50 Most Loathsome People in America, 2004

Continuing our love of lists, here's one from the brilliant Buffalo Beast. Right in the middle we find:

25. Dr. Phil

Crimes: Not a doctor. Not wise. Offers troubled souls nothing but the sweet feeling of surrendering control. Only reason for prominence is that Oprah just couldn’t support her show by herself anymore. Offers troubled simpletons meaningless slogans that resonate for a maximum of five days before they realize they already knew that shit and they still can’t stop whatever compulsive behavior got them onto his show in the first place. Is almost certainly regularly involved in some unspeakable depravity that he can’t stop and which caused him to fabricate his public persona in a frantic attempt to convince us he’s normal.

Smoking Gun: Both presidential candidates were forced to submit to his pedantic bullshit in some bizarre new soft focus emasculation ritual to get slack-jawed housewives to vote for them.

Punishment: A lifetime of guest spots on Springer.

Read the rest (some are extremely funny) here.