5 Old News Stories the Media Pretended Were New This Year

5 The Pop Star Trajectory Is as Old as Pop Stars

In August, former Disney child star and current world dominator Miley Cyrus shocked us into a frothy lather when she used her MTV VMA performance to rub her butt against a 36-year-old man's crotch. (P.S. Let's stop calling what Miley did "twerking." Five minutes of YouTubing will reveal that Miley wouldn't know a twerk if it slapped her in the face with its popping butt cheeks. Double P.S. If you're not popping, you're not twerking.) The notorious performance couldn't have provoked us more if she'd birthed a baby onstage and then eaten it whole.

Why It Was Old News:

Hey! Did you ever see that 1968 Madison Square Garden performance where a practically topless Tina Turner pretended to do fellatio on a microphone while Ike Turner made slurping noises in the background? No? Here you go!

Hey, again! Did you ever see that time Debbie Harry walked on a stage without her panties (or pants)? Here's the version of that time that I'm allowed to publish on this website:

If ever there was an appropriate time for the phrase "don't hate the player, hate the game," this was it. Because Miley Cyrus is playing a game. And she's winning it hard.

For good or bad, for almost as long as women have put themselves on the stage, they've used what the good Lord gave them to get your eyes on their bodies and your ears on their voices. Madonna, Lady Gaga, Christina Aguilera, Debbie Harry, Janet Jackson, Britney, Cher, Tina Turner, and middle-aged Julie Andrews are all part of a long tradition of scintillating while entertaining. Oh, did you miss that part where I said Mary Poppins has performed with her bosoms unswaddled?

We forget that popular music, like beauty pageants and high school, is one part talent and 99 parts sexual spectacle, and has always been that way. Jimi Hendrix dry humped his guitar on stage just in case no one noticed the actual mind-blowing music he was making at the time. 1970s disco icon Donna Summer spent one of her most popular songs writhing in orgasmic ecstasy. Miley Cyrus' own godmother, Dolly Parton, transformed herself from a Betty White look-alike into an inflatable sex toy over her six decades in the spotlight.

So let's make a vow to stop condescending to Miley Cyrus and all the other skankyish pop stars who come after her as victims of predatory management or even worse -- naivete. Clearly, there's some foresight and brilliant planning behind the career of Miley Cyrus. It's time to recognize Miley as a woman who is self-aware and probably on her way to stealing the pop star throne.

4 The N-Word Is Still Off Limits to White People

This summer, the sugar hit the fan when we found out celebrity Southern cook Paula Deen admitted to using the N-word back in 1986. She also admitted to fantasizing about hosting a plantation-style wedding complete with small African-American children tap dancing around like in "Shirley Temple days," but that's a story for a whole other article. The important thing here is that for the first time in the history of old people saying racist, backward things, we didn't just blink in embarrassed silence before asking Grandma if she'd like some more pie or which of her friends has cancer now.

This time, when Deen fulfilled the oldest comedy cliche in the book, aka old people are racist and inappropriate, the country flipped its lid and rightfully called her out on it. And Deen responded in the only way she thought appropriate: by turning into an Oompa Loompa and begging for forgiveness as uncomfortably as possible.

Why It Was Old News:

You don't have to look back far to find white celebrities using racial slurs. Whether it's Dr. Laura, Roger Ebert, Mel Gibson, Michael Richards, or Riley Cooper, every single instance draws anger and shock BECAUSE WE ALREADY WENT OVER THIS. For every white person defending their right to use the N-word, there are thousands and thousands of white people wondering where these idiots come from and how they always end up with cameras in their faces. White people see frequent N-word user Quentin Tarantino as the Michael Scott of Hollywood: clueless, embarrassing, and inappropriate, but somehow good at sales.

But back to Paula. Those who defended Deen tried to provide context/excuses for her gaffe: she grew up in segregated schools, the city where she got her start actually named a bridge after one of Georgia's most insane white supremacists, she just couldn't know any better. Which is all bullhonkey. As early as 1904, Northerners were recognizing that racist white Southerners who still insisted on using the N-word were doing so with complete awareness of their choices, cognizant that the slur was a slur, stubbornly insisting on keeping the word going. More importantly, defending Deen's screw-up with a history lesson doesn't acknowledge the fact that there are plenty (millions, if I had to guess) of white people who grew up in her exact same context without picking up the word in the first place.

While I obviously can't explain what compels otherwise bright people to spit out verbal garbage, I do think I get why the media love covering the story. Whether it's a washed-up celebrity or a beloved folksy cook using the word 26 years ago, it's always going to be news. Not because we're totally over racism and everything's great, but because look at how dramatic it is when CNN does a hard-hitting N-word special!

More importantly, talking about other people using the N-word gives those of us who never use it a chance to pat ourselves on the back. We knew skipping it in rap songs would pay off someday!

3 Our Government Has Always Been Up in Our Business

Thanks to secret documents leaked by NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden, we found out that the United States government has been secretly and illegally tracking our phone calls, emails, pages, faxes, telegrams, and smoke signals for the past, oh ... I don't know, forever. And they've been more than happy to inflict the same treatment on our allies, including German head of state Angela Merkel. When asked about the breach of trust, she said something to the effect of "It's like no one even remembers what angry Germans are capable of."

This is one moment when the outrage was actually disproportionate to the story, but in the other direction. Knowing our government was recording our everything should have sent us rioting in the streets and screaming at the White House in righteous anger. American men and women go to war to fight against regimes that treat their citizens like this. We should be rounding up pitchforks as we speak, not laughing it off with Twitter hashtag games.

Why It Was Old News:

We have yet to invent a form of communication that our government hasn't used to spy on us. Maybe that's why the American reaction to the news was more of a sad trombone sound and a fart than a raised fist. When we found out Verizon was collaborating with the NSA, did anyone disconnect their Verizon service in a fit of rage? Probably not -- shares of the company rose when the news broke. I guess investors were glad to know Verizon had found a new niche.

It feels like the federal government has always been that weird jealous boyfriend who oversteps his boundaries, which makes the American people the insecure girlfriend who just puts up with it. For example, when George Washington was barely president, he requested money for a secret service fund, a fact I only discovered by visiting the CIA's Kids' Zone page. It wasn't long after the country started that we passed the Alien and Sedition Act, which gave the president the power to imprison anyone who dared to speak out against the government. True, the act was allowed to expire, but it was like we had already joined Slytherin by that point.

Then something happened. In 1898, the United States found itself in possession of the Philippines, a nation that didn't want to be occupied by a foreign power, for some odd reason. To quell the (completely justified) rebellion that followed, the American military used every technology they could get their hands on to turn the Philippines into a police state. And when it was time to come home, the U.S. turned around and applied all their new tricks to ferreting out German-Americans with suspicious loyalties, draft dodgers, and overly zealous labor organizers. By the 1940s, Western Union was cooperating with the NSA's predecessor to provide copies of every incoming or outgoing telegraph. No caveat there -- they were just turning over all of them. This, by the way, is all public information thanks to congressional hearings that were held back in the 1970s. In fact, the reason why we're extra sure all this domestic spying is illegal is because in 1978 Congress completely freaked out over the intelligence community's overreaching monitoring boner and passed the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act to keep their mitts off us.

Long story short (too late!), three different whistle-blowers alerted us about the NSA's insanity before Edward Snowden. The difference between those guys and Snowden was that Snowden went straight to the press, bypassing all the internal mechanisms that got the other three shut down faster than a brothel during period week.

2 The Worst People Want to Rule Over Us

This year, Christmas came early to comedy writers when God opened our eyes to the roly-polyiest cautionary tale who ever graduated from the Chris Farley School of Excess. His name, as you probably know, is Rob Ford, and he's the best thing to happen to politics since alternate universe William Howard Taft got stuck in the White House tub. (Real world Taft probably never got stuck in a tub. Buy the Cracked De-Textbook.)

While alcoholism, obesity, crack use, complexions that lend themselves to crazy red faces, and obesity again aren't inherently hilarious on their own, good Lord, they're funny when you bundle them up into one politician who insists on staying on the job after common sense and the entire country of Canada suggest that he do the opposite. If your behavior is so egregiously awful that it would get you fired from the night shift at Whataburger, you might not want to plan on running a major metropolitan area anymore.

To be fair, Ford wasn't the only politician to cross the line from incompetency to indecency this year. Along with Mayor McGreasy, we can look to a whole slew of guys who couldn't maintain a kindergarten level of ethics in office. Anthony Weiner was caught sending dirty texts again, even after he was trying to make a comeback from his 2011 dirty text scandal. The Mayor of San Diego was forced to resign after former employees accused him of sexual harassment. (He was convicted.) The former head of the Los Angeles Republican Party was arrested for sexting a 16-year-old girl. U.S. congressman Jesse Jackson Jr. was convicted of using $750,000 in campaign funds to buy himself Rolexes, one of Michael Jackson's fedoras, an Eddie van Halen guitar, and trips to Build-a-Bear workshop. BUILD-A-BEAR WORKSHOP. At least Ford got some crack out of the deal. Jackson went home to a horror all the crack in the world couldn't fix.

With each resignation, or, as in the case of Ford, anti-resignation, we look at these guys and ask ourselves, "Is this really the best we've got? Crackheads who use campaign money to buy teddy bears? This is who we trust with the governance now? Him? OK. Welp, if you say so." (Shakes head. Looks up immigration laws to Canada. Remembers that's where Ford is. Quits life.)

Why It Was Old News:

The exact same traits that propel pricks into positions of leadership are the characteristics that compel them to send pictures of their erect genitals to women and use campaign funds to buy Michael Jackson's fedora. In other words, the same people who say to themselves "I should rule over these people" are also saying "That crack/vagina looks like it needs some lovin', and I'm just the man to do it."

Way back in the olden days of 1998, psychologists Robert Hill and Gregory Yousey administered a test called the Narcissistic Personality Inventory to random professionals in four different fields: university professors, clergy, politicians, and librarians. Remember, 1998 was the year the president of the United States got caught putting his underwear parts in a 22-year-old's mouth parts.

Before hitting the inevitable conclusions of the study, we should know what psychologists mean by "narcissist." It's not just someone who keeps posting selfies on your Facebook timeline. Technically, a narcissist has a "need for admiration ... exaggerated self-importance, a preoccupation with fantasies of unlimited success, power, or brilliance, envy, entitlement, exploitiveness, limited empathy, and arrogance." This is beyond "please notice how pretty I am," it's "I deserve to be on top." Obviously, of these four specific professions, the politicians displayed the most narcissistic traits. There's a caveat, though -- they were also the least likely to respond to the survey in the first place. Because they're so important and busy.

People like LBJ, JFK, Richard Nixon, Rob Ford, and Anthony Weiner aren't like us. They see the world through a lens that automatically turns them into douches, and not the good kind that cleans your insides out. The bad kind that gives you infections down there. But that narcissism is actually what makes them better at their jobs, provided they don't screw it all up. Experts think that leaders who display higher levels of grandiose narcissism perform higher in crisis management, persuasiveness, and keeping their agenda on the table. The big news wasn't that more politicians got caught with their pants down, it's that they're all fighting their instincts to not meet in one room and have a coke-fueled orgy as we speak.

1 Humanity Is (Always) Going in the Right Direction

In a world where George Zimmerman is out there pulling his gat on whoever looks at him funny and Trayvon Martin isn't a living person anymore, it's only natural to get caught up in the worst the world has to offer. Then when something good happens, we're knocked off our feet. This year, a single man refocused the entire mission of one of history's most influential institutions. A Pakistani teenage girl was recognized for her constant fight to educate Muslim girls, even after getting shot in the head for her advocacy. And the Supreme Court struck down the section of the Defense of Marriage Act that prevents gay married couples from getting federal benefits. So, to recap: The future of two of the world's most conservative religions are in progressive hands, and the United States government is tired of fighting gays for their constitutional rights. Are you excited? Good. Should you be surprised? No.

Why It Was Old News:

History always punishes conservatives, not because conservatives are bad or wrong, but because they are, by definition, stuck. If you're standing still while the world is moving, you're going to get left behind.

Now remember, the word "conservative" isn't just a political term. If you want something to stay the same, whether we're talking about your religion, your music choices, or your hairline, you're conservative in that respect. Civilizations that turn inward and reject progress fall behind every time. Before Europe even figured out how boats work, China was already navigating their way to the Middle East and Africa. They should have been the ones who colonized the world -- except around the year 1500, the Chinese decided "we're good here" and ceased all exploration to the outside world. While European powers were clamoring all over each other to discover/take over different parts of the globe, China officially banned all sea travel. By the time European countries got their sights on China a few hundred years later, the technology gap was too wide to cross. Europe won.

The exact same thing happened in Japan. Beginning in 1633, Japan went into isolation mode: no one could come in and no one could leave. Two hundred years later, England had the firepower and technology to force their way in to get access to that delicious Japanese trade money. In both cases, both cultures started out ahead, then shut in on themselves for whatever reason, therefore missing every opportunity to see new things, experiment, and improve on others' ideas, or move forward in any way. They were conservative. And they got stuck.

Whether you're talking about weapon technology or values, the same holds true. Hunkering down and refusing to budge leaves you in the past, and the best example of that is Jesus Christ himself. His whole mantra was "You heard it said like this _______. I SAY ________." He was like FDR bringing a New Deal to the Jews. And if there's anyone we can say history has been kind to, it's that liberal rabble-rouser. (Jesus. And on second thought, FDR. Both.)

So don't be surprised if the next generation of Christian conservative leadership is a lot less conservative than you'd expect, or if the Tea Party slowly fades away in the next few election cycles, or our grandkids never quite understand what the big deal with gay marriage was.

Kristi is a senior editor with Cracked, and she contributed to the De-Textbook. Buy it today!

Related Reading: These are the biggest news stories of 2013. Now read the stupidest news stories of 2013. Greeks aren't giving themselves HIV to get healthcare and the world's first robot suicide was just a malfunctioning Roomba. Worry not friends, we've got plenty more where those came from.

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As 2013 draws to a close, be sure to check out Cracked's year in review because, well, we know you don't remember it half as well as you think.