A collection of top-ranked stinkers, rascals, and reprobates, plus a few just-plain-dumb folks, as seen and shared on MSNBC’s Countdown with Keith Olbermann

Controversial, outspoken, and wildly entertaining, Keith Olbermann hosts a popular nightly newscast on MSNBC. A key feature of Olbermann’s unique and witty countdown of the day’s top stories is his daily award for "The Worst Person in the World." Honorees range from dumb criminals to the likes of Tom Cruise, Amber Frey, Geraldo Rivera, the Coca-Cola Company, assorted members of the Bush Administration, and FEMA spokesperson Mary Hudak. Bill O’Reilly of Fox News has a bumper crop of gold medals. From sports figures to schoolteachers, no one is exempt from Olbermann’s ire.

One hundred and twenty of these incisive presentations, featuring bronze, silver, and gold medal recipients, have been packed into this tongue-in-cheek treatise on the past year’s events. Along with actual transcripts, Olbermann shares his methodology for selecting the winners from the vast pool of possibilities presented by each day’s news. Finally, he selects his top pick for the "worst of show" and reports some of the fallout from his awards, such as the mysterious disappearance of certain remarks from a transcript on Rush Limbaugh’s Web site after Olbermann called them out on Countdown.

In the style of Jon Stewart, Bill Maher, and Al Franken, Keith Olbermann’s The Worst Person in the World presents a brash and scalpel-sharp appraisal of the depths to which humans can slide socially, politically, and morally–and what fun it can be to find out.