He carves the Beast Roast

January 19, 2011 5:16 PM

An axegrinding tradition: the Buffalo Beast has posted its annual list of the 50 Most Loathsome People in America (previously)
posted by Schlimmbesserung (108 comments total)

I'm fairly sure that the people who make these lists are fairly loathsome themselves.
posted by jonmc at 5:22 PM on January 19, 2011 [5 favorites]

I was feeling pretty good around #5 that I hadn't seen "you" on the list, but what do you know, it's there at #1.
posted by Pyry at 5:24 PM on January 19, 2011 [1 favorite]

Maybe someday they'll include 'Us.'
posted by jonmc at 5:25 PM on January 19, 2011 [7 favorites]

I was feeling pretty good around #5 that I hadn't seen "you" on the list, but what do you know, it's there at #1.

"You" is always, always on the list.
posted by Pope Guilty at 5:28 PM on January 19, 2011

In the backhanded tradition of tech dickery, Zuckerburg brazenly pilfered the idea which allows you to neurotically tend that asshole from high school’s virtual farm while not getting any work done.

I think it's "Zuckerberg" not "Zuckerburg." I find the Winklevoss twins more annoying. Why must they dress alike and do the exact same thing at every turn? They're annoying and creepy, which makes me really not care if Mark Zuckerberg (I can't stand his voice) stole the idea. I know I should be fair, but the Winklevoss twins are too creepy to think about. So I loathe them more. And in the end, they're all loathsome people.

I'm not familiar with this list and I think Sarah Palin is far more annoying than me, so she should be number 1.

Also, I wish to take this opportunity to say once again that I love Barack Obama and the Obama family, so I'm going to pretend he's not on the list.
posted by anniecat at 5:28 PM on January 19, 2011 [1 favorite]

All ready to snarkily dismiss going in, but after reading, concluded it's not all that bad of a list, really.
posted by 2N2222 at 5:31 PM on January 19, 2011 [4 favorites]

As for the actors/"athletes"/whatever-the-hell-the-Kardashians-are, the Simpsons presented an easy solution long ago.
posted by anarch at 5:34 PM on January 19, 2011

Aw man, no one should diss Paula Dean. She's made of syrup and butter! How could you not like that!?
posted by meese at 5:35 PM on January 19, 2011 [4 favorites]

"Haley Barbour (looks) like William Shatner if William Shatner ate a racist butter sculpture of William Shatner."

That made me laugh.
posted by BitterOldPunk at 5:35 PM on January 19, 2011 [20 favorites]

Saying that Tucker Carlson is a "consummate dildo" is an insult to dildos.
posted by blucevalo at 5:37 PM on January 19, 2011 [9 favorites]

Not as many NY-centric listees as in the past, so that's good.
posted by briank at 5:39 PM on January 19, 2011

I find the Winklevoss twins more annoying. Why must they dress alike and do the exact same thing at every turn?

This got me googling videos of the real-life Winklevi. Christ, what an asshole (2x). I hope they sent Aaron Sorkin, David Fincher, and Armie Hammer a check for presenting them much better than they present themselves.
posted by eugenen at 5:39 PM on January 19, 2011

Saying that Tucker Carlson is a "consummate dildo" is an insult to dildos.

I always get Tucker Carlson and Tucker Max confused. I hope that confusion spills over into the general populace, since maybe Carlson might get laid and relax a bit.
posted by jonmc at 5:41 PM on January 19, 2011 [1 favorite]

5) David Brooks
Charges: The Bernie Madoff of American letters, every tortured construct and inaccurate assumption ever set to print by this annoyingly self-described “Bourgeoisie Bohemian” is a fraudulent attempt to justify why his house is more expensive than yours.

Spot. Fucking. On.
posted by spitbull at 5:42 PM on January 19, 2011 [4 favorites]

What is up, beast? All on one page? No artificial page view inflation goodness for you? Also, I agree that you is loathesome.
posted by Mister_A at 5:42 PM on January 19, 2011 [1 favorite]

Hah, I think the Beast's best claim to the moral high ground is their decision to keep it all on one long page.
posted by Schlimmbesserung at 5:44 PM on January 19, 2011 [17 favorites]

what does it say about me that:

1) i dont agree with the Lady Gaga and Obama choice.

2) i didn't recognize 3 people from the list

3) i agree with all their choices, including YOU, outside of the 5 above :)
posted by liza at 5:46 PM on January 19, 2011

Call it cruel, call it unnecessary, but damned if "[l]ooks like William Shatner if William Shatner ate a racist butter sculpture of William Shatner" isn't the best description of Haley Barbour ever.
posted by grabbingsand at 5:47 PM on January 19, 2011 [4 favorites]

You likely scrolled down to #1, without reading the rest, because you’re an impatient, semi-literate Philistine who’s either unable or unwilling to digest more than 140 characters at a time.

This is true.
posted by empath at 5:47 PM on January 19, 2011

Boy, I sure would love to see a 50 Best People in America list.
posted by infinitewindow at 5:51 PM on January 19, 2011 [4 favorites]

Hmm... Something is *badly* broken with the first link.

Currently clicking on it brings up a WordPress installation dialog.
posted by jgaiser at 5:51 PM on January 19, 2011

I quite enjoyed reading that list. Even though it's terribly depressing.
posted by awfurby at 5:52 PM on January 19, 2011 [1 favorite]

How can you put people like Paula Deen, Kim Kardashian, and LeBron James on the same list with Boehner and the Koch brothers? I'm not saying every pick has to be politically relevant, and I'm fine with pop culture irreverence, but how is "you have an annoying TV show" even on the same planet as "you're subverting the democratic process and/or bankrupting America's social programs"?

Plus, where the hell is Far East Movement?
posted by rkent at 5:55 PM on January 19, 2011 [3 favorites]

Yeah, I dearly love the Buffalo Beast, but their whole site is jacked right now. I can't even get to their front page. But in other years their annual list has been abswolutely spot on.
posted by newdaddy at 5:56 PM on January 19, 2011

I have never read a more brilliantly succinct description of the tea party (#9).
posted by mikehipp at 5:58 PM on January 19, 2011 [1 favorite]

We broke it.
posted by msali at 5:58 PM on January 19, 2011

I always get Tucker Carlson and Tucker Max confused. I hope that confusion spills over into the general populace, since maybe Carlson might get laid and relax a bit.

And here I was hoping that both of them would get hit by a Mack truck while crossing the street, leaving behind nothing but a thin film of L.A. Gear and half a bow tie.
posted by Diablevert at 5:58 PM on January 19, 2011 [2 favorites]

The site's been up and down all day but the google cache works fine.
posted by Rhomboid at 6:00 PM on January 19, 2011

"you have an annoying TV show" even on the same planet as "you're subverting the democratic process and/or bankrupting America's social programs"

Well, they sure as shit ain't mutually exclusive...
posted by brennen at 6:01 PM on January 19, 2011 [4 favorites]

mirror
posted by Civil_Disobedient at 6:02 PM on January 19, 2011

I sure miss SPY.
posted by ricochet biscuit at 6:03 PM on January 19, 2011 [6 favorites]

This is bad
posted by Greg Nog at 6:11 PM on January 19, 2011

yeah, I miss SPY, too. It's criminal that you can't download their old issues (at least I've never found a scanned collection online).

Anyway, does Taibbi still have a hand in these yearly lists? If I had to guess, I'd say no; he really has a way with the evisceration of the stupid and the evil.
posted by Auden at 6:11 PM on January 19, 2011

That said, I am favoriting this for the sheer fact of it not being on fifty separate pages.
posted by ricochet biscuit at 6:13 PM on January 19, 2011 [3 favorites]

Wait, Paula Deen is a real person? I thought that SNL skit was just something the writers made up.
posted by delmoi at 6:15 PM on January 19, 2011 [1 favorite]

I believe Paula Deen is the creator of the racist Bill Shatner butter statue.
posted by Splunge at 6:21 PM on January 19, 2011 [13 favorites]

Whoop di do, another self-important, bitter and impotent cry disguising what is yet another cheap Internet filler list that takes absolutely no effort, energy, thought, or research to do!

On the other hand, imagine what fun you could have with a drinking game where you took a swill every time you came across one of those while surfing...
posted by Alexandra Kitty at 6:24 PM on January 19, 2011

People made filler like lists and so on long before the internet was a fact of daily life. If you don't believe me, look at any issue of People ever published.
posted by Mister_A at 6:27 PM on January 19, 2011

Hey, they picked up both of my state's senators. I'm so proud.
posted by dilettante at 6:31 PM on January 19, 2011

Paula Deen really does not deserve this. Also, the Boehner entry reads suspiciously like the author knew nothing about him until Matt Taibbi's piece a couple weeks ago.
posted by naoko at 6:43 PM on January 19, 2011

Aw man, no one should diss Paula Dean. She's made of syrup and butter! How could you not like that!?

You didn't hear it from me, but she pissed off the local roller derby team (Derby Devils represent!) by threatening to buy their practice space and turn it into a warehouse. Long drama cut short: She didn't, but for a while there, the complex's occupants (including a summer soccer league) had to move out, then move back in again later after the sale fell through. I love me some butter, but if I have to choose sides, I'm lining up with the flat track girls. So yeah, not everyone thinks she's made of sunshine, light and trans fats.
posted by 1f2frfbf at 6:56 PM on January 19, 2011 [3 favorites]

Well, at least Paula Deen is on there.
posted by cmoj at 7:00 PM on January 19, 2011 [1 favorite]

I laughed at the Lady Gaga one.

Not nearly as controversial as she imagines.

Zing!
posted by Existential Dread at 7:07 PM on January 19, 2011 [6 favorites]

Also, Jesus Christ, did W really do this? What an asshole.

And then there's this: a confusing yet entertaining sci-fi epic but then, despite its mechanical sound, the “Smoke Monster” turns out to be the ghost of the father of liberal philosophy, side plots about mental illness and alternate universes go nowhere, paper-thin characters inexplicably commune with the dead, and finally, in a clichéd, Old Testament-inspired supernatural battle, evil is defeated when a big rock dildo is crammed into a shiny hole by a handsome, emotionless doctor. And the whole damn thing—concocted entirely on the fly, with no eye toward resolution—from the plane crash to the time travel was actually just some brightly-lit, stained glass, feel-good, new-age, ecumenical afterlife delirium.

Snark exhaustion aside, I'm enjoying this.
posted by Existential Dread at 7:13 PM on January 19, 2011 [1 favorite]

Hmm. They wish a certain Tea Party darling gets shot in the head. Meh.
posted by Burhanistan at 7:38 PM on January 19, 2011 [1 favorite]

I didn't know Charlie Sheen was a 9/11 truther, or that he wrote this TOTALLY INSANE fictional account of a conversation with President Obama about the "conspiracy."
posted by lalex at 7:41 PM on January 19, 2011

Booo, I was totally on board until Lady Gaga. There is no way she's worse than Rick Sanchez, Carl Paladino, Charlie Sheen, Christine O’Donnell, AND the Insane Clown Posse.

Haters gonna hate and all that jazz, I suppose.
posted by Windigo at 7:46 PM on January 19, 2011

Dear Alt-Weekly Writers in Buffalo: "Southern" does not necessarily equal "evangelical." What was with that and Paula Deen? Didn't even work as snark. She's not a proselytiser, except for The Tater, also butter, and I hear that she digs booze.
posted by raysmj at 7:51 PM on January 19, 2011 [2 favorites]

She also gambles. And not like a lottery ticket a month type deal. Like underground secret poker lairs run by gangsters like in Micheal Clayton. She is the Micheal Clayton of Savannah.
posted by ND¢ at 7:56 PM on January 19, 2011

1.) while it is indisputable that I am loathsome, they do not have a clue to the factual reasons for this being the case.

2.) no Michael Vick?
posted by bukvich at 8:03 PM on January 19, 2011

You get off pretty easy when it comes to sentencing, in the end.
posted by kenko at 8:13 PM on January 19, 2011

I take a few exceptions here:

Tyra Banks:

The winner of last season’s ode to body dysmorphia “Auschwitz’s America’s Next Top Model” was so disturbingly thin that her torso could be used as a bulimia aid. And this ideal of supposed beauty was brought to us by a woman dense enough to think she could wear a fat suit for a few hours and truly know the plight of the obese.

A top model frequently does resemble an eating disorder case, so I don't understand what the Buffalo Beast's problem is.

And who are they to judge Tyra's compassion for fat people? Are they so compassionate?

The Facebook founder’s fortune comes in part from selling your information to third parties via default privacy settings. After vowing to donate half of his some $7 billion to charity, as transparent PR in the wake of The Social Network, he got into bed with the execrable Goldman Sachs and a Russian investment firm run by a convicted extortionist to recoup the loss.

If Facebook makes money from selling information, so does practically any other commercial website. Whatever.

There is nothing wrong with selling stock to Goldman Sachs. I don't know anything about the Russian investment firm.

But Mark Zuckerberg is just a businessman and entrepreneur who happens to be famous now.

And he is donating billions to charity, isn't he?

Mark Zuckerberg's enterprise and private largesse may far exceed anything having to do with Buffalo in terms of future value to American society.

2) David & Charles Koch
Charges: In a land filthy with noxious liars, these two are the filthiest.

I don't understand what is so dishonest about the Koch brothers. They are right-wing billionaires whose fortunes derive from industry, who donate liberally to causes that align with their own business and political interests. Evil arguably, but it's all on the surface with them.

Why is George W. Bush, #29, further removed from the deepest abyss of evil than Perez Hilton, Tyra, Zuckerberg, and others who aren't smugly oblivious to their personal responsibility for incalculable quantities of damage to their country and the world?
posted by knoyers at 8:20 PM on January 19, 2011

As succinct a history of Boehner as I've ever read. He should wear this as a name tag less anyone forget:
Charges: Cries so often he embarrasses Glenn Beck’s family. An incorrigibly lazy corporate puppet who owes his emotional instability to legendary Merlot consumption and his radioactive Naugahyde complexion to innumerable special interest golf junkets. His first notable act in Congress was to hand out tobacco lobby checks on the House floor before a vote on anti-smoking legislation; his PAC received $30K from Abramoff-affiliated tribes; he lived in an apartment owned by lobbyist John Milne; he knew about Mark Foley’s page perversion and sat on it. More recently, he compared the financial crisis to an ant and the weak Dodd-Frank bill to a nuke—while concurrently trying to block unemployment benefits. And the most egregious aspect of his drunken weeping on “60 Minutes,” about kids having the same education opportunities he did, is that he’s scored hundreds of thousands from for-profit schools and the student loan industry—even sponsoring legislation that would slash public loan funding and redirect it to his golf buddy’s company Sallie Mae. He’s the kind of amoral opportunist who would campaign for Nazi reenactor Rich Iott in secret, not because there is any chance in hell of winning, but because Iott’s stinking rich and bound to repay the favor.

posted by readery at 8:32 PM on January 19, 2011 [1 favorite]

knoyers: the Zuckerberg/Goldman Sachs deal is about using ambiguous financial loopholes to allow essentially public investment in Facebook while keeping the books private, by having the investments go through a shell of some sort (I admit I don't understand all the details.) That he's doing this while selling his userbase's information rubs some people the wrong way. Also there was a movie this year where he's depicted as a total asshole.

Personally, I believe that Fred Phelps should always be #1 on this list, but here he got only a passing mention in somebody else's write-up. Aside from that (and a few questionable entries - I've met Paula Deen and she's exactly the same off camera as on, and sweet as can be in my experience) I enjoyed it.

Oh, and also, I get the frustration towards closeted homophobes, but calling out every Republican as secretly gay got a little tiresome. There are evil things they're doing that we have facts of. Let's not speculate as to their sexuality in order to demonize them further, if only because it doesn't much help gays and lesbians.
posted by Navelgazer at 8:33 PM on January 19, 2011 [1 favorite]

There is a horde of people out there actively campaigning to make the United States more stupid, and there's an equally-large horde making a fortune off those same people. Even worse, increasingly large subsets of the two are identical. We need people calling these folks out, not just once a year but continuously.

On, and the list also taught me what Kolob was. I like to think Xenu lives there.
posted by JHarris at 8:37 PM on January 19, 2011 [1 favorite]

Maybe someday they'll include 'Us.'

They did in 2006:

12. Us

Charges: Overweight, drug-addled nihilist swine with huge egos and no journalistic ethics who hold the world and our readers in general contempt because the kids were mean to us in high school. Crapping on everything and offering no solutions. Lamenting environmental destruction without so much as recycling. Juvenile, chip-shouldered, bridge-burning snots on a self-destructive mission to offend the planet. In 2006, we had the bad taste to proposition the First Lady of Buffalo, successfully rig an NHL playoff series; unapologetically mock the 5-year anniversary of 9-11; irresponsibly reprint the Danish Mohammed cartoons; crash a Scientology party on hallucinogens; and disrespect people of all religious persuasions at every opportunity. What the hell is our problem, anyway?

Exhibit A: In this list alone, we've trashed a dead man, a grieving mother, Jesus, and a helpless infant. Only included ourselves as blatant act of self-promotion and to stymie would-be critics.
posted by Phlogiston at 8:38 PM on January 19, 2011 [4 favorites]

Re: Kolob. Is this what "Kobol" in BSG is about?
posted by Navelgazer at 8:40 PM on January 19, 2011

knoyers: the Zuckerberg/Goldman Sachs deal is about using ambiguous financial loopholes to allow essentially public investment in Facebook while keeping the books private, by having the investments go through a shell of some sort (I admit I don't understand all the details.)

So some high-net worth investors had a chance to buy into a privately held company through some other private investment entity. This happens all the time and I don't see anything illegal, unusual or wrong about it. Private companies need to raise capital. Facebook doesn't have to go public.

Anyone who is uncomfortable that Facebook sells information isn't forced into Facebook at gunpoint either.

Zuckerberg's inclusion in this list is probably more a consequence of the movie rather than any spectacularly "loathsome" behavior.
posted by knoyers at 8:49 PM on January 19, 2011

I didn't know Charlie Sheen was a 9/11 truther. Yeah, Rosie O'Donnell was one too. A lot of people fell for the 'how can there be melted steel' arguments. After a gas tanker hit a bridge in Oakland a few years later leaving melted steel beams in the wreckage, you generally stopped hearing these arguments.

I, too, disagreed with a few choices on the list. But usually I completely disagree with how lists like these are constructed. I think I'm in 90% agreement with this list. I've even learned about a number of particularly loathsome people I didn't know about before.
posted by eye of newt at 8:53 PM on January 19, 2011 [1 favorite]

As a Minnesotan:

Where the FUCK is Michele Bachmann?
posted by Judith Butlerian Jihad at 8:59 PM on January 19, 2011 [9 favorites]

knoyers, I'm half-way with you, I'm just explaining what the outrage is about. As is, I'm of two minds. I think Zuckerberg is on the list because he's this moment's designated punching bag, but also anything involving Goldman Sachs raises up the hairs on the back of my neck. (Oliver Wendell Holmes, during the birth of legal realism, wrote about the "Bad Man," for whom laws must be written. The Bad Man will obey all laws to the letter, while exploiting every loophole they can find in order to continue bad practices while evading punishment for their deeds. Goldman Sachs is basically exactly what he was describing.)
posted by Navelgazer at 9:12 PM on January 19, 2011 [2 favorites]

Replace Paula Deen with Michael Vick and you'd have a keeper. Hell, even just on the Food Network there are more loathsome people than Deen.
posted by Kadin2048 at 9:14 PM on January 19, 2011

I was all set to despise Tyra Banks after reading her entry, but then I watched the video they linked to and now I feel sort of sorry for her, like maybe I should send her a Get Well card with a stuffed teddy and a mylar balloon, or something.
posted by Ritchie at 9:37 PM on January 19, 2011

Why must they dress alike and do the exact same thing at every turn?

There's actually only one Winklevoss who has a standby hot backup with him at all times.
posted by GuyZero at 9:39 PM on January 19, 2011 [1 favorite]

And he is donating billions to charity, isn't he?

Mark Zuckerberg's enterprise and private largesse may far exceed anything having to do with Buffalo in terms of future value to American society.

As yet, Zuckerberg has only pledged to give to charity. We'll have to wait and see if he actually does so.

Regarding Vick, at some point ex-cons have to be given some recognition of time served and penance done. Plus, I didn't go back and look, but they probably flogged him pretty hard in years past.
posted by Existential Dread at 9:40 PM on January 19, 2011 [1 favorite]

Almost everyone in American Public Life now is a despicable, amoral jackass. I like the Buffalo Beast and always laugh at some of the stuff on this annual list, but it must be a joyless job to assemble such a thing in 2010/2011.

As a thought experiment, I tried to come up with maybe five or ten people always floating near the top of our daily toilet of U.S. celebrity/political/business idiocy who aren't loathsome scum, and I got as far as "Steve Jobs" before my brain was flooded with names that should have been on the list, probably for the third or fourth or tenth time: all the other cable news clowns, all the other trashy/enabling gossip sites, the sports clods, the Pentagon liars, all the other members of Congress and the governors and the mayors and the hip-hop/pop banalities and Wall Street swine with their multi-million-dollar bonuses.

Reading this thing used to be a lot more fun because (maybe?) a David Brooks wouldn't have been described so savagely by thousands of bloggers and tweeters all year long. Now .... we all know these people are awful frauds and liars and cheats, and we know it all year long, and it doesn't change anything. I mean, every time I look at work Twitter I want to crash my car into something, and my Twitter only has people I picked to be there.
posted by kenlayne at 9:44 PM on January 19, 2011 [1 favorite]

How does Paula Deen make this list instead of Guy Fieri?
posted by rogueepicurean at 9:48 PM on January 19, 2011 [1 favorite]

13) Mohamed Mohamud
Charges: The would-be terrorist so nice they named him after a violent pedophile. Twice.

what
posted by iamck at 9:57 PM on January 19, 2011

Yeah, there's a lot of the cynical vitriol thing on the Internet, but little of it is this good (and concise).

"Hmm. They wish a certain Tea Party darling gets shot in the head. Meh."

By a bear.

"Oh, and also, I get the frustration towards closeted homophobes, but calling out every Republican as secretly gay got a little tiresome. There are evil things they're doing that we have facts of. Let's not speculate as to their sexuality in order to demonize them further, if only because it doesn't much help gays and lesbians."

This was my main complaint. It's one thing to riff (though the "cries so much" joke didn't get funnier like they'd planned, either), but this just came off as lazy.

Also, count me in as a fan of the single page presentation. Though that may have been an IT decision, figuring thousands of single page impressions would be better than those same thousands of people clicking through page after page.
posted by Eideteker at 10:17 PM on January 19, 2011 [1 favorite]

Whoop di do, another self-important, bitter and impotent cry disguising what is yet another cheap Internet filler list that takes absolutely no effort, energy, thought, or research to do!

I don't exactly count the days or anything, but I enjoy reading this list every year. If you know where more like this can be found, please share.

Also, "self-important"? I don't get the impression the Buffalo Beast sees itself as anything other than a trashy rag.
posted by Hoopo at 10:55 PM on January 19, 2011 [2 favorites]

Man. That was exactly why *I* hated the Lost finale too.
posted by so_gracefully at 10:55 PM on January 19, 2011

No one spotted McCainLemonParty.gov? Metafilter, I'm disappointed.
posted by Mister Fabulous at 11:01 PM on January 19, 2011

Regarding Vick, at some point ex-cons have to be given some recognition of time served and penance done. Plus, I didn't go back and look, but they probably flogged him pretty hard in years past.

I hate what Vick did to them dogs as much as the next guy but as this year has gone on I've come to the conclusion that he is either the greatest actor in the world or he has genuinely been transformed.

When I hear him speak I hear real remorse and not just for his crimes but for the kind of man he was. I see a man who truly appreciates the second chance he has been given and seems grateful for the opportunity to redeem himself.

Check out his 60 minutes interview and judge for yourself.
posted by Bonzai at 11:32 PM on January 19, 2011 [2 favorites]

This list is incomplete without Amy Chua.
posted by Xere at 12:12 AM on January 20, 2011 [1 favorite]

I hate what Vick did to them dogs as much as the next guy but as this year has gone on I've come to the conclusion that he is either the greatest actor in the world or he has genuinely been transformed.

The thing about giving obscenely lucky men like Vick a second chance is, most people don't even get first chances. There is no reason why this man shouldn't have been discarded by professional sports the moment knowledge of this came to light and replaced with one of the tens of thousands of other up-and-coming potential sports stars in this country whose soul has never borne the grievous taint of fucking recreational dog injuring.
posted by JHarris at 12:21 AM on January 20, 2011 [6 favorites]

There is no reason why this man shouldn't have been discarded by professional sports the moment knowledge of this came to light and replaced with one of the tens of thousands of other up-and-coming potential sports stars in this country whose soul has never borne the grievous taint of fucking recreational dog injuring.

There is a very good reason, he plays better football than they do.
posted by Space Coyote at 1:45 AM on January 20, 2011 [2 favorites]

34) Stefani Germanotta (Lady Gaga)
Charges: A Madonna doppelganger with scoliosis and a knack for trite, overproduced and formulaic drivel. Not nearly as controversial as she imagines. She pissed off Jerry Seinfeld? Meh. My heart’s not really in this one. She makes shitty music. Who fucking cares. Probably you. You sicken me. But I’m getting ahead of myself.
Aggravating factor: Excessive consonant repetition.
Sentence: Tracheotomy.

Ha!
posted by hal_c_on at 2:12 AM on January 20, 2011

1) You
Charges: Your brain’s been cobbled together over millions of years of blind evolution and it shows. You’re clumsy, stupid, weak and motivated by the basest of urges. Your MO is both grotesquely selfish and unquestionably deferential to questionable authority. You’re not in control of your life. You wear your ignorance like a badge of honor and gleefully submit to oppression, malfeasance and kleptocracy. You will buy anything. You will believe anything. You believe that evolution is a matter of belief.

what

Also -- leave Paula Deen alone. An over-affection for butter doesn't even merit a blip on a record of 2010 loathsomeness and it is a very reliable marker of food which is highly delicious.

Try to tell me these guys aren't regular customers of Taco Bell.
posted by A Terrible Llama at 2:48 AM on January 20, 2011

In 1990, Sanchez got drunk at a Dolphins game, paralyzed a guy with his car and drove away. He’d later bring that same diligence to cable news.

Slow clap on that one. Comedy gold.

I was really looking forward to his eventual demise that Brooke Baldwin could get more air time. Success!
posted by AndrewKemendo at 3:18 AM on January 20, 2011

I tried to come up with maybe five or ten people always floating near the top of our daily toilet of U.S. celebrity/political/business idiocy who aren't loathsome scum, and I got as far as "Steve Jobs"

What? Jobs is a huge asshole.
posted by delmoi at 4:03 AM on January 20, 2011 [2 favorites]

What? Jobs is a huge asshole.

Yeah! I mean, he's always...

Look, he's....

There was that time.... um...

He once... er...




Um, shit. Hm. What exactly has he done that would place him on a list like this?
posted by grubi at 6:53 AM on January 20, 2011

Obviously, I always love this kind of venal vindictiveness in American journalism... plus, this shit always cracks me up. They did a fine job at summing up the various assholes we encountered in 2010...
posted by ph00dz at 7:02 AM on January 20, 2011

5) David Brooks
Charges: The Bernie Madoff of American letters, every tortured construct and inaccurate assumption ever set to print by this annoyingly self-described “Bourgeoisie Bohemian” is a fraudulent attempt to justify why his house is more expensive than yours.

My lightbulb moment with Brooks was when I realized that he's just Milhouse Van Houten, grown up and somehow writing for a major paper. He's a lot easier to take if you know that after submitting every column, he pumps his fist and crows that everything's coming up Milhouse.
posted by COBRA! at 7:53 AM on January 20, 2011 [7 favorites]

What exactly has [Jobs] done that would place him on a list like this?

He makes delmoi feel inferior.
posted by MrMoonPie at 7:56 AM on January 20, 2011 [1 favorite]

Sadly I think the only reason Paula Dean is on this list is because the people writing the article think she's Nancy Grace.
posted by Uther Bentrazor at 8:25 AM on January 20, 2011

cheap Internet filler list that takes absolutely no effort, energy, thought, or research to do

no effort? you're sure about that? 6,000+ words and 12 illustrations, just like that.

you estimate wrong.

Also there was a movie this year where he's depicted as a total asshole.

For some reason, I think a lot of people liked him more after seeing that movie. Which maybe was the whole point. Conspiracy!
posted by mrgrimm at 9:10 AM on January 20, 2011

Yeah, I though that was weird too, mrgrimm. I haven't seen the movie, and so had never heard of these Winklevoss twins people were talking about up thread. Now having looked them up and reading about what happened between them and Zuckerberg, I'm totally confused as to why people would think they belong on the list more than he does. They do come off as douchebags though.
posted by Hoopo at 10:22 AM on January 20, 2011

How does Paula Deen make this list instead of Guy Fieri?
posted by rogueepicurean at 12:48 AM on January 20

you leave GUY FIERI out of this, you hear me?!?!?!?
but, please, please, please give Bobby Flay a Lifetime Assholechievement Award. gawd how that man rubs me the wrong you. grar!
posted by liza at 10:56 AM on January 20, 2011

which one is the one that looks like smash mouth? i never watch their shows but i hate smash mouth
posted by Eideteker at 11:19 AM on January 20, 2011 [1 favorite]

That's Guy Fieri.
posted by Pope Guilty at 11:42 AM on January 20, 2011

yeah, I miss SPY, too. It's criminal that you can't download their old issues (at least I've never found a scanned collection online).

Tell me about it. I had a complete run from about late 1986 to mid-1991 (i.e. the good years). I stopped reading them around then and about a year later, in a fit of minimalism, I took them all downstairs to my apartment's laundy room and left them on the table there among the Harlequin romances and copies of Family Circle.

When I get around to inventing a time machine, I am going to work out when exactly I abandoned them there and pop back to 1992, two minutes after the 1992 me has left the room and scoop these up for posterity.
posted by ricochet biscuit at 12:01 PM on January 20, 2011

"You" is always, always on the list.

It's only because I was Time Person of the Year in 2006.
posted by atbash at 12:50 PM on January 20, 2011

which one is the one that looks like smash mouth? i never watch their shows but i hate smash mouth

Daw, that guy with the convertible with the Hawaiian shirts and cargo shorts who eats all that greasy food and has the spikey bleach-blond full-of-hairgel thing going on? The WORST.
posted by Hoopo at 1:05 PM on January 20, 2011

What exactly has [Jobs] done that would place him on a list like this?

I wouldn't know, I don't pay much attention to Jobs because I can't afford ANYTHING Apple sells because I'm not in the top 20% wealth/income of Americans. Oh wait...
posted by oneswellfoop at 1:48 PM on January 20, 2011 [1 favorite]

Since when do the bottom 80% wealth/income of Americans only buy what they can afford?
posted by Hoopo at 3:34 PM on January 20, 2011

There is a very good reason, he plays better football than they do.

You really think that is the case?

When you get to the top of a field like this for which there is a lot a competition, and we're talking about an insane amount here considering that professional sports is just about the only imaginable way out of a life of crushing poverty for many young men, and you approach a place where something like "football playing ability" becomes much more of a subjective thing, because objectively quality can't be more than a percentage point or two.

I will admit, I do not follow professional sports, so I don't know if Vick actually is the Messiah of throwing around an oblong rubber ball. I would say however that, even if he is, the promised land to which he leads us is probably not worth the lives of those animals.
posted by JHarris at 4:26 PM on January 20, 2011

I don't know if Vick actually is the Messiah of throwing around an oblong rubber ball. I would say however that, even if he is, the promised land to which he leads us is probably not worth the lives of those animals.

That's not the point. The point is, beginning on the day of his release from prison, the realistic options for NFL teams were "Michael Vick" or "whatever quarterbacks are coming out of the NCAA this year," and the fact of the matter is that Michael Vick is pretty much an excellent throwing QB and a running back all rolled into one, and that is a damn valuable skill set for an NFL player.

No one in history has sat down and said "you know what, this guy is awesome, all considered that dog torture was totally worth it." It's just that, well, it happened, and now he is still a damn good football player with 3-5 good playing years left. Somebody was bound to snap him up.

(not that I am a Vick fan, mind you. I would be fine with him being drummed out of polite society for the rest of his life. But it wasn't up to me.)
posted by rkent at 4:46 PM on January 20, 2011

knoyers, I'm half-way with you, I'm just explaining what the outrage is about. As is, I'm of two minds. I think Zuckerberg is on the list because he's this moment's designated punching bag, but also anything involving Goldman Sachs raises up the hairs on the back of my neck. (Oliver Wendell Holmes, during the birth of legal realism, wrote about the "Bad Man," for whom laws must be written. The Bad Man will obey all laws to the letter, while exploiting every loophole they can find in order to continue bad practices while evading punishment for their deeds. Goldman Sachs is basically exactly what he was describing.)
posted by Navelgazer at 9:12 PM on January 19

Goldman Sachs is also a designated punching bag, a name that symbolizes anger due to conspicuous moneymaking. I never understood the purported moral difference between Goldman Sachs and many other very self-interested corporations and investment banks.

As yet, Zuckerberg has only pledged to give to charity. We'll have to wait and see if he actually does so.

Only a small fraction of Mark Zuckerberg's multibillion-dollar paper fortune has been realized. Much of that small fraction, or $100 million, was given to the beleaguered school system of Newark, N.J. Isn't that a fair good faith deposit?

Meanwhile journalists cheerfully call him "loathsome."
posted by knoyers at 7:24 PM on January 20, 2011

Zuckerberg's loathsomeness has little to do with his wealth.

(Still waiting to hear which subcultures are the criminal ones, knoyers.)
posted by Pope Guilty at 10:39 PM on January 20, 2011

I don't understand what is so dishonest about the Koch brothers. They are right-wing billionaires whose fortunes derive from industry, who donate liberally to causes that align with their own business and political interests. Evil arguably, but it's all on the surface with them.

It's the "right wing" part. But as long as you don't have any problem with George Soros, let's call it even.
posted by spitbull at 5:10 AM on January 21, 2011

I wouldn't know, I don't pay much attention to Jobs because I can't afford ANYTHING Apple sells because I'm not in the top 20% wealth/income of Americans. Oh wait...

Which is why you also hate the CEO of Mercedes Benz.
posted by grubi at 10:08 AM on January 21, 2011

Also, if you can't afford ANYTHING Apple sells, that would mean you are *really* bad off. The iPod Shuffle is $49, for Christ's sake.
posted by grubi at 10:10 AM on January 21, 2011

I will admit, I do not follow professional sports, so I don't know if Vick actually is the Messiah of throwing around an oblong rubber ball.

Oblate.
posted by Space Coyote at 10:18 AM on January 21, 2011

Comparing Soros to the Koch brothers, as if Soros were some left-wing billionaire mastermind spending millions upon millions of dollars to fund dishonest left-wing voices, is silly and completely disconnected from reality.
posted by Pope Guilty at 11:30 AM on January 21, 2011 [1 favorite]

No one in history has sat down and said "you know what, this guy is awesome, all considered that dog torture was totally worth it." It's just that, well, it happened, and now he is still a damn good football player with 3-5 good playing years left. Somebody was bound to snap him up.

It is weird that you say that, because it means that a bunch of people effectively did say the dog torture was totally worth it. The people who hired him said it, and so did all of the other teams who would have snapped him up. The guy who fired him, according to the MIGHTY PEDE "(Atlanta) Falcons owner Arthur Blank," DID think the dog torturing wasn't worth it. The Philadelphia Eagles evidently thought it was.

And because Vick was hired by someone else, one bright young kid coming out of NCAA was not hired. These facts are directly true, there is nothing complex about my logic.
posted by JHarris at 12:31 PM on January 21, 2011

it means that a bunch of people effectively did say the dog torture was totally worth it

And because Vick was hired by someone else, one bright young kid coming out of NCAA was not hired. These facts are directly true, there is nothing complex about my logic.

I agree. Your logic is simple. Tortured and wrong, but simple.

Here is some more simple logic.

The one bright young kid coming out of the NCAA who did not get a job was not as good a quarterback as Michael Vick. Pro sports are a meritocracy.

Michael Vick went to federal prison for his crimes. He did hard time. He paid his debt to society.

Vick appears to be a far better person than he was. This experience seems to have transformed him in a positive way.

Vick is a better quarterback than he was previously.

I'm not exactly sure what you mean when you say that the Eagles ownership think the dog torture was worth it.
posted by Bonzai at 10:10 AM on January 22, 2011

I agree. Your logic is simple. Tortured and wrong, but simple.

How can it be both tortured and simple?

The one bright young kid coming out of the NCAA who did not get a job was not as good a quarterback as Michael Vick. Pro sports are a meritocracy.

If you believe anything that literally tens of thousands of people try out for can be a meritocracy in a meaningful sense of the word then I think you show maybe too much faith in our methods of predicting sports performance. Playing sports in an amateur setting and in a professional setting are too-different experiences to assume perfect correlation.

Michael Vick went to federal prison for his crimes. He did hard time. He paid his debt to society.

That's a legal obligation, but moral obligations are harder to repay.

Vick appears to be a far better person than he was. This experience seems to have transformed him in a positive way.

I'm sure he seemed to be an excellent person before his dog hurting ring was uncovered, too.

I'm not exactly sure what you mean when you say that the Eagles ownership think the dog torture was worth it.

When the Falcons fired Vick it was because they couldn't trade him, so we have to assume he was considered damaged goods professionally. When the Eagles hired him, thus, it was due to exploiting an opportunity that others, for some reason, were reluctant to capitalize upon. Thus the Eagles' opportunity came directly due to the moral squeamishness of others.

It's not that I don't think Michael Vick isn't changed, or isn't an excellent player. It's that celebrity sports figures have way too much focus in our culture, and we're far too willing to forgive their frequent, ludicrously huge transgressions. It's nothing about making him into a role model; it's everything about basic human decency.
posted by JHarris at 10:26 PM on January 30, 2011

I meant simple as in stupid not as in uncomplicated. I do realize you meant it as uncomplicated. It was my little joke.

How I mean meritocracy. The best players get the jobs. Best player is defined by performance. It isn't about predicting sports performance so much as watching them play and measuring performance during training camp and the preseason.

I'm sure he seemed to be an excellent person before his dog hurting ring was uncovered, too.

By all accounts, no. He was widely considered to be a player that never quite rose to his potential and considered himself more important than the team. I have no way of knowing if this was true, but it was the common perception. When the dog-fighting allegations first came up he lied to the Falcons owner who backed him all the way.

Vick was indeed considered damaged goods. To be perfectly honest the reason most teams didn't want to pick him wasn't because they love dogs (it's a business) or because the fans love dogs (fans will quickly forgive a winner) it wasn't even because they weren't sure he still had any talent (training camp would find that out). It was because they remembered how his arrogance had nearly destroyed his football team. Even before the dog fighting he was in trouble for drugs and other off-field distractions.

You seem to think that teams were all clamoring for a chance to sign him, when in fact the speculation when he was released was that no one wanted to give him a second chance. I personally figured the first team to lose a QB to IR would sign him as a backup.

What happened was that Tony Dungy, who didn't really know Vick very well, was asked by the NFL to consul and mentor him while he was in prison. Dungy then lobbied the Eagles and convinced them that Vick had truly changed.

If you don't know football you won't know Dungy but he has a reputation in football for being one of the classiest guys to ever coach the game. The reason the commissioner tapped him for the job was because counseling prisoners was something he already did. I can't think of another football coach who I admire more as a human being.

Celebrity sports figures certainly do get too much attention in our society. I would extend that to apply to all celebrities. This is not a fault of the celebrities. It is a fault of our society.

What Michael Vick did was pretty horrible but you have to decide if we live in a society where people can redeem themselves. As you said moral obligations are harder to pay, but are they impossible? Is there absolutely no way a person can ever be forgiven?

Here is part of the 60 Minutes interview where Dungy and a representative of the Humane Society talk about why they decided to help Vick.

Here is an interview he did with his former Atlanta coach that aired on the NFL network. In it he admits he lived a lie and his misdeeds went beyond the dog fighting.
posted by Bonzai at 11:24 PM on January 30, 2011