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Note: Due to the linkbait nature of this article, the main link will go to a quite excellent Foghorn Leghorn clip. If you wish to subject yourself to Henry Blodget’s insurmountable stupidity, here’s the link.

The Macalope already kicked the crap out of Blodget and Business Insider once today, but that was for a different article. My turn to take on this trio of idiocy. The headline:

Consumer Reports Says iPhone 5 Is the Worst of the Top Smartphones

At least someone reads Consumer Reports, so I don’t have to.

The iPhone has been such a mind-boggling success that it drives more than half of Apple’s overall profit. And for most of the past five years, Apple has had a lock on the “best smartphone in the market.”

In recent years, however, competitors have caught up with the iPhone. Some reviewers think Samsung’s new phone is superior to Apple’s latest phone. And many people expect Samsung to leap ahead when the new Galaxy S4 comes out this spring.

These “some reviewers” and “many people” aren’t cited nor linked, of course.

Another respected product reviewer, Consumer Reports, agrees with those who think Apple has lost its edge.

Consumer Reports is “respected” in the product review space for electronics the way Charlie Sheen is “respected” in hotel rooms: when they show up, things tend to end in a complete disaster visible mostly through a veil of tears.

Consumer Reports actually rates the iPhone 5 the worst of the top smartphones.

The worst, dear reader. Not just the worst, but the worst. With italics and everything. Shit, dawg.

CR doesn’t spell out the reasoning for its numerical ratings (yet) …

Spoiler alert: random number generators.

… but the results are still startling.

What if the iPhone 5 was beaten by a BlackBerry, or the Motorola ROKR? That would be startling, for sure.

As you can see, on AT&T and Sprint, the iPhone 5 is rated behind two phones:

The LG Optimus G (Android) [The what?]

The Samsung Galaxy S III (Android)

I should clarify that Blodget added the “The what?”, not me.

On AT&T, the LG got 79 points from Consumer Reports, and the Samsung got 78. The iPhone 5’s “startling” result? 77.

On Sprint, the LG got 77 points, the Samsung 76, and the iPhone 5 received 75.

For both carriers, Consumer Reports ranks the iPhone in the top three of the phones on each network, by a margin of two points. Two entire points. “Startling”.

On Verizon, the iPhone doesn’t rank in the top three, but who gives a fuck? It’s Consumer Reports. Blodget couldn’t be bothered to ask them what criteria they used — probably because that would require the use of both hands on the keyboard — but Bryan Johnston of Wireless and Mobile News did:

Some things that Consumer Reports hold important are call quality, ability to play Flash, ability to create Microsoft Word and Excel documents, ability to use voice/data at the same time, ease of use, separate call buttons and removable batteries.

(Insert some joke about how Apple should’ve included a discontinued product on their phone.) In the esteemed words of Cake, “shut the fuck up”.