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Tags: 2017 | hillary clinton | maxine waters

The Year in Buffoonery

The Year in Buffoonery
Hillary Clinton kicks off her book tour of her memoire of the 2016 presidential campaign titled "What Happened" with a signing at the Barnes & Noble in Union Square on September 12, 2017, in New York. (Timothy A. Clary/AFP/Getty Images)

By    |   Wednesday, 27 December 2017 11:27 AM EST

When historians look back at 2017, there can be no doubt that they will marvel at the level of buffoonery on display across the political and cultural spectrum. Given the dearth of buffoonery in today’s current events, especially with the epidemic known as “Trump Derangement Syndrome” plaguing our current political discourse, one would be forgiven for missing some of the more under-the-radar buffoonish behavior, especially in light of the ultimate in buffoonery that was the Hillary Clinton “What Happened” tour-de-blame.

Whittling down the ultimate “Buffoon of the Year” is a daunting task, but one we are winning to undertake. Here is a rundown of some of the ridiculous, yet entertaining buffoons of the past year.

If any politician’s year can be said to exhibit a mastery of buffoonery, it must be Maxine Waters. Being a lifetime politician representing one of the largest minority-majority districts in Congress living outside her district in one of the richest and whitest neighborhoods in her state would be enough to merit inclusion in this year-in-review. But, “Auntie Maxine” went above and beyond in 2017 with her relentlessly inane calls for impeachment of President Trump and her… let’s call it “curious” defense of the firing of former FBI Director James Comey, even though she likely would have supported the move had it been done by President Hillary.

And what was more ridiculously entertaining than the “Resistance” screaming to the high heavens in pink knitted hats? Starting with the ineptitude of the DisruptJ20 plot and continuing to that “nasty woman” Ashley Judd speaking to the shrieking “triggered” masses, all of the kerfuffle that is the "Resistance" boils down to their refusal to accept one incontrovertible fact: that Donald Trump is their president.

The buffoonery of politics was only outdone by the buffoonery of the media. President Trump’s coining of “fake news” pervaded American culture, and with good reason. One reporter above others who became the face of the “fake news” media in 2017 was CNN’s Jim Acosta, who was the perfect example of a reporter who loved being the story more than reporting the story. It didn't matter if it was Acosta whining that he couldn't get his daily face time on TV when White House press secretary Sean Spicer cut the video feed, or his "cosmopolitan bias" on immigration called out by Stephen Miller, or it was Sarah Huckabee Sanders and her near-daily call-outs of Acosta and the White House press corps for inaccurate and improper reporting techniques, media took it on the chin in 2017.

Celebrity buffoons took center stage in 2017 more so than in years past. Kathy Griffin’s disgusting photo of her with a fake, bloody severed head resembling President Trump was only surpassed by her "he broke me" pity-party, backlash, and victim portrayal after she was universally lambasted for going far beyond the bounds of political parody. Late night TV continued its descent into laughable hypocrisy. Jimmy Kimmel's teary-eyed pro-gun control monologue immediately after the Las Vegas shooting attempted to shame law abiding gun owners, yet he couldn’t call up the same sanctimony after Harvey Weinstein’s scandal for days after the news broke.

Even the world of sports was not immune from buffoonery. By any account, the NFL had less than a banner season. Ratings dropped as much as 25 percent from last year, players kneeling on the sidelines in protest of the reason-du-jour, including on Veterans Day, turned off fans. Empty arenas on TV became commonplace, leaving Commissioner Roger Goodell and leave management in a state of paralysis for weeks. And, then there’s Lavar Ball, who argued with President Trump even after the president rescued his teen son and UCLA teammates from the clutches of a Chinese criminal sentence.

We could go on, but you get the point.

No doubt, 2017 was an absurdly entertaining year throughout American culture. 2018 has a high bar to clear.

Gene Berardelli is a street-smart trial attorney who, through his time as the Law Chair of the Republican Party in Brooklyn, New York, has developed a solid reputation as an election attorney successfully representing conservative candidates.

Russell Gallo is a security expert and combat veteran who attained the rank of First Sergeant in the New York Army National Guard, earning a Combat Action Badge in Iraq. Together, they host Behind Enemy Lines Radio, a national award-winning radio show and podcast broadcasting out of "The People's Republic of" New York that airs weekly on AM and FM radio stations as part of the Talk America Radio network. To read more of their reports — Click Here Now.

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When historians look back at 2017, there can be no doubt that they will marvel at the level of buffoonery on display across the political and cultural spectrum.
2017, hillary clinton, maxine waters
766
2017-27-27
Wednesday, 27 December 2017 11:27 AM
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