Republicans

Lock Him Up

Donald Trump “truthed” that he’s going to be arrested on Tuesday. It’s Tuesday. As Ted Knight said in Caddyshack, “Well? We’re waiting.”

Republicans are in an uproar over the possibility Donald Trump will be indicted and arrested in Manhattan over the hush-money payment scheme to porn star Stormy Daniels. It didn’t work because we still found out about the “Yeti pubes.” They claim the statutes of limitations have passed in the case which is not true but is an admission of guilt. They claim the investigation is solely political since, as Trump puts it, he’s the “leading” candidate in the presidential race.

Trump claimed that Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg “has allowed violent crime to reach new heights in New York without any retribution” in order to prosecute Trump. Other Republicans have made the same claim, saying Bragg should focus on other crimes in New York…and then without an ounce of awareness promise to investigate Bragg.

Instead of focusing on the border, inflation, the economy, China, and making sure Matt Gaetz isn’t hitting on underage congressional pages, Republicans want to investigate another Trump investigation.

Republican Florida congressman and Goon Caucus member Byron Donalds was on CNN this morning complaining about Bragg not focusing on New York, defended Congress going after Bragg, and then talked about how FEMA hasn’t provided enough trailers to his district after the last hurricane. Maybe you worry more about FEMA trailers in Florida and less about prosecutions in New York.

Republicans are threatening and harassing the Manhattan DA before any charges have been announced. While calling Bragg’s investigation political, they promise to investigate Bragg, and again without any awareness, with Jim Gym Jordan leading the committee.

Republicans are screaming and howling that a presidential candidate can’t be prosecuted, investigated, indicted, arrested, etc…while forgetting that they’re the “lock her up” gang.

Have you ever been to a Trump rally? I have. Have you at least seen one on TV? They do love their chants at Trump rallies. There’s “space force,” “fire Fauci,” “drain the swamp,” “build the wall,” and the always popular and very racist “send her back,” but perhaps the most popular of the chants that don’t exceed three syllables is “lock her up.”

In 2016, attendees of MAGA rallies started the chant “lock her up” in regard to Hillary Clinton, who at the time was the leading presidential candidate. Hmm. That’s weird. Right now, Republicans are saying it’s a bad thing to try to arrest leading presidential candidates and political opponents.

Donald Trump never disavowed these “lock her up” chants. Usually, he just stood at the podium with that creepy smile on his face ike he had just spotted a ten-year-old in Trump Tower that he’d like to date in eight years, allowing the crowd to continue the chant.

In 2020, while he was president (sic), he said during one of these “lock her up” chants, “I agree with you 100 percent.”

Throughout his presidency (sic), Trump called for investigations, prosecutions, indictments, and arrests of political opponents. He claimed Hillary Clinton and President Obama committed “treason” for their parts in the Russia investigation (they had zero parts in it).

In 2020, he tweeted at his Attorney General William Barr to “arrest somebody,” and wondered aloud why President Obama, then-Democratic nominee Joe Biden, and Hillary Clinton hadn’t been imprisoned for launching a “coup” against his administration.

In the same 24-hour period, he tweeted, “Where are all of the arrests? Can you imagine if the roles were reversed? Long term sentences would have started two years ago. Shameful!”

And then he let loose a barrage of tweets in all caps, stating, “DO SOMETHING ABOUT THIS, THE BIGGEST OF ALL POLITICAL SCANDALS (IN HISTORY)!!! BIDEN, OBAMA AND CROOKED HILLARY LED THIS TREASONOUS PLOT!!! BIDEN SHOULDN’T BE ALLOWED TO RUN – GOT CAUGHT!!!”

These tweets were sent right after Trump returned to the White House from Walter Reed Hospital where he was recovering from COVID, so he was probably pretty high on bleach, ivermectin, hydroxychloroquine, Diet Coke, and Adderall.

Elise Stefanik has called Bragg’s investigation “unAmerican.” Rand Paul, missing the irony of accusing Bragg of arresting political opponents while calling for Bragg’s arrest.

Speaker Kevin McCarthy said a possible indictment would be “an outrageous abuse of power by a radical DA who lets violent criminals walk as he pursues political vengeance.”

Mike Pence said it was a “politically-charged environment in New York where the attorney general and other elected officials literally campaigned on a pledge to prosecute the former president.” But it’s not as politically charged as the riot at the Capitol on January 6, 2021, that was chanting, “Hang Mike Pence.” Again, only three syllables.

Tech investor, Republican presidential candidate, and guy you never heard of before until now Vivek Ramaswamy said he didn’t want to live in a country where “the party in power is able to use police force to arrest its political opposition.”

Lauren Boebert tweeted, “We’re witnessing the most obscene political witch-hunt in American history.” And then her son impregnated the witch.

Marjorie Taylor Greene tweeted with a link to MTG merchandise, “George Soros puppet and Democrat activist Manhattan DA Alvin Bragg has declared us all Enemies of State by declaring war on MAGA.” But you too can proudly wear “Enemy of the State” panties.

Jim Gym Jordan said it was an “unprecedented abuse of prosecutorial authority.”

Matt Gaetz said to a young woman walking past him in a hallway, “Hey, are you 18 yet?”

George Santos said, “I never abused my office politically when I was the Manhattan DA.”

But if you can remember, the party in power in the House of Representatives in 2016 conducted the Benghazi hearings. They forced Hillary Clinton to testify during her campaign. Kevin McCarthy praised the hearings for hurting Clinton’s poll numbers.

None of the goons, not McCarthy, Stefanik, Donalds, Paul, Pence, MTG, Boebert, or Ramalamadingdong ever told Trump to stop tweeting to his Attorney General to arrest his political opponents. None of them called it “unAmerican.” Remember, all of these goons were A-OK with President (sic) Trump using taxpayer-funded military aid approved by Congress to extort the President of Ukraine to dig up dirt on his political opponent.

Attorney General (sic) Bill Barr did use the Justice Department to defend Trump and his goons and appointed a Special Counsel to investigate the Russia investigation, which has turned up diddly. So yeah, they did try to go after Trump’s political opponents. The problem was, they didn’t have anything on Trump’s political enemies. That’s the same problem they have today with the Bidens and all the claims of corruption and payments from China…they don’t have anything.

Republicans impeached President Bill Clinton for lying about oral sex but they want to sweep under the rug that Donald Trump paid hush money to a porn star to keep quiet about doing the wild thing in Vegas and that his ding-dong looks really really weird.

Republican outrage can’t be taken seriously. McCarthy says justice isn’t being applied evenly…and neither is his outrage.

If Democrats are actually using the law to go after political opponents, then Republicans are outraged that Democrats are acting like them.

If Republicans don’t want their candidates to be arrested, then stop making criminals your candidates.

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.

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Here’s your cartoon for this week’s CNN Opinion newsletter. Please sign up to get these in your inbox every Sunday

When China sends a spy balloon to fly over the United States (and other nations), it lies. When Russia knocks down a U.S. drone in international air space over the Black Sea, it lies.

I hadn’t gotten to draw the spy balloon in a few weeks.

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.

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MAGA-Lardo Subpoenas

Donald Trump is preparing to be arrested by the Manhattan District Attorney next week, politicizing it, fundraising off it, and trying to create another violent riot from it. This case stems from paying hush money to porn star Stormy Daniels in 2016, days before the election, to keep quiet about boinking in a Las Vegas hotel room just four months after Melania gave birth to Baron. It’s not illegal to cheat on your wife four months after she gave birth to your fifth child. It’s not illegal to shag porn stars in Vegas. It’s not even illegal to pay hush money to a porn star to keep quiet about boinking in Vegas. But…it is a crime to donate money to your own campaign and not file it.

Michael Cohen, who was Trump’s lawyer/fixer at the time, paid Stormy $130,000 in the scheme, and Trump reimbursed Cohen later with a check…AFTER he was in the White House. Trump committed a crime and he did it while he was president. This should be his third impeachment.

Trump has denied having sex with Stormy Daniels but has admitted reimbursing Michael Cohen.

Former National Enquirer publisher David Pecker should also be facing criminal charges for paying a Playboy playmate $150,000 shortly before the 2016 election to keep quiet about her trysts with Tiny.

While the Manhattan case may be historic in that a former president (sic) is arrested, and extremely embarrassing when we get to see Trump’s mug shot and hopefully a perp walk (pleeeeeeeeeeeeease let there be a perp walk of Trump in handcuffs), it’s not the case that’s the biggest threat to Trump.

The greatest threat to Trump is the case in Georgia where Trump engaged in election interference, fraud, tampering, intimidation, etc, and the Special Counsel probe of Trump trying to steal the election, instigating a terrorist attack on the Capitol, obstructing Congress while it was performing a constitutionally-mandated duty, committing an insurrection, and stealing classified documents and obstructing justice.

We learned last week that Special Counsel Jack Smith has subpoenaed at least two dozen people over Trump’s handling of the documents, including employees of Mar-a-Lago. Multiple sources close to the situation said the list includes former attorneys, aides, housekeepers, restaurant workers, and other employees of the country club that has become Trump’s full-time residence.

I’ve read in the past that Trump is actually a pretty good tipper, often handing $50 bills to housekeepers. Now we know why. But I think silence should cost more than $50. If you’re an employee at Mar-a-Lago and you see something, then say something.

These investigations and prosecutions are NOT political. The Manhattan DA refused to prosecute Trump personally when he went after the Trump Organization. Donald Trump attacked our country and tried to steal an election. Sure, it’s unprecedented for a former president (sic) to be arrested, but it’s also unprecedented that a president (sic) is a traitor.

Indict Trump, arrest Trump, convict Trump, and imprison Trump. It’s the American thing to do.

Music note: I listened to Hole.

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.

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Let’s Go To Prison

Fucknut Qanon troglodyte she-beast Marjorie Taylor Greene plans to visit January 6 defendants in prison. She believes the white nationalist terrorists who committed an insurrection in attacking our nation in a failed coup attempt are patriots. But hey, maybe while she’s there, she can visit the biggest January 6 defendant, former president (sic) of the United States Donald J. Trump. The “J” is for jagoff.

Donald Trump predicted this morning, Saturday, March 18, 2023, that he’s going to be arrested this Tuesday. Trump “truthed” in all caps because nobody’s taught grandpa how to use the caps lock key yet, “THE FAR & AWAY LEADING REPUBLICAN CANDIDATE AND FORMER PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, WILL BE ARRESTED ON TUESDAY OF NEXT WEEK. PROTEST, TAKE OUR NATION BACK!”

Wow, right? He admits he’s the former president.

An indictment is expected soon from the Manhattan grand jury that’s been hearing the district attorney’s case against Trump in the hush money scheme to silence Stormy Daniels in the 2016 presidential election. Does Trump actually know when the indictment is coming down? He probably doesn’t. But what he is doing is using this to raise money. He’s also calling for a protest much like he did for January 6 when Congress was certifying the Electoral College and Joe Biden’s victory in the 2020 presidential election.

Within hours, Speaker Kevin McCarthy tweeted that he is calling for investigations into whether federal funds were being used for “politically motivated prosecutions.” But Donald Trump did pay Stormy Daniels to remain silent about their shagfest, the toad, and yeti pubes without filing it as a campaign expense. McCarthy should wait until after a trial before calling for more bullshit investigations. This is the same guy who bragged that the Benghazi investigations were used to hurt Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign. How much in federal funds is the Republican House using for politically motivated investigations into Hunter Biden?

MTG has now added defunding federal investigations into Mr. Yeti Pubes before she’ll vote to raise the debt ceiling. Republicans want criminals to run wild.

But if you’re excited about the prospect of Trump being convicted and sent to prison on the Stormy Daniels thing, don’t be. Out of all the investigations currently ongoing against Trump, this is the one he’s not really worried about. In fact, he may insist upon doing a perp walk as it’ll be a great fundraiser and aid in creating another MAGA white nationalist terrorist riot. What fun.

For Trump to be indicted, prosecutors will have to convince a jury that Trump intentionally violated campaign finance laws with the strongest testimony coming from a convicted perjurer in Michael Cohen, and a porn star. And even if he is convicted, jail time is not mandatory. Since this will be the first time he’s ever been convicted criminally, I wouldn’t put money on a jail sentence.

The cases that should truly worry Trump are the investigations by Special Counsel Jack Smith and the one over election tampering in Georgia. Trying to steal an election, overthrow the government, and stealing and hiding classified documents is much more serious than boinking a porn star. The biggest excitement I’ll gain from this is the possibility that we’ll see Sniffles in handcuffs.

But even in the Stormy case, Trump has a greater chance of eating prison food before Russian President Vladimir Putin does.

The International Criminal Court (ICC) has issued an arrest warrant for Putin. Don’t get excited about this one either because not only can’t the ICC go and get Putin out of Russia, it’s a warrant that’s not recognized by a lot of nations, including the United States. President Biden said it’s “justified” even as he pointed out that we don’t recognize it.

Even if he’s never arrested, Vladimir Putin is a war criminal. And the warrant is still a big deal because this is the leader of a G0 nation.

But if Putin is ever put in prison, let’s make it convenient for MTG, who loves and defends both men, and make Trump and Putin cellmates.

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.

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Woke Brackets

I got home really late last night and I was exhausted. I checked out of my hotel in Pigeon Forge early in the morning, drew my cartoon at Starbucks, then got an Uber to the Knoxville airport, ate, flew to Atlanta, and had a Frosty during that four-hour layover while my flight was delayed…then delayed again, flew to Washington, took the Metro to Springfield, called a Lyft to take me home to Fredericksburg…and then stayed up two more hours because while being exhausted, I was also kinda wired. I ordered some food from Wawa and then they canceled my turkey sandwich, so I went ahead and cooked something at 1 a.m.

I spent that time catching up on the news and reading about Republicans blaming wokeness for SVB’s collapse. And then I saw an article about the military’s “woke” response to Russia downing a U.S. drone, and then something about March Madness popped up and I thought, “Can I blame wokeness if my bracket busts?”. That’s how I write sometimes. I thought the idea of a woke bracket was funny because it really sounds stupid. And then I found out this morning that woke brackets are a thing.

Proofer Laura told me this morning that she thought I had invented woke brackets, and I thought I had too…but she Googled and it’s a thing, though it seems most aren’t about basketball.

In 2021, Outkick started this bracket thing where readers can vote on Twitter called the “Woke Bracket Challenge” where I think you pit one bracket predictor against another which turns it into something I don’t care about at all.

And then I found the “anti-woke bracket” from the Washington Examiner, a failing conservative online publication based in Washington, D.C. You make your picks based on which schools have the fewest “freedom-hating bureaucrats” at their institution. It’s based on a report from the conservative think tank the Heritage Foundation, which has counted all the diversity, equity, and inclusion administrators for every school in the Power Five conferences, and then compared that number to the number of teaching faculty at each university and wow…someone has too much time on his hands.

And I thought it was already a huge distraction and waste of time with the regular brackets.

As I’m trying to understand these woke and anti-woke brackets, it suddenly occurred to me that I don’t have to understand it…because all the right-wing goons who scream about woke can’t tell you what woke is. Ron DeSantis sure can’t and neither can Bethany Mandel, an author who co-wrote a book (with a DeSantis goon) claiming the far-left has indoctrinated today’s youth with racial ideology, victimhood, culture, and “gender madness.” When asked to define “wokeness,” Mandel couldn’t.

Mandel was on The Hill’s online show, The Rising when co-host Briahna Joy Gray asked her to define the word “woke.”

Mandel’s response was, “So, I mean, woke is sort of the idea that, um,…This is going to be one of those moments that goes viral.” And it did.

Mandel then said, “I mean, woke is something that’s very hard to define, and we’ve spent an entire chapter defining it. It is sort of the understanding that we need to totally reimagine and reduce society in order to create hierarchies of oppression. Um, sorry, I—it’s hard to explain in a 15-second sound bite.” So she wrote an entire chapter defining it but couldn’t define it.

The co-host of the show, libertarian Robby Soave, jumped in to rescue Mandel and defined woke as “the tendency to punish people formally or often informally for expressing ideas using language that is very new that no one would have objected to like five seconds ago.” Wrong! It’s not about punishing people who disagree with you. Soave wasn’t even close. It’s about understanding.

While Republicans are howling about wokeness and clearly struggling to understand it, a new poll by USA Today found that 56 percent of those surveyed say the term means “to be informed, educated on, and aware of social injustices.”

Republicans are going to have to find another word to describe all that bullshit they’re crying about, because “woke” isn’t it. They’re claiming that understanding social injustice makes them a victim while writing books that blame the left for indoctrinating kids into victimhood.

And like Republicans with “woke,” I don’t understand college basketball this year because I didn’t follow it, which means my bracket has just as good of a chance as anyone else’s.

Music note: I listened to The Pixies.

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.

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DeSantis Loves Putin

Any candidate who can’t see that democracy in Europe and the defeat of fascism is in our vital national interest has no place in the White House…or Congress, or a governor’s mansion, or have his own talk show.

While talking to Tucker Carlson on Fox News, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis said, “While the US has many vital national interests, securing our borders, addressing the crisis of readiness within our military, achieving energy security and independence, and checking the economic, cultural, and military power of the Chinese Communist Party, becoming further entangled in a territorial dispute between Ukraine and Russia is not one of them.”

First, checking the military power of China is a vital national interest, but Russia’s military invasion of a soveriegn nation is not? Second, Russia’s illegal invasion of Ukraine is NOT a territorial dispute.

Russian President Vladimir Putin has firebombed the entire nation of Ukraine which he’s justified with lies about Nazis. If Ukraine was actually controlled by Nazis, they’d be siding with Putin. Putin is trying to make Ukraine a part of Russia again and destroy the government elected by the people of Ukraine. He’s bombed homes, hospitals, schools, and playgrounds killing over 400 children in the process. Anyone who calls this a “territorial dispute” is a vile disgusting despicable human being. This is Ron DeSantis.

You can include Ron DeSantis with Matt Gaetz, Lauren Boebert, Jim Jordan, Marjorie Taylor Greene, Tucker Carlson, and Donald Trump, who all are on the side of Putin’s fascist Russia over democratic Ukraine. In choosing Russia over Ukraine, they’re choosing Russia over the vital national interests of the United States.

Of course, Ron DeSantis would side with the fascist who doesn’t allow fair elections in his nation over the democratically-elected Volodimyr Zelenskyy. DeSantis has modeled his tyranny of Florida on the fascist states of Russia and Hungary. He’s waged war on science, history, LGBTQ, education, and all dissent.

Ron DeSantis says “Florida is where woke goes to die.” “Woke” is an idealogy of open-mindedness, thoughtfulness, and compassion. Woke is understanding positions you will never be in and being aware and conscious of the plights of others. If you’re a white male and you understand others who are not white males will have a more difficult path than you and realize that you do indeed have white privilege, then congratulations. You are woke. Ron DeSantis wants “woke” to die and is trying to kill it through legislation. Ron DeSantis is trying to cancel, not just free speech, but free thinking. He’s currently trying to turn one state college into a reeducation camp.

It’s shocking that Republicans don’t believe Russian aggression, threatening NATO and Europe, is not in America’s vital interests. Ronald Reagan must be rolling in his grave while Ron DeSantis is rolling in Putin’s propaganda.

Creative note: This cartoon was drawn at a Starbucks in Pigeon Forge, Tennessee. The blog was written inside a Ruby Tuesdays in the terminal of the Knoxville airport.

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.

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Conjunction Misfunction

Silicone Valley Bank crashed Saturday with $212 billion in assets. It’s the second-largest bank failure in history. This prompted Cocaine Bear, I mean Donald Trump Jr, to tweet, “I don’t remember banks collapsing under Trump.”

Seaway Bank and Trust Company, Proficio Bank, First NBC Bank, Guaranty Bank, Fayette County Bank, The Farmers and Merchants State Bank of Argonia, Washington Federal Bank for Savings, The Enloe State Bank, Louisa Community Bank, Resolute Bank, City National Bank of New Jersey, Ericson State Bank, The First State Bank, First City Bank of Florida, Almena State Bank all collapsed during the Trump administration. In case you’re counting, that’s 15 banks that collapsed during the Trump administration. Just because Sniffles Jr doesn’t remember something doesn’t mean it didn’t happen. Ten years from now and he won’t remember dating Kimberly Guilfoyle.

Marjorie Taylor Greene tweeted, “They give money to Silicon Valley Bank. They give money to Ukraine. But no money for East Palestine.” MTG’s received a bailout of over $183,504 which she didn’t refuse. And why should taxpayers pay for a corporation’s fuck up in East Palestine? The government paying to clean up the disaster in East Palestine, Ohio would be a taxpayer-paid bailout for a corporation. Norfolk Southern is a huge campaign contributor to Republicans.

On Sunday, the Treasury Department, the Federal Reserve, and the FDIC announced they were taking “decisive actions” to protect the economy and shore up confidence in the banking system. This is so there isn’t a panic and everyone in the nation pulls their money out of their banks, which is what happened to SVB. This is a bailout but it’s not a taxpayer bailout like the one we saw in 2008.

SVB is not going to be revived and lenders and shareholders won’t be getting any government money. But depositors will be paid back from a fund that banks pay into called the “Depositors Insurance Fund.”

Conservatives are blaming the bank’s collapse on…wait for it…”wokeism.” Wait, what? Seriously? Yes, seriously. It’s because the bank hired gay bank tellers and trans security guards. No, really, they blame investments that promote environmental and social goals and SVB’s commitment to diversity and equity programs. The reason conservatives hate SVB so much is that it was a bank used by the tech industry, which of course they believe discriminates against them. For them, it’s an easy target if you don’t look at the details.

And yes, Trump’s deregulation of the banking industry is a contributing factor in SVB’s collapse.

President Obama signed the Dodd-Frank Act in 2010 which was designed to prevent another collapse like the one we saw in 2018. Dodd-Frank mandated stricter capital and liquidity standards for institutions with $50 billion in assets. Trump’s rewrite raised the minimum to $250 billion in assets.

SVB’s CEO was a huge supporter to raise that minimum and at the time, SVG had less than $50 billion in assets. When SVB crashed last week, it had $212 billion.

If Republicans want to scream and hootin’ and hollerin’ (I’m in Tennesse) about the bank’s collapse, then they need to scream at themselves.

You can’t keep deregulating banks and railroads and then wonder why they crash…or blame wokeism.

Creative note: This cartoon was drawn at a Starbucks in Pigeon Forge, Tennessee. I wrote the blog back in my hotel room.

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.

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Retire Nikki

Here’s your cartoon for this week’s CNN Opinion newsletter. Please sign up to get these in your inbox every Sunday

Democrats hold a lead with the youth vote over Republicans 60 percent to 30 percent. So it’s easy for Nikki Haley to suggest raising the retirement age for the people who will never vote for her and the people stupid enough to vote for her. But right now, she’s still polling around four percent among Republicans. I lose more sleep over other Republicans possibly becoming president.

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.

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Grandma Boebert

“Been around the world and found that only stupid people are breeding” – “Flagpole Sitta” by Harvey Danger.

Tyler Boebert, who you may remember from the Boebert gun fetish Christmas card a couple years back, has knocked up his 16-year-old girlfriend, which is only a couple years older than the girls his father flashes his penis to in bowling alleys.

Lauren Boebert, who has three other sons waiting in the wings to knock up teen girls, should have spent less time posing her sons for ammo Christmas cards and more time teaching them how to put condoms on bananas. But Lauren is giddy about being a grandmother at 36 and is using her incoming grandchild to promote rural teen birth rates.

She’s excited that there is a high birth rate among teens in rural areas than in urban areas. Sexually transmitted diseases are also higher in rural areas than in urban.

Boebert made the announcement at CPAC, saying, “There’s something special about rural conservative communities. They value life. If you look at teen pregnancy rates throughout the nation, well, they’re the same, [in] rural and urban areas. However, abortion rates are higher in urban areas. Teen moms’ rates are higher in rural conservative areas because they understand the preciousness of a life that it’s about to be born.”

Yeah, sure. They also lack access to not just birth control but sex education. Boebert isn’t just anti-abortion but also opposes educating kids on sex. When you fail to provide sex ed, the chances increase of your son knocking up his 16-year-old girlfriend. Boebert said at another CPAC event that comprehensive sex ed shouldn’t be taught to “any student in a public school.” Naturally, Boebert is in favor of abstinence education but as her own kid proves, that doesn’t work.

Of course, there are smart people in rural areas, but people in cities tend to be better educated and informed than those in the country. Case in point: Sarah Huckabee Sanders is the governor of Arkansas.

Sanders is also rolling back child labor laws in her state, eliminating requirements for the state to verify the age of children younger than 16 before they can take a job. At what point will Republicans reinstate slave labor and indentured servitude? Meanwhile, Republicans in multiple states are taking time away from accusing Democrats of being pedophiles and groomers to lower age requirements for marriage.

The only good thing that can come from putting underage kids to work in meat-packing plants is that they’ll be too busy to be exposed to a Boebert penis.

Music Note: I listened to Paula Cole.

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.

Watch me draw:

Toad

I have three concerns with this cartoon.

My first concern is the file size. My cartoons usually include a lot of detail which makes for large files. I create four files for each cartoon. The file for this one is incredibly small. The black and white jpeg of the cartoon is only 444K. That’s small. It may be an unnecessary concern of mine but I worry that a small file will be low in quality when it’s published.

That concern may not be necessary because of my second concern, which is…nobody’s going to run this cartoon. OK, maybe the Detroit Metro Times. They’re ballsy. And that leads to my third concern.

My third concern is that it won’t be published, not because the cartoon is about Donald Trump’s penis, but because a lot of people won’t understand the cartoon. So here goes another blog that explains the cartoon.

It’s about Trump’s dick.

One of my proofreaders didn’t understand the cartoon. It’s possible my other proofer didn’t either and she was just being nice because she’s nice. But the way I justify drawing a cartoon that possibly most of my readers and newspaper clients won’t get is: I draw a lot of cartoons. I’m the only political cartoonist in this country who gives my readers and clients a brand-new cartoon every single day (there is another guy who often shits out three a day but most of those are traced photos and stolen clipart he signs his name on, so he doesn’t count).

It’s also a Saturday and I often do crazy shit on the weekends. Anyway, my clients get enough from me they can use that one can land in the trash.

An editor might say, “I can’t use this because I don’t get it. What’s it about?”
And I would tell him, “Trump may be indicted on criminal charges for his role in hush payments to porn star Stormy Daniels, who described Trump’s dick as looking like Toad from Mario Kart.”
And then the editor would reply, “Good God, now I’m definitely not publishing this.” Unless that editor is from the Detroit Metro Times.

And yes, Trump is facing criminal charges in Manhattan as the District Attorney has invited him to testify before the grand jury. In New York, potential defendants have the right to answer questions in the grand jury before they are indicted. Most decline and I’m sure Trump will too because any testimony can be used against him. These invitations are usually followed by indictments.

District Attorney Alvin Bragg may be the first to charge Trump criminally…but not the last.

Trump is under investigation in Georgia for interfering in that state’s presidential election when he demanded Georgia’s Secretary of State to “find” him 11,780 votes. Trump HAS to be charged in Georgia. Not charging him would be criminal.

He’s also under investigation by a Special Counsel for his role in the January 6 white nationalist terrorist attack, for trying to steal the 2020 election, and for stealing government documents, many of which are classified.

Trump has also committed sooooooooooo many other crimes without any charges or even investigations. Trump not being in prison already is a testament that we have a very unequal justice system. Donald Trump is a criminal…a big fat racist orange grifting criminal.

The Manhattan investigation has been going on for five years, which is another testament to our unequal legal system.

Here’s the deets: Trump shagged Stormy Daniels years ago. He didn’t want her to talk about it during the 2016 presidential campaign, so he paid her to keep quiet about it. Trump’s lawyer/fixer, Michael Cohen, paid Stormy $130,000 in the final days of the campaign. After Trump became president (sic), he reimbursed Cohen with a check and then lied about it. Bill Clinton would have been impeached for this shit and possibly sent to prison. If there was even a rumor of President Obama doing this, there would be congressional investigations today.

One of the reasons Michael Cohen was sent to prison was for campaign finance violations. So how is Cohen guilty of breaking campaign finance laws but Trump isn’t?

Paying someone hush money isn’t a crime. But it may be a crime if you do it as a campaign contribution that isn’t filed. Concealing the payment could be the crime in this case. In New York, falsifying business records can amount to a crime, but just a misdemeanor. To elevate the crime to a felony charge, Bragg’s prosecutors must show that Trump’s “intent to defraud” included an intent to commit or conceal a second crime.

That second crime may be that the hush money was an improper donation and a violation of state election laws, in that the hush money benefited Trump’s campaign.

Initially, Stormy took her story to the National Enquirer and offered them an exclusive for which they would pay for. They did this with another woman Trump boinked, paid her for the exclusive rights to the story, then never published it in what’s often referred to as “catch and kill.” The National Enquirer was published by a Trumper, a guy named…wait for it…”Pecker.”

Instead of paying Stormy for the story, Pecker helped negotiate the hush payment with her and Michael Cohen in order to help the Trump Campaign. Trump has said the National Enquirer should be winning Pulitzers.

Nobody has ever been charged with a felony under all these circumstances. Trump’s fuckery is unique. The president (sic) of the United States paid his lawyer to pay a porn star to keep quiet. The odds may be very low that Trump is convicted and if he is, it’ll probably just be a low-level felony with the maximum sentence being four years, but the judge has the option of not including any jail time in the sentence.

So the question may not that be whether Trump goes to prison or not but…was the $130,000 to keep people from knowing Trump cheated on his wife (just four months after she had given birth to Baron, but in Trump’s defense, her body was probably still weird, gross, and icky after giving birth to his fifth child, which I’m sure you understand) with a porn star or that his penis looks like Toad from Mario Kart?

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.

Watch me draw: