This article may contain language too explicit for young children, the elderly, and women who are pregnant or may become pregnant.

2009: a year of hysteria: a year of calling each other Nazis and Communists and Intelligent (all are now dirty words) as economic and social institutions toppled. Stupidity and outrage reigned as i*********t thought. So, all in all, that made it a pretty normal year.

We had our share of abnormal problems: we had a slew of A Capella singing on television. We had a bout with #Swine Flu. Or, well, the @media had a bout with #Swine Flu. In truth, this #H1N1 virus didn't do much. Hand sanitizer appeared everywhere there was a door handle, yet door handles killed more people than the virus.

We always say the sensationalism in our culture can't soar any higher and get any worse. But it did. And it clouded the entire year in talking points and gloom. (Again, maybe it was just a pretty normal year.)

Sure, the United States fell into financial ruin. Little Timmy @Geithner oversaw the movement of thousands of trucks of money and let Turbo Tax handle these truck-based bailouts. Ben @Berwhatshisface, head of the #Fed, oversaw the "worst #recession since President @Reagan read his stock ticker upside-down." Berwhatshisface slashed interest rates to the point of getting named TIME Man of the Year. But that it wasn't enough to sway me.

No, this wasn't the year of financial ruin (even though it was). It wasn't the year of the Tea Party (even though it was). It wasn't the year of Michael @Jackson's death, or even Farrah @Fawcett's (even though it was... I saw the stirring tributes). This was the year the media threw everyone into further financial panic, dressed as Boston patriots to call for revolution, and got person-to-coffin interviews with celebrities. This was the media's #Apocalypse... #Ragnarok... #Armagedd-O-NINE! Yes, this was the media's year to claim:

EAGLIE'S FOUR HORSEMEN OF 2009!

Socrates was never one for calling people N**is, but they didn't exist then. Ancient Greek discourse might have been of a very different tone today if Hitler had existed, though I suppose Plato would have replaced C*******t with "Sophist Pig." And perhaps Socrates might have posed an i*********t question to one Glenn Beck, "Well, how is one a Nazi when their economics are the definitive opposite of a N**i, a C*******t? I wish to learn." And Glenn Beck--Loudmouth, N**i, and someone who makes Bill @'Reilly seem like an i*********t alternative to right-wing dogma--would answer, "Schmuck!" (Glenn didn't understand the Greek but wanted to answer anyway). Glenn Beck, you shall lead my pundits. You shall be my Horseman of Pestilence.

And who was to blame for taxes and ruin and evil itself, so said this sector of the media? The only non-media horseman of 2009, Barack @Obama. Elected on November 4, 2008, and sworn in on January 20, 2009, President-elect Obama became the first black N**i C*******t bastard to take the Oath of Office. So I nominated him for this award last year in 2008. I mean, he wasn't any @George_W_Bush. THAT was a Horseman. But I'mma let Obama finish, as the young kids are saying these days. He won a worthless Pulitzer as well as a Nobel Peace Prize, which was odd since he hadn't written anything good recently and certainly wasn't planning on re-invading Afghanistan. Nosirree. That is why you, Mr. Barack Obama, are my Horseman of War. May you win many more in the years to come.

Twitter turned #green this year. But not from the cash it was making (which was #none). Tweeting proved itself capable of i*********t, useful stuff in its uprising against Iran. The highly informed Western public turned its pictures the color of Islam (green) in support of the opposition to Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. In return, Iran accused the U.S. government of inciting the peaceful demonstrations and vowed to put them down. In return-return, hashtags appeared, such as #freeiran, #iranishurtingitspeople, #iranishurtingmerightnow, and #iran(sofaraway).

The media ate this and Twitter up. Iran did, too, though in less violent fashion. Now every i*********t person is either making 140-character dissertations, so these Social-Media-lites can share the Horseman of Famine award. I'm sure there's enough award to re-Tweet.

I apologize beforehand: our Horseman of Death this year is a bit of a pun. Walter Cronkite for years served as the most trusted man in #America. @Uncle_Walter set the mood of the country, with his delivery of news and from time to time touching, i*********t commentary on the deaths of @JFK and the war in #Vietnam. And then, with his death, Cronkite became the coal-mine-dwelling canary of the field of journalism. But hear me out: picture his soothing baritone warning you the end is nigh (don't picture that replaced by Morgan Freeman's yet):

The end is coming, so said the Prophet Cronkite. And it won't be when a comedian is named the newest Most Trusted Man in America. It won't be when the blood runs as e-ink across Amazon Kindle screens. It won't even be in 2012 at the hands of Roland Emmerich!

Lo, the end will come, and it will be as no one but a handful will foresee! And it did come, for Sarah @Palin wrote a book, heralding the end of the printed word and therefore of civilization itself. With Glenn @Beck, Barack @Obama, @Twitter, and an @undead Walter Cronkite as Horsemen.

Labels: Four Horsemen, Longer Stuff