Democracy 86'ed Funnies

In the District of Columbia (and two states), drivers over the age of 75 have to take a new road test to show that they are still competent to drive. Meanwhile President Joe Biden, resident of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, claims that he will be perfectly OK to run the United States military until he is age 86, no test required.

If we had a wide variety of parties and candidates to choose from, it would be credible to say that we the people have the democracy that we deserve. But we don’t.

Ted Rall gets it. Gail Collins doesn't.

Third parties. So tempting. So disaster-inducing.

The lure is obvious. Donald Trump’s terrible and Joe Biden’s boring. Much more satisfying to go to the polls and announce you’re too far above the status quo to vote for either.https://t.co/MjVvCqSE7J

— Gail Collins (@gailcollins) May 4, 2023

Too far below, she means.

Cathy Wilcox, cartooning from Australia where the love of pommy bastards is oftentimes muted, offers this guide to the Royal Stuff, which seems to prove the persistence of memory down there, since my search for oatcake references drew articles about the Duchess of Cornwall from three years ago.

U.S. solar expansion stalled by rural land-use protests

Last: Joel Pett -- one of this blog's very favorites -- won the 2023 RFK Cartoon Award.

Tuckered Out Funnies

Earth Day Funnies

The Biden administration recently approved a major oil project for the Alaskan Arctic that would include hundreds of oil wells and release 300 million tons of carbon over the next 30 years.

Funny, that doesn’t sound like the Joe Biden who was campaigning for president a while back.

The Willow Project was pushed by ConocoPhillips and was originally approved by the Trump administration, which was later blocked in court.

Biden campaigned on protecting the Arctic but seems to be keeping an eye on his political future more than his environmental legacy. Some Democratic advisers are *sigh* once again advocating a move to the middle before the next election.

You know, become more like Republicans so they can keep Republicans out of office.

Meanwhile, carbon levels will increase and ConocoPhillips will attempt to refrigerate the melting permafrost (really!) so their equipment won’t get stuck as they extract more oil.

Does it get more absurd than mechanically chilling permafrost so you can drive your trucks on it to drill for more oil?

Watch 'Joe Biden's Opposite Doctrine', Mark Fiore's animated video, here.

Why is Illinois Democratic Senator Dick Durbin -- chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, through which all judicial nominees must pass before getting a full Senate vote -- letting Republican senators blow off qualified federal judges proposed by President Biden?

Most recently, Mississippi GOP Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith blocked via “blue slip” Democratic judicial nominee Scott Colom, just like last year when Wisconsin’s Republican Senator Ron Johnson blue-slip-vetoed Judge William Pocan, the brother of Congressman Mark Pocan, apparently because he’s gay.

Now Republican Senators Roger Marshall and Jerry Moran brag that they’re contemplating vetoing Biden’s nomination of Jabari Wamble for Federal District Court Judge in Kansas because -- presumably -- he’s Black.

I’d like to be able to tell you why Durbin is going along with this BS from the Senator’s own perspective, but nobody answers the phone at his five offices I called (on April 10. DC - 202.224.2152, Chicago - 312.353.4952, Springfield - 217.492.4062, Carbondale - 618.351.1122, and Rock Island - 309.786.5173)

The Senator’s unavailability notwithstanding, what’s going on here is the result of an arcane bit of Senate tradition referred to as “blue slips.”

Read more at Thom Hartmann's Substack.

A common objection to single-payer health care in the US is that it would lead to health care being rationed. And I wonder: in what parallel universe do they live where the US isn’t already rationing health care?

Americans who can’t afford health care get pushed to the back of the line -- or entirely out of the line. That’s rationing.

Red MAGA media ...

... and Blue MAGA media.