CNN Must Let Andy Cohen Get Blackout Drunk on New Year’s Eve

After months of speculation, and recent denials, Andy Cohen confirmed yesterday to Page Six that he and the demon Anderson Cooper will not be drinking during CNN’s New Year’s Eve broadcast. In these final moments before the clock strikes 2023, we would like to speak directly to CNN CEO Chris Licht and ask:

WHY??????????????????????????????????????

CNN’s New Year’s Eve broadcast, which on its face sounds like the most boring shit imaginable, has — despite all odds, and through the excessive alcohol use of its correspondents, hosts, and guests — managed, over the years, to be the only New Year’s Eve broadcast worth watching.

The show was dealt a major blow in 2017 after the villainous Anderson Cooper threw Kathy Griffin, his supposed friend, under the bus, causing her (post Trump-beheading photo) to be jettisoned from the broadcast. And we will never forgive either Cooper or CNN for their betrayal. But last year things seemed to pick up a bit; for example, a heavily inebriated Andy Cohen, who replaced Griffin as the show’s co-host, called rival NYE host Ryan Seacrest a “loser” and later said, in an extended rant, that Bill DeBlasio was the “crappiest” mayor in New York City history. This is what we’re here to see.

“We aren’t drinking, but we’re going to have a BLAST,” Cohen told Page Six yesterday. Depressing. This was meant to clarify contradicting statements he made in an interview published Wednesday by Rolling Stone that had taken place a month earlier. “CNN said the correspondents will not be drinking,” Cohen told the magazine at the time. “Anderson and I will be the people partying on CNN [though] we will be partying responsibly.” Apparently not even this is true.

CNN — the ice on which you currently stand is thinner than Anderson Cooper’s loyalty. You have already ruined New Year’s Eve for us once, with the firing of Kathy Griffin. You are now on track to ruin it a second time. You will not be getting any more chances.

We do not tune in to watch Don Lemon soberly tell us what is happening on New Year’s Eve in some other city. We tune in to watch Don Lemon get his ear pierced while fucked up at some bar. We do not tune in to watch Andy Cohen stand there and talk. We tune in to watch Andy Cohen almost fall down repeatedly because he is so fucked up he cannot stand. (Some have pointed out that an alcohol ban does not necessarily prohibit Andy Cohen from indulging in other substances. We are confident that he understands this loophole and we are relying on him to exploit it.)

Chris Licht, we have been through so much. The year has been long, and it has not been easy. You owe us the ability to watch supposedly respectable newspeople (and Andy Cohen) get blackout drunk on New Year’s Eve.

You must fix this.