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Late Night Political Humor

“There’s a petition going around asking President Obama to make the day after the Super Bowl a national holiday. That’s a good idea. After a long, exhausting day of sitting on the couch watching TV, I need a day off.” – Jimmy Kimmel

“I have a lot of eating planned for Sunday. Hot wings. Nachos. Sausages. The inside of my stomach is going to look like a Michelle Obama nightmare.” – Jimmy Kimmel

“In his farewell speech to the Senate this week, John Kerry spoke for 51 minutes about Washington being gridlocked. The cause of the gridlock? Senators giving 51-minute speeches.” – Jay Leno

“A bipartisan group of senators has unveiled a plan that would create a path to citizenship for illegal immigrants. Or as immigrants call that, ‘a tunnel’.” –Jimmy Fallon

“A new poll found 78% of respondents believed the planet had warmed over the past 100 years. The other 22% burst into flames.” – Stephen Colbert

“Oh, the People Who Hate You!” – a poem recited by Jon Stewart:
“They do not like you Barack Obama,
Whether on a train a, plane, or llama.
They do not like you shooting skeet,
They do not like you eating meat.
They do not like you drinking beer,
or even if you roped a steer.
They won’t like you with the monster trucks,
because, young man, they do not give a fuck.
They do not like you when you pray,
They did not like you anti-gay.
They do not like you cutting tax,
They could not stand when you wore your mommy slacks.
You cannot reach across the aisle,
‘Cause everything you do is vile.
They complained when you killed Osama!
So on a train, a plane, or a llama,
Rolling a 44 at Bowl-O-Rama,
Despite your nice white Kansas mama,
comma,
they do not like you, Barack Obama.”

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Strange Bedfellows go Postal

They say politics makes strange bedfellows, and there are few examples more hypocritical than what’s going on with the US postal service.

Jim Morin
© Jim Morin

Conservative Republicans pretend to be strict constitutionalists on issues like freedom of religion and the right to bear arms. Yet they completely ignore the fact that the Post Office is written directly into the constitution. Instead, they want to kill it, constitution be damned. Republican dogma hates the Post Office, a quasi-governmental operation full of unionized employees that competes with private sector companies like FedEx and UPS.

Conservative dogma says that government can’t do anything as well as the private sector (“government is not the solution, government is the problem”), and by golly, they are going to prove that any way they can.

Conservative Republicans say they want government to be run more like a business, but in 2006 the GOP-controlled congress passed a law requiring the post office to fully fund future health benefits for retirees for the next 75 years. No private business would (or perhaps even could) do that — it would bankrupt them! Indeed, it certainly appears that the Republicans were purposely trying to bankrupt the Post Office.

Furthermore, even though the Post Office gets no funding from the US government at all, it cannot set its own prices. Just changing the cost of a stamp requires a proverbial act of Congress. Private companies don’t deliver on Saturday or they charge extra for that service, but the Post Office is required to do it for free.

But one of the most ironic things is that while Conservative Republicans often sing the praises of rural America, it is rural America that is most hurt by efforts to kill the post office. The private companies that Republicans are defending against the Postal Service primarily serve urban customers. If Republicans succeeded in killing the Post Office, it would hurt rural country folk the most. No private business would ever deliver mail to rural areas, because it is far too expensive.

And finally Republicans claim to be all about jobs, but they don’t seem to care about the quarter of a million middle-class Americans who earn their living delivering the mail, even though the government doesn’t pay their salary so it does not increase the deficit nor cost taxpayers one penny.

I’ve lived in plenty of other countries, and I have to say that our Postal Service is actually pretty darn good. Relatively fast, cheap, and reliable. Why do Republicans hate it so much?

Joe Heller
© Joe Heller

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Late Night Political Humor

“The Senate has overwhelmingly approved John Kerry as the next Secretary of State. In his farewell speech today to the Senate, Kerry spoke for 51 minutes. So, apparently he does believe in torture.” – Jay Leno

“We have a new secretary of state, John Kerry, former senator from Massachusetts. For four years Hillary Clinton served as the secretary of state, and in a moving ceremony today Hillary official turned over the pants suit.” – David Letterman

“John Kerry is the first white male to hold that job since 1997. So finally middle-aged white guys with gray hair are breaking through the glass ceiling.” – Jay Leno

“Yesterday President Obama went to Las Vegas and spoke about his new immigration plan. Afterwards he was harshly criticized by the locals for speaking in English.” – Jay Leno

“Zimbabwe’s finance minister revealed yesterday that his country has only $217 left in the government Treasury. Today President Obama said, ‘Stop bragging!'” – Jay Leno

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Long Hours, Low Pay

Teachers Pay and Hours
[from Tim Smith]

It is almost as if someone was purposely overworking teachers and paying them very little. But only in the good old USA.

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Late Night Political Humor

“According to a new poll, 50 percent of Americans think the country is divided. The other 50 percent think it isn’t.” – Jay Leno

“’60 Minutes’ anchor Steve Kroft is defending Sunday’s interview with President Obama and Hillary Clinton, saying that he didn’t have enough time to ask hard-hitting questions. That would be easier to believe if the name of his show wasn’t the amount of time he had.” – Jimmy Fallon

“According to reports from a journal called Psychological Science, people eat more junk food and gain weight during tough economic times. How ironic is that? The biggest obstacle to Michele Obama’s war on obesity is President Obama’s economic policy.” – Jay Leno

“The president just announced that same-sex couples will be included in his immigration reform bill. When they heard, same-sex couples were like, ‘You know we’re already citizens, right?'” – Jimmy Fallon

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Creative Immigration Solutions

Brian McFadden
© Brian McFadden

The part of this comic that hit me the most was the very first panel. How did we somehow change from a country largely made up of immigrants, that used to be so welcoming to immigrants that we have a huge statue to welcome them, to a country that treats immigrants like crap? I’m not saying we should totally open up our borders, but we have to stop politicizing immigration, and start working together on a reasonable solution. Surely a country of immigrants can solve an immigration problem.

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Late Night Political Humor

“In a big meeting of the Republican National Committee, Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal told the GOP to ‘stop being the stupid party’. Then Texas Governor Rick Perry gave the rebuttal.” – Jay Leno

“The U.S. Postal Service raised the price of a stamp yesterday. Stamps are something that the pilgrims used before we had the Internet.” – Jimmy Kimmel

“The price of a stamp goes up a penny today, to 46 cents. To make sure everyone received the news promptly, the U.S. Postal Service announced it by email.” – Craig Ferguson

“It will now cost you 46 cents to mail a letter. Some people are complaining about the price even though it’s a penny more than the old price. You’re not allowed to spend $4 on a cup of coffee and complain about a cent.” – Jimmy Kimmel

“Last week Iran launched a monkey into space, and it actually returned to Earth alive. It was great news for the space program and terrible news for the monkey who thought he’d finally gotten out of Iran.” – Jimmy Fallon

“In Iran last week, the government successfully launched a live monkey into space. I like that they specified it was a live monkey as if there was a chance they would send a dead monkey into space.” – Jimmy Kimmel

“Iran has successfully sent a monkey into space. Iran is calling it a huge advancement in not letting women drive.” – Conan O’Brien

“Last night President Obama and Hillary Clinton appeared on ’60 Minutes’ for their first joint interview. It was a little awkward when they both showed up wearing the same suit.” – Jimmy Fallon

“If I seem a little woozy, it’s because I’m wearing a pair of those Hillary Clinton double-vision glasses.” – David Letterman

“Women serving in the United States military will now be serving in combat. Finally there will be somebody in the tank who will stop and ask for directions.” – David Letterman

“A Secret Service dog died during a fundraiser where Vice President Joe Biden was giving a speech. The dog is being described as ‘lucky’.” – Conan O’Brien

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The US Gang Problem

Business Journals seem to be publishing articles that are downright liberal recently. One interesting example is this article — “The four business gangs that run the US

No, two of them are not the Democratic and Republican parties. We’re talking about the gangs with real power. Here they are:

  • Military-industrial complex – Fifty years ago Dwight Eisenhower tried to warn us about this one, but did we listen?
  • Wall Street-Washington complex – That’s right, the “too big to fail” Wall Street gang. We cry out that we are out of money and that we have to fight deficits, but no check is too big to write to these masters of our universe.
  • Big Oil-transport-military complex – the folks that brought you two stupid wars (at least) in the middle east, suppressed most public transport and non-oil energy sources, got us to ignore climate change, filled our world with plastics that never degrade, invented planned obsolescence, and got the government to build one of the most socialistic things they’ve ever done: the federal highway system.
  • Healthcare industry – the people who swallow up an enormous 17% of our GDP and in return give us some of the worst health results in the developed world, and still somehow manage to convince a large number of Americans that this is a good thing.
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Late Night Political Humor

“Already the Obama administration has been rocked by scandal. Beyonce lip-syncing; or at least we think she was lip-synching. Manti Te’o said it sounded very real to him.” – Bill Maher

“Lip-synching – let that be a lesson; if you are in Washington DC and you open your mouth and another voice comes out, it better be the NRA, an oil company, or a bank.” – Bill Maher

“President Obama delivered his inaugural address, which set a more liberal tone for his second term, especially the part where he showered the crowd with birth control pills.” – Seth Meyers

“New Rule: The media must give President Obama a few more days before they start covering the 2016 presidential race. They’re already speculating about Biden and Hillary. Come on, even Taylor Swift gives a guy a little more time than that. And why is she America’s sweetheart? She’s 17 and she’s gone out with more men than Joan Crawford.” – Bill Maher

“This year marks the 50th anniversary of Martin Luther King, Jr’s historic ‘I Have A Dream’ speech. As well as the 1 year anniversary of my girlfriend’s ‘I had the weirdest dream’ speech. Guess which one was longer.” – Seth Meyers

“The Pentagon lifted the ban this week on women being able to serve. Yes, women can now serve in front line combat positions, proving that women will follow gay men anywhere.” – Bill Maher

“Tom Tancredo, who was a congressman from Colorado and ran for president, made a bet that his state would not legalize marijuana. And of course, he lost that bet. And you know what he has to do because he lost that bet? Yes, he’s got a suck on a joint. I just hope in the next few years he loses a bet on gay marriage.” – Bill Maher

“New Jersey Governor Chris Christie is getting big-time financial support for his re-election campaign, a fundraiser hosted by Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg. That means the creator of the world’s largest social network is raising money for the world’s largest governor.” – Jimmy Kimmel

“Why does Mark Zuckerberg need to raise a fundraiser worth $12 billion. Write a check and be done with the whole thing.” – Jimmy Kimmel

“Did you know when you poke Chris Christie on Facebook, your computer giggles like the Pillsbury Doughboy?” – Jimmy Kimmel

“Gov. Bobby Jindal of Louisiana said ‘we must stop being the stupid party’. Good luck with that. When Sarah Palin heard that, she demanded an apology. She said, ‘How dare he insult hard-working, patriotic, idiotic Americans like me’.” – Bill Maher

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The Difference between Voters and Dirt

Jen Sorensen
© Jen Sorensen

Well, it looks like it backfired. Republican plans to “reform” our electoral college voting system to make it even more unfair – and to boost Republican chances of winning the next presidential election, even if they lose the popular vote – couldn’t stand up to the glare of attention it received.

And the difference? Voters sometimes speak out.

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Trigger Happy

The media gets distracted by a non-issue, and puts their foot in it:

So the White House calls their bluff:

Obama Shooting Skeet

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Late Night Political Humor

“House Speaker John Boehner said that President Obama’s focus is to annihilate the Republican Party. Do Republicans look like they need any help from President Obama? They’re doing a hell of a job themselves.” – Jay Leno

“The Pentagon has allowed women to serve in combat. Yeah, the hope is that we can now finally defeat the Taliban by giving them the silent treatment.” – Conan O’Brien

“Women can now serve on the front lines in combat. I believe up until now, the only woman who had ever seen action under a general was of course Paula Broadwell.” – Jay Leno

“Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was grilled by Congressmen about the attack on Benghazi. Then out of habit she grilled them about where they were last night, and who’s this Megan?” – Conan O’Brien

“A scary moment at John Kerry’s secretary of state confirmation hearing. One of the senators had taken his Ambien the night before and combined with the stuffy room and Kerry’s boring speech, he slipped into a coma.” – Jay Leno

“North Korea said it will test a rocket that they hope will hit the United States. In other words, watch your back, middle of the Pacific Ocean.” – Conan O’Brien

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Vaguely Disturbing by Calculation

Ruben Bolling
© Ruben Bolling

Yes it’s true, federal laws against computer crime are so vague and overreaching that pretty much everyone is guilty of violating them. Of course, these laws are invoked only when you piss someone powerful off, like Aaron Schwartz did.

I have a friend who discovered that some computers at the company where he worked as a system administrator were improperly secured. This embarrassed the VP responsible so much that he called the police. The crime? Breaking into a computer, a felony. Even though there was no intent to steal anything, damage any computers, or do anything else nefarious, he was convicted.

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Seems Apropos to Me

In one of the largest academic scandals in recent history at the school, as many as 60 students have been forced to withdraw from Harvard University after they were found cheating on a final exam.

Why is this ironic? Because the class was “Introduction to Congress”.

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Late Night Political Humor

“There’s a photo from the Inauguration in which Former President Bill Clinton appears to be checking out Kelly Clarkson. Clinton said, ‘That’s not true, I was checking out Beyonce and Kelly Clarkson got in the way’.” – Conan O’Brien

clinton-new-interns

“Beyonce is remaining silent about charges that she lip-synched the national anthem. However, the charges are being strongly denied by a recording of Beyonce.” – Conan O’Brien

“Yes, lip-gate. Beyonce-gate. The crisis in Lip-ya. Beyonc-gazi … If Beyonce lip-synced at Obama’s inaugural, do you know what that means? If so, please write in because I’d love to know why I’m so angry!” – Stephen Colbert

“Steven Tyler defended Beyoncé after she lip-synced at President Obama’s inauguration. Tyler said, “I know how she feels, I did the same thing at the Harry Truman Inauguration.'” – Conan O’Brien

“Joe Biden made another one of his famous gaffes on camera Monday, saying he was proud to be president of the United States. I guess he forgot he wasn’t at home standing in front of the bathroom mirror.” –Jay Leno

“Arnold Schwarzenegger has signed on to a new ‘Terminator’ film. Due to his age, this one features the catchphrase, ‘I’ll be back right after ‘Wheel of Fortune.'” – Conan O’Brien

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