A Brief History
On January 7, 2018, we look back at the tumultuous year of 2017 and the jerks that made the year so interesting. Politics, sexual harassment, crimes, terrorism, and general buffoonery ruled the year, and we now recognize 10 of the most egregious offenders of 2017. Who would you add to this list? Who did we include that you object to? Let us know, just don’t be a jerk about it!
Digging Deeper
1. Stephen Paddock, Mass Murderer.
This guy has to come first. He holed up in the Mandalay Bay Hotel of Las Vegas and opened fire on a large crowd attending an outdoor country music concert, killing 58 people and wounding another 546. At this time we still are not sure what his motive was, but it certainly could not have been reasonable cause to open fire on 22,000 innocent people. What a jerk! Paddock shot himself before responding cops could do us the favor. All the other shooters of 2017 can line up for their jerk awards right after this goof.
2. Martin Shkreli, Pharmaceutical Scammer and Securities Fraud.
Possibly the smuggest, smarmiest creep in the history of jerks, this former pharmaceutical CEO raised the price of a life saving medicine in 2015 from $13.50 per pill to $750 per pill just because he could. His sneering, derisive behavior at Congressional hearings (referring to Congress as “imbeciles”) made him about as despicable as any villain in fiction, or worse! In 2017 his securities fraud caught up to him and he was convicted in August, with his bail later revoked for soliciting anyone to get him a strand of Hillary Clinton’s hair for $5000, seen by a judge as soliciting assault. This creep’s sentencing will take place on January 16, 2018. We hope he locked up for a good long time.
3. Ezekiel Elliot, Football Brain.
This former Ohio State star and running back par excellence for the Dallas Cowboys got himself suspended for 6 games during the 2017 NFL football season for a domestic violence incident in 2016. During this period of heightened awareness about violence against women and 2017 being The Year of Sexual Harassment, Elliot pulled the tasteless stunt of pulling down a woman’s shirt during a St. Patrick’s Day parade, an act caught on video and released on a viral internet meme. Good thinking, Ezekiel Idiot! An Elliot spokesman said the incident was “all in good fun.”
4. ISIS, Religious Terrorists.
These creeps continued to murder their way through 2017 and continued to destroy every vestige of culture they could find that did not suit their worldview of what is proper in the eyes of their religious beliefs. Priceless historical buildings, works of art, and artifacts were destroyed, but we find solace in the incredible progress made by the United States and other countries in the fight against the ISIS terrorists, shrinking the area controlled by these guys by at least 70-80% during the 2014-2017 time-frame. ISIS now occupies only small enclaves in Iraq, and not much more than that in Syria. Meanwhile, every misguided idiot that strikes out against any non-ISIS entity in a terrorist attempt claims to do so in the name of ISIS. These losers and malcontents in Western countries that enjoy religious freedom and the good life, but choose to embrace a sick, terrorist movement are jerks. Of the estimated 30,000 foreigners that traveled to Syria and Iraq to fight with ISIS, it is believed at least 25,000 have been killed. Many of the remainder have fled.
5. Donald Trump, President?
Trump promised he would act “Presidential” once he was sworn in, but has so far failed to do so. His behavior has been a national embarrassment, whether you agree with him politically or not. Even as President, he continues to call political rivals name as if he were a kindergarten child. His going on and on about the phony size of his inauguration crowd and his blatantly false claims of his accomplishments is sooo un-presidential. The “Tweeter in Chief” just cannot seem to control himself and just pretend to be dignified for the sake of the country for even a little while. His self-serving rants in front of the Boy Scouts, at the CIA and other crowds (law enforcement, military, etc) are unseemly and inappropriate. His blatant lie about the Tax Cut being “for the middle class” is so untrue it is sickening.
6. Mnuchin/Price/Pruitt, Secretaries of Ripping off the public.
These rich creeps were accused of using expensive travel at taxpayers’ expense for their personal benefit during their brief time so far as members of the Trump Administration Cabinet. Price has since quit as Secretary of Health and Human Services, but Pruitt (EPA) and Mnuchin (Treasury) stubbornly remain. So much for draining the swamp…
7. Harvey Weinstein, Serial Sexual Harasser.
This big deal in the movie industry turns out to be the Bill Cosby of the casting couch. The tremendous amount of complaints that have surfaced regarding his decades of creepy sexual conduct triggered a massive movement to expose men and women seen as having sexually harassed, coerced, assaulted, and imposed upon other people. The list of those famous folks outed or accused in 2017 is staggering, including television and movie personalities, politicians, and business people. Even the physician of the USA Girls Gymnastics team got convicted of sexually abusing the athletes in his care, and music conductors were not immune from complaints. It seems 2017 was a watershed year for such complaints.
8. Monica Crowley, plagiarizer.
This woman was tapped to be the Trump Administration National Security Council Director of Communications until it was revealed that she had plagiarized her doctoral dissertation and at least 50 items in a book she had written. We have no tolerance for people that come by their credentials by nefarious means. Getting a PhD is no picnic, and we do not need lying, cheating creeps stealing their Doctorate.
9. Jordan Hill, Tesfaye Cooper, Brittany Covington, and Tanisha Covington, torturers.
The African American youths (the first 3 18 years old, the last 24 years old) kidnapped an 18 year old White mentally disabled youth on December 31, 2016 and held him for 3 days of torture, which the geniuses aired on video on their Facebook page. The police were quickly alerted to the sickening video, and the 4 jerks were arrested and charged with multiple felonies. They are seen on the video beating the bound and gagged victim, cutting off some of his scalp, and forcing him to drink from a toilet. They can be heard yelling “F*ck Trump” and “F*ck White people” on the video. Although the video was only 28 minutes long, the victim was tied up and tortured for many hours. The icing on this terrible cake is the ransom demand for $300 made to the victim’s parents. The incident was used as a backlash against the Black Lives Matter movement, even though the offenders had nothing to do with BLM, nor did they say anything about BLM.
10. Cop Killers.
In 2017, 125 police officers lost their lives in the line of duty in the United States, many of the deaths being accidental, but many because of intentional criminal acts of idiots. A total of 45 cops were killed by gunfire, another 6 killed by vehicular assault, 1 stabbed to death, 5 by other assaults, and 5 during vehicle pursuits. Another 3 officers died of illness stemming from exposure to toxins during the 9/11 terrorist attacks of 2001, part of the insidious long term effects of terrorism. We salute the men and women that wear a badge and defend us from criminals and other safety hazards, and we label as jerks those that seek to harm police, the vast majority of which are good and dedicated people. Idiots that resist arrest, ambush cops, endanger the public by fleeing in cars are all candidates for jerks of 2017.
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Historical Evidence
For more information, please see…
Grinberg, Emanuella. “Something went ‘incredibly wrong’ with Las Vegas gunman, brother says.” CNN. http://www.cnn.com/2017/10/02/us/las-vegas-attack-stephen-paddock-trnd/index.html (accessed 6 January 2018).
