EU Flag, Revised

A recent report by Rania Khalek at Breakthrough News got me inspired to find out just how much each of the tanks cost which were smeared by Russia in Zelensky’s recent “Duck Soup” Offensive — and subsequently redesign the European Union flag.

Whooaaa… that much, huh? So, just how much of the value of your average European’s labor was stolen from them to build a bunch of these bad boys to arm up gangs of Nazi hillbillies? How much more of their healthcare and other social programs will they be giving up in order to #StandWithUkraine?

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Thanks For Covering Our Debt — Suckers!

And so, yet another Debt Ceiling Wrestlemania comes to a close — and as predicted, the ruling class gets the payoff, Zelensky gets new toys, and we get austerity.

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Apropos Of Nothing (Cliff? What Cliff? no.2)

Apropos of entirely nothing, really… just stumped for a gag, smoking and doodling at an ungodly hour the other night, vaguely inspired by this alarmist headline in the Washington Post, though this cartoon was not at all intentionally related to the whole debt ceiling pissing contest on the Hill this week… and while I’m at it — is it a cliff, or the ceiling? Quit jerking us around, Washington Post.

I also fully confess to an equally boneheaded literal interpretation of the whole beat-ass “cliff” metaphor. Hell, I’m old enough to remember the FIRST time around with that “cliff” horseshit.

…and besides, if you really take a good, close, hot steamy gawk at Biden’s real priorities — and the current attitude of the American general public towards more unemployment, inflation, war and austerity — you couldn’t exactly say we were “drifting”.

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Irony Meter Busted, Film At 11

So, a couple of days ago I’m taking my morning walk up and down Constitution past the Taft Carillion, and I spot a bunch of these posters splattered all over the neighborhood. Of course, while I’m obviously delighted at the sight of these, I’m amazed and confused at the use of a tweet from our shiny new Speaker Of The House regarding US military spending.

Mind you, I’m not bullshitting myself about McCarthy or anything, but the irony of a GOP House Speaker stopping the Donkeycrats from dragging us into another forever war in Big Israel is just so goddamn deee-lish that I can’t hardly stand it.

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the Vasectomy Kid

 

“In 2020, U.S. Congress imposed secondary sanctions on banks that processed transactions related to the Nord Stream 1 and 2 pipelines and on ship insurers that serviced them.

When construction of Nord Stream 2 was finished in 2021, Washington imposed new sanctions on insurance and certification companies to keep it from opening.

Finally, both pipelines were sabotaged in an undersea explosion in September 2022.

As a result, the industries that had made Germany preeminent in Europe, such as steel, chemicals, machinery, and automotives, are suffering from high energy costs and the loss of Russia’s aluminum, titanium, and palladium.

As a consequence, one in four German companies is considering moving production to other countries, amid the energy crisis…”

— Renate Bridenthal at the Geopolitical Economy Report, 01.10.2023

 

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That's Right, Kiddies! It's PUTIN'S...

Gropin' Joe has made it abundantly clear at the AFL-CIO convention a week or so back that he plans to beat that "Putin's Price Hike" horse until it's either dead or people actually start believing that horseshit. We promised Gorbachev we wouldn't expand NATO, then promptly spent the better part of the 1990s expanding NATO to Russia's front stoop and fomenting pro-US regime-change "color revolutions", but yeah, sure, Joe — it's Putin's war. Sonofabitch plans on distracting us from his horrid performance and our wartime austerity pain by blaming Putin for everything but the Mariners dragging ass in the AL West.

So — you heard it here first, kiddies. Supreme Court just stripped your reproductive rights? Putin made 'em do it. That asshole boss at Starbuck's who just canned you for union organizing? Putin did it. Those pals of yours who promised to help move that sofa last Saturday flaked on you? Putin. That raging hottie you've been dating for the past 2 months just put you in the Friend Zone? Yeah, that's right, my dude — fucking Putin. 

Dude's been one busy motherfucker lately, gotta give credit where it's due.

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Night Of The Living #StandWithUkraine

While y'all were hanging your Ukrainian flags out in front of your houses and putting little Ukrainian flags in your Facebook profile fotos and screaming about the dirty Rooskies and chewing rags over those poor little old Ukrainian ladies mixing Molotovs in their basements, this is what happened to your unemployment benefits extension and your rent relief and your eviction moratorium and your Covid "stimulus" and your healthcare.

Inspired by the top two stories in the Washington Post of May 20, above the fold like a shot and a chaser: we're pissing your healthcare away on a NATO/US proxy war in the Ukraine, and forget about baby formula anytime soon. Love that reference to "firm public support" in the Ukraine Care Package story. Bwah hah, "public support"... what do you mean "we", white man?

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The Sick Man of Earth

It's damn near official: the US is the epicenter of this pandemic, in more ways than one.

The US is waging economic warfare against Iran, Iraq, Venezuela and Cuba as they struggle to contain the pandemic in their nations, even as Cuba sends doctors to assist efforts in Italy and elsewhere in Europe. The US has also attempted to block delivery of masks and respirators to Barbados, of all places.

The US Federal government is seizing shipments of masks and ventilators destined for hospitals in Massachusette, New Jersey and other states. The Governor of New York is still cutting Medicaid funds in the middle of a pandemic — and, of course, the Democratic Party is insisting on dragging voters to the polls in person for the Wisconsin Primary, despite the horrorshow in Illinois.

Acts of war, piracy, deprivation, fraud?
It should be pretty clear by now who the real "sick man" is on this planet.

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What Part Of "NO"...

...won't they understand?  
"We invented democracy – BITCHES!"
–the Greeks

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God Save The King! (new Spanish flag)

One thing I'm thankful to Al Jazeera for is that it lets me follow the recent events in Spain in far greater detail than I ever could on CNNMSNBCFox.

Here's one in solidarity with Spaniards all over their country taking the streets to protest economic "austerity" and the ruination of their economy by the bankers, and to demand an end to the monarchy following the abdication of King Juan Carlos.

God Save The King -- and his fascist regime! 

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There's No Place Like Rome

 In Rome this week, thousands hit the streets against state-enforced austerity and for "home, income, dignity for all!" This cartoon is in solidarity with the thousands who braved horrific police violence, and in particular with the youth whose hand was blown off by a firecracker during a battle with police.

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Warning Signs

These days — especially given Obummer’s willingness to gut Social Security and Medicare to appease the Rightists — nothing sets my internal alarms clanging quite like the sound of politicians, pundits and other Washington zombies uttering the words “Bipartisanship”, “Compromise” and “Grand Bargain”, because no matter how you slice ‘em, they all translate to one thing: 

We’re fucked.

With that in mind, I present this set of three parody traffic warning signs, ideal for reproduction at large sizes, mounting on quarter-inch foam core, trimming and duct-taping to traffic sign poles around your neighborhood — especially if your neighborhood happens to be Capitol Hill in Washington, DC. Have at it, folks! 

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Walk Like An Egyptian – Bash Back Like A Brit

I really can’t come up with any words this time to go with this one; everything I’ve got to say about the uprisings in London and across Britain I’ve already said in this cartoon.

So, instead, I’ll just throw it over to Daniel Hind, writing at Al Jazeera in an op-ed entitled Nothing “Mindless” About Rioters:

Civil disturbances never have a single, simple meaning. When the Bastille was being stormed the thieves of Paris doubtless took advantage of the mayhem to rob houses and waylay unlucky revolutionaries. Sometimes the thieves were revolutionaries. Sometimes the revolutionaries were thieves. And it is reckless to start making confident claims about events that are spread across the country and that have many different elements. In Britain over the past few days there have been clashes between the police and young people. Crowds have set buildings, cars and buses on fire. Shops have been looted and passersby have been attacked. Only a fool would announce what it all means…

We can dispense with some mistakes, though. It is wrong to say that the riots are apolitical. The trouble began on Saturday night when protesters gathered at Tottenham police station to demand that the police explain the circumstances in which a local man, Mark Duggan, had been shot dead by the police. The death of a Londoner, another black Londoner, at the hands of the police has a gruesome significance. The police are employed to keep the peace and the police shot someone dead. This is a deeply political matter. Besides, it is conventional to say how much policing in London has changed since the Brixton riots of the early eighties – but not many people mouthing the conventional wisdom have much firsthand experience of being young and poor in Britain’s inner cities.

More broadly, any breakdown of civil order is inescapably political. Quite large numbers of mostly young people have decided that, on balance, they want to take to the streets and attack the forces of law and order, damage property or steal goods. Their motives may differ – they are bound to differ. But their actions can only be understood adequately in political terms. While the recklessness of adrenaline has something to do with what is happening, the willingness to act is something to be explained. We should perhaps ask them what they were thinking before reaching for phrases like “mindless violence”. We might actually learn something…

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The Three Seasons

When the shit hits the fan,
you’ll be sittin’ on the can
when the whip comes down!
–rolling stones.

Right now, in Egypt, Cairo’s fabled Tahrir Square is packed full of people protesting the continuing military police state, protesting the release of police charged with crimes of brutality and military trials for civilians.

Right now, in Greece, newly-enacted harsh economic austerity measures have brought students and workers into the streets by the thousands in protest.

Meanwhile, right now, in the Bad Old USA, the Obama Administration has extended the infamous Patriot Act and is preparing to gut Medicare and Social Security as part of a harsh economic austerity program. So, how are Americans responding to this? Why, they’re slobbed out on their apathetic fat asses, falling asleep watching the latest news on Casey Anthony.

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Off your ass, America–time to get your Greek on!

Y’know, I really am jealous of the Greeks – not because of the shape their economy’s in, nor because of the corruption of their government and its servility to capital, nor because of the state-imposed “austerity” programs they struggle against. I’m jealous of the Greeks and other Europeans because they haven’t forgotten how to fight in the streets – unlike US activists, for whom “direct action” these days means standing around, waving signs or holding candles in front of the White House in the dark.

In Greece right now, unionists, students and anarchists are taking on the police, kicking ass and taking names in the streets. They aren’t taking “austerity” lying down. They’ve made the country virtually ungovernable. Meanwhile, in the bad old USA, “progressives” are “fighting” the imminent loss of hard-won social safety nets by waving signs, having vegan potluck dinners and teach-ins, and voting Democratic – in spite of the mountain of evidence that the Democratic Party doesn’t give a rat’s ass about them today (as if they ever did).

I was inspired to do this cartoon after seeing a recent article on Al Jazeera, as well as a large piece in the Washington Post, detailing the extent of the Greek uprising currently going on, as well as the extensive involvement of militant anarchist youth.

C’mon, Americans – off your asses and into the streets. It’s time to get your Greek on!

The Washington Post, 05.14.11, “Into The Arms Of Anarchy”, page A1
The Washington Post, 05.14.11, “Into The Arms Of Anarchy”, continues page A5.

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