Welcome back to our retrospective on the most-read posts at Hot Air in 2014, a chance to review the top stories and reminisce about the oddities that captured our imagination. One of those oddities included the “Lean Forward” network making fun of Mitt Romney for having a black grandson, which is included in today’s rankings of the 40th through 31st most-read posts this year. So is another network’s anchor laughing at an audio description of an assault, which she thought was the greatest clip ever presented on the cable net. It was a strange year in media, and in politics, as you’ll shortly recall:

• #40: Romney capitalizes on 2012 clairvoyance about today’s global Hellscape with searing op-ed – Golly, that Mitt Romney sure knew a thing or two during the 2012 campaign, huh? Maybe if the media had paid attention rather than reflexively mock the Republican, more people would have realized it. I wonder if the media will learn that lesson for 2016 …. naaaah. (Noah)
• #39: North Carolina, Georgia, Virginia Update: VA headed for recount Update: AP calls N.C. for Tillis in Update: Georgia goes GOP, no run-off – Remember when Kay Hagan was ahead, Mark Warner was going to clobber Ed Gillespie, and Michelle Nunn was about to force David Perdue into a runoff? Good times, good times. The Republican wave started here and kept right on rolling all night long. (Mary Katharine)
• #38: Former Clinton aide to Pelosi: Apologize – As the disastrous rollout of ObamaCare continued into February, Democrats like Nancy Pelosi tried to pretend they had nothing to do with it. Lanny Davis was one of the few on the Left to advise them to own up to it. They didn’t take his advice, and the results speak for themselves. (Ed)
• #37: Video: Gunman invades Dollar General, meets concealed carry permit holder – Unfortunately, this post doesn’t answer the biggest question: what idiot would commit an armed robbery at a dollar store? It does answer the question as to what happens when said idiot commits the armed robbery of a dollar store in state with supportive carry. Let’s just say it didn’t turn out well for the idiot. (Jazz)
• #36: Police protect Jewish students from Pro-Palestinian mob…in Boston – The war in Gaza was a bloody, incomprehensible mess that Hamas started in order to force Israel to lift its blockade. It didn’t go well for Hamas, which is probably why the pro-Palestinian mobs repeatedly attacked pro-Israel gays demonstrating in Beantown. It’s also why we don’t hear much about the war five months later — because it was a massive backfire for Hamas that exposed the tunnels they had built for a much more violent attack on Israel. (Guy Benson)
• #35: Open thread: Ferguson grand jury announcement expected within hours; Update: No indictment; Update: Obama to deliver statement – It almost felt like “Fitzmas” last month as the media waited breathlessly to see whether Karl Rove, er, Darren Wilson would get frogmarched after an indictment. Thanks in part to media saturation (but only in part), the media got the show they wanted when this Fitzmas fizzled out, too. The cable nets still got their ratings boost, though, so it all worked out in the end. (Allahpundit)
• #34: CNN media reporter: Costello deserves all the criticism she’s getting – Carol Costello still has a job. That seems to be a measure of Brian Stelter’s influence as a media critic at his own cable net. Give Stelter credit for calling her out, anyway, for bubbling over with glee as she introduced the audio of Bristol Palin describing her assault at a party after police arrived to break up the brawl. The best part: Costello spent the summer lecturing viewers and one ESPN host about domestic violence against women. (Ed)
• #33: Cuomo: Pro-life people have “no place in the state of New York” – Andrew Cuomo thought he’d call out the “extremists” in his opposition, and ended up taking off his own mask of moderation instead. He later said his remarks were “distorted” by the media, who had, er … quoted him. Sean Hannity couldn’t wait to get out of New York as a result, but perhaps it’d be better to replace Cuomo instead. (Mary Katharine)
• #32: MSNBC panel: Hey, get a load of Mitt Romney’s black grandson – Perhaps the most embarrassing media moment … of 2013, actually. Melissa Harris-Perry and MSNBC offered this one up too late to get into last year’s countdown, so we’ll offer it this year instead, especially since the controversy (and much of the page views) spilled over into 2014. Harris-Perry attempted a Twitter apology (like Costello) on New Year’s Eve, but gave a tearful on-air apology (which Costello still has not offered) on January 4th. Romney publicly accepted it the next day, but not everyone was willing to forget it — nor did MSNBC learn its lesson. (Allahpundit)
• #31: Last minute surprise: North Carolina investigating Kay Hagan over ‘conflict of interest’ – It may have been a last-minute dirty trick in a tight election, but if so, it was the slowest-developing last-minute dirty trick in history. Both Hagan and Thom Tillis had potential conflicts of interest on their records, and Politico had written about both months earlier. North Carolina opened up a probe into the financial deals of Hagan’s husband with federal grant money, but there hasn’t been any news since the election. It’s one reason to remain skeptical about any last-minute reports of investigations into candidates. (Noah)

Tomorrow we’ll take a break and come back on Monday to look at #21-30 on the top posts of 2014. In the previous thread, we had requests for the top comment threads of 2014, and I’ll see if we can dig that out for a separate post this week. (I answered a couple of questions from that thread in the comments.) Meanwhile, since we’re reaching back to 2013 for one entry, let’s recall another MSNBC gem from a year ago in which Joy Reid explained to viewers that Christmas trees were idolatrous. No, seriously … and that one’s #53 on the list: Confirmed: MSNBC pretty darned ignorant about Christianity and Scripture.