1. Alec Baldwin: He’s in a movie a week, every third commercial, and once a month hosts Saturday Night Live. If that’s not exposure enough, he regularly goes viral on YouTube blowing his stack. You need a long vacation next year, Alec — as we do from you. Why not give a few of your brothers a break — and us too.
2. & 3. Harry Reid and Mitch McConnell: The Senate’s two major sourpusses need to give serious thought to retiring for a year. At least get some pep pills, guys, a face lift, something. Your disappearances in 2014 are sure to give Congress — or at least the voters — a double lease on life.
4. Tom Brokaw: I thought he’d retired five years ago, but he keeps popping up at the drop of a hat to weigh in on the Greatest Generation, which he seems to have given birth to single-handedly. It was a darn fine generation, Tom, but it’s time to take a final bow.
5. Jeff Bezos: OK, you’ve conquered the world of marketing, Jeff. Nice work. Now get lost for a year and take all of your cute little drones with you.
6. The Girl with the Pearl Earring: It’s a lovely painting but enough already. You’ve had your moment, even your own movie, so take a year off, sweetie.
7. Malcolm Gladwell: He may have reached the tipping over backward point with a new book every year that stretches one dubious thesis to 400 pages, a mark of literary ingenuity, to be sure, but give someone else a shot at the best-seller list, pal.
8. Anthony Bourdain: Some of us have dined once too often with the country’s most insufferable gourmet, who never met a bizarre morsel he didn’t love. I don’t know about you but I’m full. Anyone got a pack of Rolaids?
9. Maybe this is also a good time for Rachael Ray to be granted a year in Food Channel purgatory with Bourdain, PaulaDeen, and Nigella Lawson. Rachael did nothing wrong in 2013 but that’s just the trouble — she’s much too squeaky clean for my taste buds. A small scandal would make her far more digestible, if not quite yummo.
10. Jennifer Anniston: I can’t recall one movie she’s been in but it’s virtually impossible to pick up a copy of People, US, Entertainment Weekly, or the Star and not find her mug on the cover. As a friend says, “Either she has the best PR machine in Hollywood or she’s slept with every magazine editor.” You’re probably a lovely person, Jen, but a year off the newsstands could be a great career move.
11. Chris Christie: He hasn’t even announced for president but is in grave danger of wearing out his welcome by April. A year of dodging the media will help keep him in contention. Don’t want to peak too soon, Governor — if it’s not already too late.
12. Suze Orman: Turn on the TV at any time of the day or night and you will find Suze yammering how stupid we all are for not being more shrewd with our investments. Twelve Orman-less months might do wonders for my portfolio, not to mention me.
13. Depak Chopra: Like Orman, the guru of TV gurus dispenses wholesale wisdom by the truckload, but it’s time he gave his sage insights a year to rest. You, too, Dr. Phil. You’re both working your self-help much too strenuously. A year’s sabbatical on a desert island would really refresh you, or at least us. Maybe Dr. Oz could join you guys.
14. Vladimir Putin: I thought his reign had run out of gas years ago but he won’t go away so we need to nudge him into leaving us alone in 2014.
15. Miley Cyrus: If her goofy name were not irritating enough, she’s incapable of laying low for 48 hours. Hey, babe, take a year-long twerk-break.
16. Princess Kate: She’s winsome, she’s a new mom, she’s a royal highness, but she’s much too available. A year off from the adoring throngs would do everyone a lot of good.
17. Leonardo DiCaprio: He got dangerously close to overstaying his welcome playing J. Edgar Hoover; it would be hard to find more unlikely casting. He and George Clooney appear to be the only bankable movie stars left in Hollywood.
18. Alex Rodriguez: His fifteen minutes of fame expired about two years ago, but he may still need to be dragged off the field next spring.
19. Gloria Allred: TV’s most ubiquitous, overambitious ambulance chaser needs at least a year to put a sock in it and return to private practice. Case dismissed.
20. Edward Snowden: He seems to be gaining respectability in his quest to be added to Mt. Rushmore, so it’s a good time for Ed to go into hiding for a year, like his pal Bradley Manning, who neatly disappeared into a new gender just in the nick of time.
