Remembering 2009

2009 has been a very eventful year.  It began with the United States inaugurating the first black President.  Many people believed it was the end of racism, but we still have a long way to go.  Still, a very memorable moment in history.  His popularity soaring at the beginning of the year soon began to fall as the American public awaited “change”.

The economy hit everyone hard including the rich and famous we found out with the Bernie Madoff Ponzi scheme.  There were several suicides attributed to this one man’s massive scheme that affected thousands of investors defrauding them of billions of dollars.

We coined phrases like “octomom” and “balloon boy” when outrageous stories hit the news.  Octomom also known as Nadya Suleman shocked the world when she birthed eight additional children to her already large family as a single Mom.  People became outraged to think as taxpayers they might have to support this woman on a welfare system.  She became a great controversy in 2009.  Another story that upset the nation was the story of “balloon boy” or Falcon Heene a six year old boy that the family claimed had floated away in a balloon.  When the authorities discovered this entire story was a hoax the parents pleaded guilty and were sentenced to jail time.

We lost memorable celebrities and people in 2009.  Perhaps the most memorable Michael Jackson who touched lives of so many around the world.  He seemed to bridge gaps between generations and races.  His sudden death impacted the entire world.  We lost Farrah Fawcett and Patrick Swayze to cancer.  Farrah passing on the same day as Michael seemed to be too much. Ted Kennedy passed away after he had been diagnosed with a brain tumour.  We lost Walter Cronkite anchorman on CBS news.  The year ending with the death of Brittany Murphy a young actress who was bubbly on screen passed at the age of 32 from cardiac arrest.

On the lighter side of the news everyone was relieved when the pilot of flight 1549 managed to land in the Hudson River saving the lives of at least 155 passengers.  Had the plane crashed into the city instead this would have been another huge disaster for New York.  The pilot Chesley “Sully” Sullenberger III became a hero when he managed to land this plane as safely as possible.

The year ending with a controversial health care reform bill passing in the Senate that would certainly be a historical event and soon change our lives leaving us to wonder what 2010 holds for us.