. Box 3721, Fredericksburg, VA 22402.
The biggest takeaway from the Supreme Court’s ruling that churches in New York can remain open, because placing restrictions on them is infringing upon their Constitutionally-protected religious freedom, is where the court will be years from now.
The court ruled on similar cases just a few months ago, and ruled 5-4, with Chief Justice John Roberts joining the liberals, that the government can place restrictions on churches. On Wednesday night, it was another 5-4 ruling, this time in favor of the churches and again, with Roberts joining the liberals.
The big takeaway here is that Amy Coney Barrett was the vote putting it over the top. The last time the court voted on this, Ruth Bader Ginsburg was on the court and actually understood the case.
The argument here is that New York Governor, Andrew Cuomo, was being harder on churches than places like retail businesses. But the thing is, it’s not the same.
You don’t go to a grocery store to spend two hours parking your ass in one spot. You do that in church. It’s not comparable. The churches are complaining that Cuomo is singling them out for their religion.
Nobody cares about your religion other than to protect it. I don’t care if you go to mass for seven hours every night, dance in circles with snakes while speaking in tongues. You do you. But, I do care if you go to church and bring back your virus to the grocery store. Do you understand how that works? No?
Neither do five members of the Supreme Court.
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Right now, someone at Hobby Lobby is crying their homophobic balls off.
The Supreme Court decided by a 6-3 margin, that the 1964 Civil Rights Act also protects gay and transgender workers from workplace discrimination. Let me put this so the fucknuts can comprehend it: Your boss can’t fire you for being gay…so you can come out now. He can’t even fire you if you work in a bakery refusing to bake gay wedding cakes. How a cake can be gay, I don’t know but still…they can’t fire you.
The real shocker with this ruling is that two of the court’s more conservative justices voted in the majority. John Roberts, who is the Chief Justice and has sided with the liberals in the past, and the occupier of Merrick Garland’s seat, Neil Gorsuch. In fact, Gorsuch wrote the majority opinion.
Gorsuch breaks it down for you also, writing, “An employer who fires an individual merely for being gay or transgender defies the law.” Before this ruling, even with gay marriage legal, it was still legal in half the states in the nation to fire someone simply for being gay, bisexual, or transgender. Now, all those right-to-work states are going to have to go back to firing people without giving a reason. That’s still legal. They can fire you for being gay as long as they don’t tell you why you’re being fired.
Donald Trump, the president (sic) who nominated Gorsuch for that stolen SCOTUS seat, said, “I’ve read the decision and some people were surprised, but they’ve ruled and we live with their decision. He added it was a “very powerful decision, actually.” The truth is, he’s not happy. His administration has been busting gay rights since he came into office.
Donald Trump has urged the court to rule against gay workers. He’s barred most transgenders from serving in the military. Just last week, the Department of Health and Human Services issued a regulation that removed protections for transgender patients against discrimination by doctors, hospitals, and health insurance companies. Even though Donald Trump said Caitlyn Jenner could use the bathroom at Trump Tower (watch out, Caitlyn. There’s a bunch of goons at the doorway), he’s not really progressive with LGBTQ issues.
Justice Samuel Alito wrote the dissenting opinion saying, “The common understanding of sex discrimination in 1964 was bias against women or men and did not encompass discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity. If Congress wanted to protect gay and transgender workers, he wrote, it could pass a new law.”
Let me break down Alito’s argument: Because homophobia was more acceptable in 1964 when the anti-discrimination act was written and the creators of that law had no intention of protecting LGBTQ people, that law should not protect LGBTQ people.
Seriously…this guy is on the Supreme Court? That was basically reasoning you could find in the parking lot of a Trump rally but presented with much more eloquent words than, “fuck the gays.”
Thank you, Justice Neil Gorsuch. You did the right thing. Now, if you want to continue to do the right thing, before every vote you should ask yourself, “What would Merrick Garland do?” Then do that.
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Kids! It’s time for another walk through my butcher shop and see how the meat’s made. Be careful as it can get nasty. Watch where you step.
I sent this idea to CNN and my editor really liked it. My editor’s only question was, “where are those two guys on the lower right?” It was a good question. I moved them, added a golf club and a cheeseburger, made the city Washington, and it came out like…
…this.
I told you to watch where you step. This was actually much nastier in my head. Who am I kidding? All my ideas are nastier in my head. Right now, Donald Trump and John Bolton are making out in there. Now it’s in your head too. Hope you weren’t eating.
I actually drew this rough months ago, and it was overtaken by other aspects of the impeachment issues. Then it came back to me and I roughed it out again because I didn’t feel like scrolling through all my files. There are nearly 600 roughs in that folder. But it turned out like…
…this. Both versions had golf clubs and cheeseburgers.
This one didn’t turn into anything.
Damn Jay Sekulow.
I drew this before that clusterfuck of a State of the Union.
If you’ve been to this website before, you know I like the word “goon.” It’s so accurate.
I kinda like this one.
I roughed this out several times and intended to make a cartoon out of it. But it was so hard that I gave up. I figured it wasn’t good enough to put that much work into it. Then, someone else did something very close.
And then, I saw this turn into a Facebook meme. Goddammit!
I didn’t do this one because I thought there’s been enough Nixon lately.
This is the argument.
This one’s turning true.
I was going to put all their conspiracy theories and various bullshit stances on their shirts, and I forgot. Don Lemon explained he was making fun of Trump and not his supporters. For the record, yes. I’m making fun of all you Trump supporters. I think you’re all a bunch of lying, treasonous, traitorous, racist, sexist, stupid, conspiracy-loving, cult-worshipping deplorable assholes.
I told you to watch where you step because it was going to get nasty. I hope you weren’t eating.
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You can help me continue to create cartoons, blogs, and videos by making a contribution. All support, large and small, is greatly appreciated. You can also support me by purchasing a signed print (8 1/2×11) for $40, or a signed poster (18×24) for $100 by clicking the PayPal button (just include a note if you’re purchasing a print). If you want to support but don’t want to use PayPal, you can send a contribution through the mail (address is on the contact page. Again, include a note for a print). I don’t plan on going anywhere and your support will help guarantee that. Whether you support, can’t. or just choose not to, please know that I am truly thankful that you visit my site and read my work.
This is very similar to the oath cartoon I did last week but in this version, I give them a different oath. It’s an oath where they promise to be corrupt. The trial has started today and Mitch McConnell has already broken his oath.
McConnell wants to ram the entire thing through so that the bulk of it happens late at night, perhaps until 1:00 a.m. He’s hoping Americans stop paying attention. If voters pay attention, it’s not good for Republicans.
It’s not good because the majority doesn’t just want to hear witnesses. A majority wants Trump removed from office. It’s not good for Republicans for Americans to pay attention because they may hear the evidence, and Donald Trump is guilty. Donald Trump should be removed from office. The facts don’t help Donald Trump or Republicans.
Republicans have the majority in the Senate and they still need to fix the trial. They violated their oath before they ever took it.
Yesterday’s cartoon was on Trump goons. In a way, this one is too as each of the 53 Republicans in the United States Senate has chosen to participate in Trump’s coverup. Each of those senators has chosen to be a Trump goon.
Support the cartoonist.
You can help me continue to create cartoons, blogs, and videos by making a contribution. All support, large and small, is greatly appreciated. You can also support me by purchasing a signed print (8 1/2×11) for $40, or a signed poster (18×24) for $100 by clicking the PayPal button (just include a note if you’re purchasing a print). If you want to support but don’t want to use PayPal, you can send a contribution through the mail (address is on the contact page. Again, include a note for a print). I don’t plan on going anywhere and your support will help guarantee that. Whether you support, can’t. or just choose not to, please know that I am truly thankful that you visit my site and read my work.
I spent last Thursday morning nauseous and queasy from food poisoning. This morning, I was looking up photos of Senate Republicans, so yeah…another Thursday morning feeling nauseous and queasy.
Senate Republicans have already abandoned the oath they swore to when they took office. You know, that quaint idea of protecting and defending the United States of America from all forms of aggression, foreign and domestic. Because with Donald Trump, our nation’s received forms for aggression, foreign and domestic. How have Senate Republicans responded to it? They’ve all rolled over for belly rubs.
On the 2016 campaign trail, Donald Trump gave loyalty oaths at his hate rallies. He defended the practice from comparisons to the oaths Hitler demanded as “fun.” Republicans in Congress haven’t had a problem with the oath, at least not since the election. Before Trump was elected was another matter.
Lindsey Graham said of Trump, “He’s a race-baiting, xenophobic, religious bigot,” and “You know how you make America great again? Tell Donald Trump to go to hell.” Now, he promises not to be a fair juror in Trump’s impeachment trial which is starting next week and said “I’ve clearly made up my mind, I’m not trying to hide the fact that I have disdain for the accusations and the process.”
Ted Cruz called Trump a “pathological liar” and a “sniveling coward” after Trump retweeted a meme comparing the beauty between their wives. Now, he’s defending coming to a conclusion before the trial.
Marco Rubio said, “No senator can be impartial.” Back in 2016, he was making fun of the size of Trump’s penis.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has resisted calling witnesses, despite new ones coming out every day stating how Trump was trying to bribe a foreign leader to help his reelection. McConnell is totally coordinating the trial with the White House.
This morning, Senate Republicans are going to take an impeachment oath they’ve already promised to break. You can argue that Democrats are doing the same, but at least they can base their opinion that Trump is guilty on the fact that all the witnesses, documents, and facts support that Trump is guilty.
And the Republicans who are promising to be openminded will only do so if they don’t have to hear any more witnesses or evidence against Trump. The only way this could be any worse would be if we found out later that one of the Senators was helping Trump bribe Ukraine. But fortunately, the guy who did that in Congress is in the House.
The impeachment trial of Donald Trump beings next week and should continue for two more. But this morning, Republicans will get a head start by swearing on an oath they don’t have any intention to follow. At the same time, they don’t have any intention of representing the United States.
Creative note: Can’t recognize all the Republicans and wanna give up? Here you go. Left to right (top row); Tom Cotton, Rand Paul, Rick Scott, Joni Ernst, Jerry Moran, Ben Sasse (bottom row) Mitch McConnell, Lindsey Graham, Ted Cruz, Cindy Hyde-Smith, John Kennedy (very bottom) Marco Rubio.
Support the cartoonist.
You can help me continue to create cartoons, blogs, and videos by making a contribution. All support, large and small, is greatly appreciated. You can also support me by purchasing a signed print (8 1/2×11) for $40, or a signed poster (18×24) for $100 by clicking the PayPal button (just include a note if you’re purchasing a print). If you want to support but don’t want to use PayPal, you can send a contribution through the mail (address is on the contact page. Again, include a note for a print). I don’t plan on going anywhere and your support will help guarantee that. Whether you support, can’t. or just choose not to, please know that I am truly thankful that you visit my site and read my work.
Is anyone surprised that Mitch McConnell, Lindsey Graham, and other Senate Republicans are promising to violate an oath before they even swear to it? Of course not as these are the same Republicans who have given up on everything they used to believe in. Remember when they claimed to believe in family values, the military, patriotism, reduced debt, and protecting our nation from Russia?
Mitch McConnell didn’t have any problem violating Senate rules and the Constitution when he refused to hold a hearing for President Obama’s last Supreme Court nominee and then handing that nomination to Donald Trump. McConnell didn’t have any problem with blocking Obama’s nominations to lower courts either. While Republicans claim Obama left vacancies for them to fill, the truth is that only 28.6% of his judicial nominees were approved by the Republican-led Senate during the last two years of his presidency. While appearing on Sean Hannity’s show on Fox News, McConnell took credit for blocking Obama’s nominees after Hannity wondered aloud why Obama left so many vacancies. And then McConnell cackled which will probably keep me up at nights for several years to come.
Senators are required to make a new oath of office before an impeachment trial. Article I, section 3, clause 6 of the Constitution sets out that senators sitting on a trial of impeachment “shall be on Oath or Affirmation.”
According to Rule XXV of Senate Rules in Impeachment Trials, all senators must make the following oath: “I solemnly swear [or affirm, as the case may be] that in all things appertaining to the trial of the impeachment of [the person being impeached], now pending, I will do impartial justice according to the Constitution and laws: So help me God.”
McConnell told Hannity, “Everything I do during this, I’m coordinating with the White House counsel. There will be no difference between the president’s position and our position as to how to handle this.” This was probably followed by more cackling. He said he will be working in “total coordination with the White House counsel’s office and the people representing the president in the well of the Senate.”
Lindsey Graham has stated he has no intention of being an impartial juror. He has stated a refusal to listen to the evidence and that there shouldn’t even be a trial. Back in 1998, Graham scolded his colleagues for making decisions before the trial. He said, “Let the facts do the talking,” and “don’t decide the case before the case is in.”
Graham and McConnell have no problems being hypocrites and telling us out loud that they plan to conduct a sham of a trial. Since they don’t have any problem violating an oath let’s hope their voters do.
Why vote for a politician who promises to break promises? If they are announcing they will violate an oath to be impartial, why would anyone believe they’ll keep their oath to protect the United States Constitution? I don’t.
Senators like Mitch McConnell and Lindsey Graham won’t keep their promises to protect the Constitution, the nation, or even the presidency. If anything, they’re promising to betray the nation.
They are promising the trial will be a sham just as they are as United States Senators.
Support the cartoonist.
You can help me continue to create cartoons, blogs, and videos by making a contribution. All support, large and small, is greatly appreciated. You can also support me by purchasing a signed print (8 1/2×11) for $40, or a signed poster (18×24) for $100 by clicking the PayPal button (just include a note if you’re purchasing a print). If you want to support but don’t want to use PayPal, you can send a contribution through the mail (address is on the contact page. Again, include a note for a print). I don’t plan on going anywhere and your support will help guarantee that. Whether you support, can’t. or just choose not to, please know that I am truly thankful that you visit my site and read my work.
The Supreme Court ruled today that courts have no business deciding gerrymandering cases. Irony.
Writing the majority opinion, which was 5-4 and decided entirely by Republican-nominated justices, Roberts wrote that courts should stay out of politics. Keep in mind, they would not have won this decision if Mitch McConnell and the Republicans had not practiced cheap and dirty politics in stealing a seat from a Democratic president, and had squished him and another judge through by lowering the number of votes needed for confirmation. Again, irony.
What the Supreme Court just did was pave the way for continued partisanship and political bedlam. Gerrymandering has been utilized by both parties in the past, but more recently by Republican legislatures. This is a huge win for Republicans who need gerrymandering to win huge majorities while the majority of American voters reject them. Even in places like North Carolina where Republicans win over 50%, the GOP-led legislature uses gerrymandering to win over 70% of seats.
The court also gave liberals a win in the battle but not the war in the census question. The Trump administration wants to include a citizenship question in the 2020 census in order to dilute Democratic representation. Once again, Roberts voted with the majority but this time with the liberals.
It’s been proven that the Trump administration was using this politically. Now, Trump, acting like a fascist tyrant, is trying to delay the census in order to have the question included. Never mind the fact that the Constitution demands that there is to be no delay in the census.
While the court gave liberals a victory on the question, they left an opening for conservatives. Basically, the court decided the Trump administration’s argument was weak. What they told them was to return to the court later with better bullshit.
The court decided they should stay out of politics, even if those politics disenfranchise minorities, and left open a window for further disenfranchisement, not just of minorities but of Democratic voters.
I think the conservatives on the Supreme Court need to work on their bullshit.
Be Complicit
What kind of person would want to be part of something that disparages, slanders, and disrespects Dear Leader and his sycophantic followers? Hopefully, you.
Making a contribution supports my work and keeps the cartoons, columns, and videos coming. My income is from newspapers that subscribe to my work and small contributors. George Soros hasn’t sent me a million dollar check in weeks. Making a contribution of any amount, or buying a print for $40.00, makes you part of this specific resistance, and a member of Team Claytoonz (we’re still working on the name). You are complicit, an accomplice, and in cahoots (and whatever gangster terms we can think of) with this political satire pointing out that the stupid emperor has no clothes. Contributions can be made through PayPal, checks, and wads of cash exchanged in back alleys.
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I had a couple of other ideas. I bounced them off some friends and while I didn’t get any “mehs”, I didn’t detect any enthusiasm. I try better than “meh.”
Here’s those two ideas.
I kinda liked this one…but just kinda. It didn’t make laugh.
The dog represents Republicans. I did laugh at this one but I was afraid I’d be the only one. That’s happened before. I’ll probably bring this idea back in the future with another topic. Neutering is funny…unless you’re the one being neutered.