Even if (or especially if) you spent the holiday alone, quarantining or sick from COVID, there’s a chance you got a little intoxicated on New Year’s Eve. (Perhaps you were dressed better than one of the world’s wealthiest individuals.) Perhaps you were as tanked as Andy Cohen, the odd Doritos eater. However, you were most likely not on national television. Cohen and Anderson Cooper co-hosted CNN’s New Year’s Eve broadcast. Cohen went a little too far, criticizing both Ryan Seacrest and Bill de Blasio, the outgoing mayor of New York City. He’s now apologizing, at least for the first portion of it.
With his pulpit in his hand, a visibly irritated Cohen mocked Dick Clark for hosting ABC’s contribution to the night’s televisual partying, which was hosted by the co-host of Live with Kelly and Ryan. Cohen yelled out, “If you look behind me, you’ll see Ryan Seacrest’s gang of losers performing.” “I’m sorry, but you’re viewing nothing if you’re watching ABC.”
Cohen was even more enthralled when the conversation went to de Blasio, who was succeeded that night by Eric Adams. “Watching Mayor de Blasio perform his ‘victory lap’ dance after four years as New York’s mayor! Sayonara, sucka! The only thing the Democrats and Republicans can agree on is what a dreadful mayor he has been. ” As he lurched about, Cohen remarked. “It’s all set. What has been accomplished has been accomplished as a result. “‘Sayonara sucker,’ I liked.”
At least one of them had been obligated to deliver a mea culpa by the time Cohen returned to work on Monday. On his SiriusXM show Andy Cohen Live, he remarked, “The only thing I regret saying is that I bashed the ABC broadcast because I actually like Ryan Seacrest and he’s a terrific guy.” “And I’m sorry I said that.” And he continued, “I just kept talking and I shouldn’t have, and that made me feel horrible.” He added, “I was just stupid and intoxicated and feeling it.”
Cohen then implied that he was not apologetic for his comments regarding the former mayor of New York City. “That’s all there is to it.” he said, “It’s the only thing.”
When he was elected in 2013, de Blasio was seen as a progressive, transformative candidate who was serious about, among other things, cleaning up the city’s often aggressive police force. He didn’t. Instead he discovered what so many mayors learn: that being mayor of one of the globe’s largest and prickliest cities is incredibly tough, and that everyone will hate you, and not just because of your “trash” taste in pizza toppings.
