It was the year Anthony Weiner admitted in the midst of his New York City mayoral campaign that he had continued to sext after resigning from Congress for sexting. Under the delightfully absurd alias “Carlos Danger,” he had sent pictures of his private parts to a 22-year-old woman, whose notoriety instantly launched her career in adult film and as a spokesmodel for an adultery-facilitating website. Weiner made us fondly recall the self-effacing modesty of past New York City politicians like Ed Koch and Rudy Giuliani.

It was the year that Toronto mayor Rob Ford denied smoking crack, before admitting smoking crack — probably “in one of my drunken stupors.” He blamed reporters for not asking “the correct questions” when he made his initial lawyerly denial, in which he had only said, “I do not use crack cocaine, nor am I an addict of crack cocaine.” He denounced a successful effort by the city council to strip him of most of his powers as a “coup d’etat.” While running around like a bull high on amphetamines during the raucous council debate, he knocked a woman down. The good mayor made us miss the decorum and straightforwardness of former Illinois governor Rod Blagojevich.

It was the year Dennis Rodman nominated himself as goodwill ambassador to North Korea, touchingly pronouncing himself Kim Jong Un’s “friend for life.”