It happens at the best events — a speaker tries to break the ice with a joke about Donald Trump. After a dig about Trump’s hair or personality, often spiced with a mention of Hitler or Mussolini, most of the audience dutifully chuckles and the speaker moves on to his purpose.

In liberal New York, what can go wrong in assuming universal agreement that Trump’s a dangerous buffoon?

Here’s what: While every speaker wants to channel Jon Stewart and play politics for laughs, the Trump broadsides come with an implicit point. Because Ted Cruz, John Kasich and Bernie Sanders have snowballs’ chances in hell of getting many votes from Manhattan elites, the unstated conclusion is that Hillary Clinton is the only sensible option.

And they say Trump supporters are crazy!

Clinton is the most corrupt figure in public life and her transgressions fill several books. They started with the miraculous 1978 deal where she turned a $1,000 investment into a $100,000 windfall and haven’t stopped yet. They continued during her tenure as secretary of state, where evidence shows she gave favored treatment to those who paid her husband mega-bucks or contributed to the Clinton Foundation.

Then there’s the private server, which could be a smoking gun all by itself. By doing an end run around secure government systems, she recklessly risked the disclosure of every piece of sensitive material she got over four years.

With that history in mind, I declared recently that I was seriously considering supporting Trump. Nearly all the massive response was favorable, but some readers, including a few friends, went ­bonkers.

One, a Manhattan shrink, ­declared himself baffled, saying Trump’s rhetoric is “racist, illogical, inconsistent and fear-baiting.”

Given his profession, and knowing his support for Clinton, I responded with two questions: How do Clinton supporters rationalize 25 years of her immoral and sometimes illegal conduct? What is the psychological process that allows them to tell themselves that character doesn’t matter in a president?

He answered by asking, “Is the moral person always the better president?” and repeated Clinton’s claim that she is the best prepared candidate.

Let’s unpack his argument, which is common.

First, the decision to minimize her chronic dishonesty baffles me because if you elect a president you don’t trust, you forfeit any right to complain when you are deceived.

And you will be deceived by Clinton. Fish gotta swim, and Clintons gotta lie. She won’t change her stripes — she is what she is.

Second, the idea that she is the best prepared is based on her long experience in Washington. The actual facts paint a different picture.

As first lady, Clinton’s first job was crafting a national health-care plan. She did it in secret, it was wildly unpopular and died a sensational death. Her arrogance led to massive GOP congressional wins in the 1994 midterms and the rise of Newt Gingrich.

She took a lower profile after that, surfacing mostly to fend off scandals, such as her purge at the White House travel office so a friend could get the business.

Her last big moment came as a victim of her husband’s philandering, which led to her 2000 decision to run for the Senate. The impeached but not convicted horndog boosted her with pardons of felons, winning her bloc votes from New York Hasidim and Puerto Ricans.

It was scandalous, but it worked, and she spent her first six years in the Senate without much controversy, except for supporting the Iraq war, which bedevils her still. She forged no significant legislation or program, and immediately after re-election in 2006, launched her first presidential campaign.

Her decision to join the Obama administration after losing was gutsy, but her allies cannot point to a single big accomplishment as secretary of state.

There were, however, big failures, including the dopey “reset” with Russia and the Benghazi terror attack, where she is best remembered for her lie to the families of the four dead Americans about the cause. As The New York Times documented, and as Sanders has emphasized, Clinton’s regime-change strategy for Libya was a colossal failure that created a humanitarian disaster and a terrorist base.

After all that, we’re supposed to believe her experience makes her the best qualified person for the most important job in the world.

That’s simply insane. And if she wins, it will mean the whole country has gone nuts.

Condemn hatred? How ‘novel’!

News is defined as man bites dog, so this headline is very big news: “Palestinian author condemns anti-Semitism.”

Palestinian Media Watch, which documents the hatred of Jews routinely spewed on Palestinian media, found a speaker going against the grain.

Author Ounallah Abu Safieh’s novel has an Arab man marrying a Jewish woman. Asked about it on Palestinian TV, he noted that Muslims, Christians and Jews had shared the Middle East for

centuries, and added, “Why now, in the present situation, do I hear that I have to hate the Jew because he is a Jew? No!”

Imagine a world where rejecting anti-Semitism isn’t news.

Too good for UN

The search is on for a new secretary-general of the United Nations, and I nominate someone who could actually fix the mess at Turtle Bay: John Bolton.

The former US ambassador is clear-eyed, principled and resolute, which is why he’ll never get the top job. Only anti-American spendthrifts need apply.

Damning praise for Hizzoner

The Putz can’t catch a break. With scandal and incompetence swamping City Hall, an article on his management style seemed to offer rare praise.

“De Blasio Keeps City Agencies On Short Leash” read the headline on a Wall Street Journal piece that credited him with being an aggressive “hands-on” manager.

Oops. The idea undercuts his defense of how some big troubling events happened — that he knew nothing until the spit hit the newspapers.

That was his explanation on the fishy real-estate deal that netted private investors a $72 million profit after the city sold a lower Manhattan building and lifted a deed restriction. “I’m not happy about the fact that I didn’t hear about it in advance before it became public,” he said.

Yet top aides knew about the deal and approved it, even after area residents warned against it.

The mayor also blamed aides after a report that he was delaying construction of the third water tunnel. A commissioner had testified to that effect, but facing criticism after the report, de

Blasio claimed he was actually planning to speed up the schedule, saying, “There are times when my team does not do a good job of explaining something.”

Another oddity involves the federal probe into his fund-raising that led to disciplinary action against five police commanders. The mayor said he approved Commissioner Bill Bratton’s moves even as he claimed he knew nothing of the probe.

Clearly, his alibi needs work.