It appears that the traditional excessive New Years drinking has begun already.

Gallup just announced a dramatic change, and after 17 years on top Hillary Clinton is no longer the most-admired woman in American eyes. Control your tears and wait for it.

The newly-crowned most-admired woman of everyone in the world is not Hillary Clinton anymore.

It’s Michelle Obama.

Two years after losing her White House lease, Mrs. Obama surged past Mrs. Clinton and Oprah Winfrey into the top spot. OK, Mrs. Obama is on a book tour that puts her out there and reminds folks of her face.

And, to be truthful here, Obama’s meaningless win was not an overwhelming victory.

She was mentioned by only 15 percent of respondents in the open-ended question. That’s three times the percentage of those mentioning another perennial choice, Oprah Winfrey. First Lady Melania Trump came in third this year at four percent, the same number as earned by the fallen Hillary Clinton.

The rest of Gallup’s top ten most-admired women in descending order was Angela Merkel, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Ellen DeGeneres, Nikki Haley, Malala Yousafzai, the Pakistani women’s rights activist and Nobel Prize winner, and Nancy “Crumbs” Pelosi. OK, the last three only got one percent mentions.

Among men, the most-mentioned was Michelle’s husband at 19 percent, followed this year by Donald Trump at 13 percent.

They were followed by George W. Bush and Pope Francis, each at two percent. The remaining male mentions each got one percent–Mike Pence, Dalai Lama, Bill Gates, Bernie Sanders, Bill Clinton,  Elon Musk and Joe Biden. Anybody else see an unusually large number of Dems here?

The ex-president has been atop the male list for 11 straight years, one shy of the 12 year record held by Dwight Eisenhower, two-term president and Supreme Allied Commander in World War II.

As you might expect, admiration preferences were colored by party membership. Thirty-five percent of Democrats chose Obama, while only seven percent of Republicans did.

Thirty-two percent of Republican most-admired Trump, while only one percent of Democrats did.

Twenty-eight percent of Democrats chose Mrs. Obama, versus only five percent of Republicans. As for Mrs. Clinton, seven percent of Democrats still chose her while less than one-half of one percent of deplorable Republicans did.