The Year In Review

From the Collapsing Economy to a Historic Presidential Election, It’s Been Quite a Year

By Bill Krull

Against the gloomy backdrop of a tanking global economy, Americans elected Barack Obama as the first African-American president in the nation’s history. If, as presidential historian Doris Kearns Goodwin has observed, the times produce the leader, then the incoming President inherits a world filled with opportunity to become one the greatest leaders ever.

Obama’s election ignited pride in the hearts of nearly all Americans regardless of political affiliation. In a world that seemed to grow more dangerous by the moment and the 24-hour news cycle dominated by ever-increasing stories of pending financial collapse, war, mass fatalities and famine, Americans and the world took heart that this nation can and will produce unsurpassed hope and opportunity for the foreseeable future.

There’s plenty of opportunity for Obama to become a scapegoat instead of a hero. On Dec. 1, the National Bureau of Economic Research, an organization in charge of such things, declared the U.S. economy in recession. It has been there for a year. Their foundations shaken by the collapse of the real estate market when homeowners began defaulting on sub-prime mortgages, financial giants such as Bear-Stearns and Lehman Brothers disintegrated into bankruptcy.

Chrysler, Ford and General Motors, for nearly a century the pillars of American manufacturing prowess and might, tottered on the brink of collapse with their CEOs jetting to Washington D.C. to beg an unsympathetic Congress for $25 billion in bailout loans. This extraordinary spectacle of auto executives getting whipped up on by members of Congress was preceded in September by the passage of the historic $700 billion Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP) in an attempt to staunch the bleeding of the world financial industry. The phrase “too big to fail” entered the world’s vocabulary.

Highlights & Lowlifes

The official 2008 president campaign that really started in 2007 began Jan. 3 when Obama and Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee won the Iowa caucuses. Hillary Clinton and John McCain surged back in the New Hampshire primary. By Super Tuesday in February, McCain rose once again from the death assigned to him by national pundits to become the front-runner for the Republican presidential nomination. The rest of the field quickly dropped out, leaving McCain as the presumptive nominee watching Obama and Clinton smack each other around.

To bolster an economy slammed by the double demons of the credit crunch and soaring energy prices, President George W. Bush proposed a $145 billion stimulus package. Congress passed it by an overwhelming majority. In his final State of the Union address, Bush acknowledged “economic uncertainty” while praising improving conditions in Iraq after nearly five years of struggle. In June, the US military announced that American fatalities in Iraq the month before dropped to 19, the lowest level since the war began in 2003. In the “other” war, the Taliban staged a deadly resurgence in Afghanistan.

A light at the end of the Iraq war tunnel appeared in August when the U.S. said it will withdraw combat troops from Iraqi cities by June 2009, followed by the removal of all combat troops by the end of 2011 as long as Iraq is stable and secure. The draft deal is part of a security pact that governs U.S. involvement in Iraq. The Iraqi National Assembly is currently debating the agreement.

On a brighter note, LSU won its second national championship of the millennium in football. The Tigers, as they did all season, came from behind to beat the top ranked Ohio State Buckeyes 38-24. With the victory, the Tigers became the first two-time National Champion in the 10 year history of the BCS, adding onto their 2003 title. A review of the 2008 season is better left until next year.

The New York Giants ended the England Patriots perfect streak of wins with a 17-14 win in Super Bowl LXII (42). One of the game’s heroes, Plaxico Burress, literally and figuratively shot himself in the foot in a New York club in the final month of the regular 2008 season.

Obama and Clinton kept whacking on each other until the final primary in June in a bitter fight that saw Obama rolling gutter balls in a bowling alley and Clinton downing shots and beer in a Pennsylvania saloon. While Obama talked about people clinging to their guns, Clinton stuck to hers until the last gasp.

That saloon experience will serve her well in her new role as secretary of state in the inevitable showdown with Vladimir Putin and Dmitry Medvedev. She should be able to match the Russian duo shot for vodka shot as the former Soviet Union seeks to re-establish itself as a world power. Medvedev, a former aide to, Putin won the Russian presidential election hands down in March.

Russia set the stage by invading former satellite Georgia and making friends with US-baiter and hater Hugo Chávez of Venezuela. Another old US-hater, Fidel Castro, signaled the end of an era when he stepped down after ruling Cuba for nearly half a century. Maybe that will finally open the door to importing Cuban cigars to the US.

Elliot Spitzer showed once again the deadly effects of hubris. The former attorney general of New York, who prosecuted a prostitution ring in Staten Island and was a crusader against corporate crime, had to resign as the state’s governor after the New York Times disclosed his patronage of a $4,000 an hour prostitute.

Democratic candidate John Edwards of $400 haircut fame admitted to cheating on his wife while she was undergoing cancer treatment. He reportedly paid his girlfriend, Rielle Hunter, a videographer who worked on his campaign, more than $100,000 for services rendered—video services, that is.

In August, exhausted from his campaign battles with Clinton, Obama accepted the Democratic presidential nomination, the first African-American ever nominated by a major political party. Meanwhile, McCain’s campaign strategists put on their snowshoes and found a maverick moose skinner from Wasilla as his running mate. Alaska Governor Sarah Palin went on the attack, winking and droppin’ her G’s and tellin’ Joe it ain’t so. Tina Fey of 30 Rock and Saturday Night Live fame followed immediately. Whether or not the experience paved the way for Palin’s future political career remains to be seen, but it certainly worked wonders for Fey.

Joe the Plumber also got his 15 minutes of fame, maybe earning enough to pay his $2,000 tax lien and to pay for his plumber’s license. Now, a group of young Republicans have started a campaign to draft Joe for Congress. The campaign tag: “Plunge the crap out of Washington.” Good luck with that, Joe. Talk about making campaign promises you can’t keep. Especially when the substance in question is being generated faster than it can be disposed of.

Speaking of which, Hurricane Gustav, bearing down on Louisiana, was a party pooper, causing Republicans to dramatically scale back their convention in Minneapolis, mindful of the political effects of Hurricane Katrina. Gustav pretty much spared New Orleans but demolished much of Southeast and Central Louisiana. It took weeks to restore power in some parts of the state.

Nature as an irresistible force in 2008 dominated much of the world, national, state and local stage. Earthquakes, floods, typhoon and cyclones struck China, the Philippines, Myanmar and India, killing tens of thousands of people while tornados repeatedly ravaged the US Midwest and South, killing hundreds.

A total of 16 named storms formed during the 2008 hurricane season, including eight hurricanes, five of which were major hurricanes at Category 3 strength or higher. Overall, the season is tied as the fourth most active in terms of named storms (16) and major hurricanes (five), and is tied as the fifth most active in terms of hurricanes (eight) since 1944. For the first time on record, six consecutive tropical cyclones (Dolly, Edouard, Fay, Gustav, Hanna and Ike) made landfall on the U.S. mainland.

The 2008 Olympic Games opened in Beijing with 14,000 performers and 91,000 spectators in the National Stadium. Dancing, music, and fireworks entertained 840 million television viewers worldwide. U.S. swimmer Michael Phelps won his 11th career gold medal, becoming the first athlete in Olympic history to do so. Phelps won his eight gold medals, breaking the record set by Mark Spitz in the 1972 Games. Phelps also set the record for the most gold in a single Olympics.

The Writers Guild of America ended its strike, but most people haven’t noticed yet. No Country for Old Men won Best Picture, but not many people noticed that either, as the 80th Annual Academy Awards had its lowest television ratings ever. The latest Batman movie, The Dark Knight, starring the late Heath Ledger, was the top-grossing film of the year. We also got to see the return of Rocky and Indiana Jones. The literary world found its answer to the retired Harry Potter with Stephanie Meyer’s romantic vampire books, which dominated bestseller lists throughout the year.

As of this writing, the year still has nearly a month to go and certainly more history remains to be made. The terrorist siege of Mumbai, killing nearly 200, reminded us that it’s a dangerous world. Yet, with the end of presidential campaign between two gentlemen clearly uncomfortable with the Lee Atwater/Karl Rove politics urged upon them by their respective strategists, we’re entering the New Year with hope.