At times, the current presidential campaign has felt like one long blooper reel, a never-ending parade of ill-chosen words, terrible timing, and missed cues. But the latest supercut from News Be Funny proves that Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump are merely following the example set by generations of previous presidents and candidates. The most powerful people in America have been screwing up badly in public for decades, and cameras and tape recorders have been there to capture it all for posterity. So politicians die, but the humiliation never will. Among the “stars” of this latest video are Ronald Reagan, Lyndon Johnson, Richard Nixon, Bill Clinton, Barack Obama, and both George Bushes.
But the real breakout star of this video might be Dan Quayle, the Indiana senator who served a single, gaffe-filled term as vice president from 1989 to 1993. This hapless politician had a particular gift for malapropisms that has yet to be matched, practically raising the blunder to an art form. This, for instance, is how Quayle attempted to make a profound statement about the dangers of prejudice:
Millions of innocent people lost their lives due to the bigotry and Hitlerism that permeated Germany and other parts of the world. It was an obscene period in our nation’s history. No, not our nation’s. But in World War II, I mean, we all lived in this century. I didn’t live in this century. But in this century’s history. Because we did not have—as a matter of fact we fought—Hitlerism.
Right. Other delirious highlights of this video include LBJ giving some extremely intimate instructions to his tailor, Clinton trying to give a speech during a fire alarm, and Reagan trying and failing to pronounce a tricky, polysyllabic name. Oh, and there’s a very NSFW horse standing on the White House lawn at one point, too. That horse is way too excited to meet the president.