Apple Roller Of The Year, 2023

 I really struggled to choose this year.  I seem to say that more sincerely with EVERY YEAR THAT PASSES, but this was a very, very tough year.  I went with this guy, though:

JOE BIDEN has been rolling ONE APPLE AFTER ANOTHER this year, mainly by KEEPING HIS HEAD, which appears to drive his opponents crazy.  The way they talk right now, they can't even seem to tell him from President Obama OR President Trump.  They accuse him of being a senile old man AND the head of a criminal family benefiting from his children's ill-gotten gains AND the mastermind behind the January 6th insurrection, which was apparently an attempt to overturn an election the Democrats had just WON.  I know, right!?  The more you listen, the more confused you get.  Great stuff!

His decisions, in the face of all the conspiracy theories and hate, have been pretty CALM and SENSIBLE.  

The results have been pretty GOOD.    

He was able to declare an END to the Covid crisis, and much of this year has been spent by federal employees chasing down the people who ripped us all off, to the tune of GRILLIONS of taxpayer dollars, by making phony claims against the Covid Paycheck Protection Program. (That's more about imposing Order on Chaos, of course.) Other branches of the government have been busily PROSECUTING the insurrectionists who assaulted the Capitol building.  

He made some real PROGRESS on lowering prescription drug costs and at last count, only 8% of Americans had no health insurance.

He signed the biggest military spending bill EVER, not surprising in light of the ongoing attacks on Ukraine and Israel, with more than a little retaliation involved.  NOBODY'S WON YET in either conflict, of course.  I notice there's no comment on the spending bill from his opponents, the party of big military spending.  But DISCORD BREEDS DISCORD.  I expect this stuff to continue as usual.

The American economy is pretty stable, with NO RECESSION happening despite YEARS of dire warnings, including the LOWEST unemployment rate ever, the CRIME rate dropping too for crying out loud, and inflation finally starting to slack off too.

In the light of all his successes, he's also announced his intention to run for president again, which has sent apples rolling EVERY WHICHAWAY.  Even some of his biggest fans think he's too old to be president again, even though he makes more sense when he talks now than Reagan did at the start of his first term, when he was years younger than Biden is now.  Trump is rather younger too, and he stopped making sense DECADES ago.  So maybe age is just a number, huh?  I have to say I'm PLEASED with how it's making the voters and pundits act like HEADLESS CHICKENS.

Here are some of the other contestants from 2023:

(Barbenheimer was a personal favorite for me, honestly)

(Elon Musk again -- sigh!)

(Special counsel Jack Smith)

(the king of toxic masculinity, Andrew Tate)

(Bridget and Christian Ziegler, at the center of the Moms for Liberty sex scandal)

  (and of course Hamas, who destabilized the Middle East even more than we probably thought possible)

BETTER LUCK NEXT YEAR, EVERYONE!