Political Irony

Clinton on Colbert

Thursday, October 29, 2015

Steven Colbert, who played himself acting like a conservative for years, banters with Hillary Clinton, who once upon a time (in college) was president of the Young Republicans chapter.

Filed in Irony | Comments Off

Late Night Political Humor

Thursday, October 29, 2015

‘Donald Trump went on a rant about how horrible socialism is. But you know what, isn’t Trump’s hair socialism? It’s the richer hair covering the poorer hair for the good of the head.’ – Bill Maher

“Donald Trump is now saying that his immigration policies would have prevented 9/11. Trump is also claiming his hair would have kept the Titanic afloat.” – Conan O’Brien

“Jeb Bush’s campaign announced yesterday that it raised over $13 million last quarter, which means it’s doing better than most of the other major campaigns. Or as Jeb put it, ‘Crap. What do I gotta do to lose this thing?!'” – Jimmy Fallon

“Jeb Bush’s campaign has a contest now where someone will be flown to Houston to meet him, his dad, and his brother. No word on what the winner gets.” – Conan O’Brien

“Actually, I saw that Jeb Bush’s campaign has been staying at cheaper hotels to save money. Which would make Jeb the first politician ever to book a room at a cheap motel just to sleep.” – Jimmy Fallon

“At the debate on Tuesday Democratic candidate Lincoln Chafee bragged about the fact that in 30 years of public service, he’s never had one scandal. Well, it just came out that Chafee once used taxpayer money to buy frogs for his office aquarium. People said, ‘Well at least it wasn’t a sex scandal.’ And Chafee said, ‘Riiiight…'” – Jimmy Fallon

“A high school student hacked the AOL email account of John Brennan, the director of the CIA. In other words, the student correctly guessed that the password of anyone still using AOL is ‘password’.” – Conan O’Brien

“While accepting the Mark Twain Prize for American Humor, Eddie Murphy did a Bill Cosby impression. Murphy’s Cosby impression was so accurate, nine women are suing him.” – Conan O’Brien

Filed in Humor | Comments Off

Happy Hallowe’en!

Wednesday, October 28, 2015

And just remember, the actual election is over a year away. We’re just getting started!

The horror! the horror!

Filed in Humor | Comments Off

Late Night Political Humor

Wednesday, October 28, 2015

“A study found that one of the most popular searches during the debate was, ‘Is Bernie Sanders Jewish?’ While the most popular response on Google was, ‘Come on’.” – Jimmy Fallon

“Democratic presidential hopeful Bernie Sanders was on ‘Ellen’ today. A lot of people, myself included, said Bernie Sanders doesn’t have the style or the charisma to be president. But he came out dancing on ‘Ellen’. I think we owe him an apology.” – Jimmy Kimmel

“CNN’s Wolf Blitzer told Democratic presidential hopeful Lincoln Chafee yesterday that he is going to wind up looking silly if he stays in the race. And let’s face it, also if he doesn’t. Chafee then told Blitzer that he’ll remain in the race as long as he can continue to raise important issues. And you know he’s got a point. I mean, literally, he’s got one point.” – Seth Meyers

“Analysts are saying that Joe Biden was actually the biggest loser in the debate, and that he missed his chance to enter the race. Yeah, they said entering now would be awkward and inappropriate – or as Biden put it, ‘Those are my two middle names! I’m in!'” – Jimmy Fallon

“Now that the dust has settled from the Democratic debate, it looks like Hillary Clinton is going to remain the Democratic front-runner. And believe it or not over on the Republican side, Donald Trump is still in the lead. And now Trump is saying that he should be given Secret Service protection. As opposed to his current security: having Gary Busey follow him around with some nunchucks.” – Jimmy Fallon

“Donald Trump is reportedly threatening to pull out of the next GOP debate unless CNBC reinstates opening and closing statements. And Lincoln Chafee is threatening to pull out of the next Democratic debate if there are going to be questions.” – Seth Meyers

“Donald Trump’s son said in an interview last night that everything his dad has ever touched has turned to gold. Well, not everything. Jeb’s still waiting to turn to gold.” – Seth Meyers

“New research shows that China has a bigger middle class than America, and more people in China are living what we would call the ‘American Dream’. That’s when you know things are bad – when even the American DREAM is made in China.” – Jimmy Fallon

Filed in Humor | Comments Off

Electoral Vote

Tuesday, October 27, 2015

One of my favorite political websites, Electoral Vote, has been ramping up for the (still relatively distant) presidential election.

In the latest issue, they sum up an article from the NY Times that predicts that Marco Rubio will be the Republican nominee for president. First of all, they point out that exactly five years ago, Ross Douthat predicted that Mitt Romney would be the Republican nominee. It was a bold prediction back then, but it was right. Of course, past luck doesn’t always guarantee future success, but it makes a good headline.

More interesting is Douthat’s reasons for predicting Marco Rubio will win the nomination. Regular readers may recall that over a month ago I predicted that Rubio would win the Republican nomination. But Douthat gives actual reasons why Rubio will get the nod, and it is intereating. Rubio will win because of process of elimination – every other candidate has a fatal flaw.

Donald Trump. No party has ever nominated a weirdo like him
Ben Carson. See Trump
Carly Fiorina. She is running for a cabinet position
Jeb Bush. He’s flailing in all directions and only the super-rich like him
John Kasich. He is too moderate and too ornery about it
Chris Christie. Too many cones
Ted Cruz. The party leaders despise him
Bobby Jindal. Carson and Cruz suck up his oxygen
Mike Huckabee. See Jindal
Rick Santorum. The voters are not the slightest bit interested
Lindsey Graham. See Santorum
George Pataki. See Graham

So Marco Rubio is the only man left standing. Douthat says that Rubio is close to the ideological center of the Republican Party, comes from a key swing state, is a good debater, has an impressive biography and personal style, and most important, nobody hates him.

I agree. If anyone can come up with a counter-argument for why somebody else will win, I’d love to hear it.

Filed in Irony | Comments (11)

Late Night Political Humor

Tuesday, October 27, 2015

“After speculation that he may enter the Democratic debate at the last minute, Joe Biden ended up not coming. Biden said he thought about showing up, but at the end of the day, his head was stuck in a banister.” – Jimmy Fallon

“Sheryl Crow performed the National Anthem before last night’s debate, but many Twitter users were unhappy with her performance. Mostly because they thought the National Anthem was Uptown Funk.” – Seth Meyers

“Sheryl Crow performed the National Anthem at last night’s debate, but it looked like Martin O’Malley was the only one actually singing along. In fairness, there’s nothing more American than just PRETENDING you know the National Anthem.” – Jimmy Fallon

“Turned out it was the highest-rated debate for the Democrats ever. More than 15 million people tuned in to watch Hillary Clinton, Bernie Sanders, and the three high school principals they invited to fill out the stage.” – Jimmy Kimmel

“It was a big night for Bernie Sanders. He talked about his views on war, and said that he strongly opposed it when he was a young man. Even crazier, he was talking about the TROJAN War.” – Jimmy Fallon

“Sanders supporters pointed to the fact that Bernie was the most googled of all the candidates during the debate. Sounds like a big thing until you realize the top questions they googled included, ‘who is Bernie Sanders?’ and, ‘is Bernie Sanders Jewish?'” – Jimmy Kimmel

“Anderson Cooper tried to make a case that Bernie Sanders isn’t electable because he calls himself a socialist. I think that’s the least of his problems. I think he isn’t electable because he calls himself Bernie.” – Jimmy Kimmel

“Moderator Anderson Cooper asked Lincoln Chafee why he switched parties from being a Republican, and Chafee called himself a ‘block of granite.’ When asked what he meant by that, Chafee said, ‘I meant that I’d make a better countertop than president.” – Jimmy Fallon

“During the debate, the candidates mentioned the middle class eleven times. Once for each remaining member of the middle class.” – Seth Meyers

“Most of the experts, they rate these things afterwards. Most of the experts thought Hillary won the debate, although some said Bernie Sanders won. No one said any of the others won, not even them.” – Jimmy Kimmel

“Donald Trump was live tweeting the debate last night. This morning he told ABC News he thought Clinton got through it ‘fine’. Which is the highest compliment he can give a woman without marrying her.” – Jimmy Kimmel

Filed in Humor | Comments Off

Hoarse Race

Monday, October 26, 2015

It’s true, the upcoming Democratic debates are all scheduled on weekends. Even if you ignore claims that this was done on purpose, it is clear that this will benefit Hillary Clinton. But nobody should be the least bit surprised by this. The party primaries are one of the least democratic aspects of our elections. Political parties exist to do the best for the political parties, not for the candidates or even the country. If you ever doubt this, just watch any political convention.

Which brings us to the second ironic point of this comic – media exists to get ratings. The media loves Donald Trump, because he has given them lots of high ratings.

We are one (more) step along the path to turning our elections into huge, expensive, reality TV shows, with candidates getting voted off the island (or fired by Trump). Eventually, maybe the candidates will fight it out, Roman gladiator style, until one is declared Caesar. The ratings will be HUGE.

Filed in Irony | Comments (4)

Can You Hearing Me Now?

Sunday, October 25, 2015

After several Freudian slips confirming that the latest Benghazi Hearings are exactly what everyone expected – a partisan political witch hunt designed to hurt Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign, the committee stupidly went ahead with their 11-hour long grilling of Clinton, live on TV.

Various mainstream media outlets declared Clinton the winner. NBC News said “As a matter of pure political theater, yesterday’s Benghazi committee hearing was a victory for Hillary Clinton and an overwhelming defeat for House Republicans.” The Washington Post headline was “Hillary Clinton triumphed at the Benghazi hearing by not losing her cool.”

Amazingly enough, even Fox News – who have always been the major cheerleaders for investigating Benghazi – agreed. Apparently even they are tired of the endless hearings. Even before the hearing was over, Ed Henry said on Fox “In terms of the narrative on Benghazi, there was no major new development that rocked her side of the story, that changes this in some way. What you have here is another big test for Hillary Clinton, and another big test that she appears to have passed.” Henry also said that Clinton “looked presidential and was in command” and called the hearings a “total wipeout” for GOP members. Greta van Susteren agreed, and said that Clinton was acting more like the politician she had watched over the years than the tentative, stumbling Clinton of this campaign so far.

Other conservative media said similar things. For example, Erick Erickson of Red State:

The hearings are a waste of time because everything about it is politicized and nothing is going to happen. There will be no scalp collection.

Columnist Byron York in the Washington Examiner:

A hearing billed as an epic, High Noon-style confrontation—granted, the hype came from the media, not Republican committee members themselves—instead turned out to be a somewhat interesting look at a few limited aspects of the Benghazi affair. In other words, no big deal. And that is very, very good news for Hillary Clinton.

Stephen Hayes in The Weekly Standard:

The coverage of the hearings—from the earliest tweets to the final page-one wraps—focused almost entirely on the style of Clinton’s performance rather than the substance of her testimony. And it must be said: She was impressive.

The cover of the Boston Herald: “HILLARY SKATES THROUGH MARATHON BENGHAZI HEARING”.

Even Republican Congressman Trey Gowdy, who is in charge of the hearings, admitted “I don’t know that she testified that much differently today than she has the previous time she testified.” What is that saying about doing the same thing over and over, expecting different results?

Filed in Irony | Comments (2)

Late Night Political Humor

Sunday, October 25, 2015

“Tonight was the first Democratic debate on CNN. And get this, they actually had an extra podium ready in case Joe Biden decided he’d join the race. Which backfired when before the debate even started people were like, ‘Could we just vote for the empty podium?'” – Jimmy Fallon

“They were keeping a spare podium open for Joe Biden in case he decided to enter the race at the last minute, as if he’s going to walk in and shock everyone like a Spanish soap opera or something.” – Jimmy Kimmel

“CNN kept an extra podium set aside at tonight’s Democratic debate in case Vice President Joe Biden had decided to announce his candidacy, and now the empty podium is pulling ahead of Martin O’Malley.” – Seth Meyers

“Tonight on CNN was the mildly anticipated first debate between the Democratic candidates. If you were in Vegas tonight you get to see Elton John, Donny and Marie, the Judds, or you can go and see the presidential debate. There’s really something for everyone.” – Jimmy Kimmel

“CNN has been running a countdown clock to this debate for days now. They got a huge audience for the Republican debate because of Donald Trump but this one doesn’t have a Donald Trump. This one has Bernie Sanders who looks like he’s on the verge of being alive. So they had to find a way to drum up excitement.” – Jimmy Kimmel

“I’m sure many of you watched the first Democratic presidential debate over on CNN. CNN released where the candidates would be standing on the stage. Hillary Clinton was in the center. Bernie Sanders was on her right, making it the first time in history he’s been to the right of anyone.” – Stephen Colbert

“One of Bernie Sanders’ campaign advisers said they wanted him to tone down his yelling at tonight’s debate. You could tell he was yelling too much because I had to keep turning the volume UP to hear the commercials.” – Jimmy Fallon

“Then there are the three other candidates: Governor Martin O’Malley, Senator Jim Webb and Governor Lincoln Chafee. Little-known fact about Lincoln Chafee: Anything.” – Stephen Colbert

“Trump didn’t have too many nice things to say about the Democratic debate. In fact, he said he thinks people would turn on the Democratic debate for a few minutes and then fall asleep. Then CNN was like, ‘Hey, that still counts! Ratings are ratings! Just leave it on! We don’t care.'” – Jimmy Fallon

“Donald Trump asked a young man who appeared to be Asian-American if he was from South Korea, to which the man replied, ‘I was born in Texas.’ Trump was so embarrassed that his face turned red 20 years ago.” – Seth Meyers

“Trump also said yesterday that as a politician, you have to get along with everybody. And then he retired from politics.” – Seth Meyers

“A new analysis of recent political speeches found that George W. Bush actually used longer and more complex words in his speeches than President Obama does. Granted none of those words were actually in the dictionary. ‘Don’t be condescencious. My vocablulation is completely misunderestimated.'” – Jimmy Fallon

Filed in Humor | Comments Off

The Revenge of the Market!

Saturday, October 24, 2015

Last month, Turing Pharmaceuticals caused widespread outrage when it raised the price of the drug Daraprim from $13.50 a pill to $750. Daraprim is a critical life-saving drug that is decades old, but was only available from Turing.

The good news is that all the publicity attracted the attention of another drug company, Imprimis Pharmaceuticals. Imprimis has just announced an alternative to Daraprim, which they have priced at a much more reasonable $1 a pill.

Imprimis also said it has plans to produce more cheap alternative drugs. Their goal is to come out with more affordable versions of the 7,800 generic FDA-approved drugs.

It remains to be seen whether this is just a clever marketing ploy, or if Imprimis is really serious about creating more competition for prescription drugs. But it is a good start.

Filed in Irony | Comments (4)

Late Night Political Humor

Saturday, October 24, 2015

“Dr. Ben Carson made news last week by saying that the holocaust could have been averted if European Jews had had guns. Though I’m pretty sure what he meant to say was, ‘I don’t want to be president.'” – Seth Meyers

“Mayor Bill de Blasio signed a bill last week that requires stores here in New York City to keep their doors closed when their air conditioning is on. So apparently Bill de Blasio is not only our Mayor, he’s also our dad. ‘I’m not paying to cool off the whole world! SHUT THAT DOOR! Not in use? Turn off the juice!'” – Jimmy Fallon

“North Korea this weekend held a military parade celebrating the 70th anniversary of their communist party. People who attended the parade called it ‘amazing’ and ‘mandatory’.” – Seth Meyers

“The White House yesterday released First Lady Michelle Obama’s Spotify playlist, which features Beyonce, Demi Lovato, and Esperanza Spalding. While Joe Biden’s playlist is just, ‘Now That’s What I Call Train Sounds: Volume 12.'” – Seth Meyers

Filed in Humor | Comments Off

Buy the Book?

Friday, October 23, 2015

As part of his run for the presidency, Ted Cruz published a book titled “A Time for Truth”. But according to a recent FEC filing, Cruz spent $122,250 of his campaign funds to buy up between 8,000 to 10,000 copies of the book.

There are several things that are questionable about this tactic. First of all, it means that Cruz is using money donated to his campaign to buy a book that Cruz gets a cut of. Cruz is lining his own pockets with money from his campaign.

Second, even though the books were purchased by the Cruz campaign, they are still sales. This tactic is a common one used to get books onto best-seller lists, which then helps increase sales. And considering that the total sales of Cruz’s book is 12,000 copies, the vast majority of the copies were purchased by the Cruz campaign.

Third, the Cruz campaign is then having the book “signed”, supposedly by Cruz himself, but almost certainly by some poor campaign volunteer. And then the Cruz campaign is selling the “signed” books for $85 on his campaign website. Which means that the donor money is being used to buy the books, which are then being marked up 300% and sold back to the same stupid donors.

And all this puts money into the personal bank account of Ted Cruz. And that’s the truth.

UPDATE: At a private fund-raiser in Dallas Texas for his brother Jeb Bush, former president George W. Bush unleashed on Ted Cruz, saying “I just don’t like the guy”, calling Cruz “opportunistic” and accusing Cruz of being a politician just for his own personal gain. Bush claimed that Cruz was sucking up to Donald Trump in the expectation that Trump’s support would come to him in the end. Cruz is well known to the former president, having served as a domestic policy adviser on Dubya’s presidential campaign in 2000, and as part of his administration.

Filed in Irony | Comments (5)

Late Night Political Humor

Friday, October 23, 2015

“The race for president is really starting to get competitive, and Donald Trump recently said that he’s actually getting ready to air his first campaign ads. Even the Geico lizard was like, ‘I think we already see enough of you on TV, mate.'” – Jimmy Fallon

“They’re saying that Republican candidate Ben Carson made a number of serious mistakes as a neurosurgeon and even left a sponge in one patient’s brain. When asked how it affected his life, the patient was like ‘It’s fine, I’m still running for president. I don’t care. Everything’s great. It’s gonna be huge.'” – Jimmy Fallon

“Despite claiming last week that he would have rushed the Oregon shooter to save lives, Dr. Ben Carson yesterday recounted how he was once held up at gunpoint in a Popeye’s Chicken and told the gunman, ‘I believe you want the guy behind the counter.’ So we know at least one guy who’s DEFINITELY not voting for Ben Carson.” – Seth Meyers

“Republican presidential hopeful John Kasich made fun of a young woman at a campaign event this week by calling on her for a question and saying, ‘I’m sorry, I don’t have any Taylor Swift tickets.’ This morning Taylor Swift announced that John Kasich is out of the squad.” – Seth Meyers

“House Republicans announced a sudden postponement to the vote to elect John Boehner’s replacement, after speakership front-runner Kevin McCarthy declared himself ‘unfit’ for the job. Though I think he just got scared of how difficult that job must be when he found out that John Boehner is 31 years old.” – Seth Meyers

“Hillary Clinton continues to distance herself from the Obama administration. In fact, Hillary just came out against President Obama’s Trans-Pacific Partnership Trade Agreement, also known as the TPP. Which is weird, because when Obama asked Hillary if she was down with TPP, she said, ‘Yeah, you know me. A flip, flop, the flippy to the flippity, flip, flip, flip, flop, you don’t stop…'” – Jimmy Fallon

“California governor Jerry Brown signed a controversial new bill allowing assisted suicide. Yeah. Just in time for Lakers season.” – Conan O’Brien

Filed in Humor | Comments Off

Family Values

Thursday, October 22, 2015

I like this comic because when Republicans talk about “family values” they are mainly speaking about gays, abortion, and single mothers. But while they talk a good story about those things, they haven’t actually gotten much done. So what are the “family” issues where they put all their energies and gotten the most results? Things like inheritance taxes so rich people can pass gobs of money on to their children, and campaign donations from uber-rich families.

While it is true that candidates in both parties take advantage of large donors, it is clear that the Republicans are the big winners in the Super Pac cash sweepstakes. Democrats would reverse Citizens United and other things that have opened the floodgates for legalized political bribery, but the Republicans won’t let them.

UPDATE: Right on cue, Republicans in Wisconsin are in the process of passing three laws that eliminate many state campaign finance laws, dissolve the state ethics and elections board, and eliminate the key tool that prosecutors use to investigate political crimes. Governor Scott Walker, back from his short-lived run for president, has said he will sign the bills.

Republicans are eliminating laws that were used to help convict six members of Walker’s staff of embezzlement and other charges. They are also increasing the amount of money that can be donated to political candidates, and removing restrictions that prohibit Super PACs that anonymously collect unlimited funds from coordinating with candidates. Yup, that means that politicians will be able to control and spend unlimited amounts of anonymous cash in Wisconsin. The bills were the result of lobbying from the Koch-brothers-funded Americans for Prosperity.

Filed in Irony | Comments Off

Late Night Political Humor

Thursday, October 22, 2015

“Hillary Clinton’s 68th birthday is coming up this month, and to celebrate, Hillary is planning to hold a big fundraiser here in New York City. You gotta give it to Hillary — she’s the only grandmother who hears about a birthday and expects the checks to come to HER.” – Jimmy Fallon

“Former President Bill Clinton said yesterday that Donald Trump’s campaign has a certain ‘macho appeal.’ And then Trump said, ‘Whoever this Macho is, I want him deported.'” – Seth Meyers

“I read that Hillary’s staff is starting to worry that her campaign still doesn’t have an official theme. Then Hillary said, ‘Yes it does — revenge.'” – Jimmy Fallon

“Anthropologists have released more information about a recently discovered extinct human species. We’re finding out all this really cool stuff. They say the species lived in trees, had brains the size of an orange, and plans to vote for Donald Trump for president.” – Conan O’Brien

“A new study of the candidates’ Facebook fans found that Donald Trump’s fans have the worst grammar. Which isn’t surprising, since Trump’s whole campaign has been one, big run-on sentence. ‘We need to build a wall and fix the economy and get back at China and Rosie O’Donnell and I’m very rich and here’s a red hat and…'” – Jimmy Fallon

“Donald Trump is reportedly planning new campaign events that will feature his wife, Melania. It’s a good chance for Trump to connect with female voters, and a GREAT chance for Melania to escape.” – Seth Meyers

“Donald Trump recently said, ‘I’m going all the way and I’m going to win.’ And Mike Huckabee said, ‘I’m going some of the way, then I’ll go home.'” – Conan O’Brien

“Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders has a catch phrase. His catch phrase is ‘Feel the burn.’ Now he’s being sued because that’s Del Taco’s slogan.” – Conan O’Brien

“Vladimir Putin celebrated his 63rd birthday today. He had a nice party, but it got awkward when two of his friends got him the same country.” – Jimmy Fallon

“U.S. officials have been wondering why, according to photos, ISIS seems to have so many Toyotas. One clue seems to be ISIS’s credo, ‘Fanatical about Islam, sensible about gas mileage.'” – Conan O’Brien

Filed in Humor | Comments Off

Clinton on Colbert

Late Night Political Humor

Happy Hallowe’en!

Late Night Political Humor

Electoral Vote

Late Night Political Humor

Hoarse Race

Can You Hearing Me Now?

Late Night Political Humor

The Revenge of the Market!

Late Night Political Humor

Buy the Book?

Late Night Political Humor

Family Values

Late Night Political Humor

‹ Home

Search

Info

Subscribe

Users

Links

Archives

Search

Info

Subscribe

Users

Links

Tags

Archives