Is it possible to top a year like 2008? We’ve encountered everything from scandal to accidental celebrity deaths. History was made in politics with the presidential election as well as in the NFL with the league’s first ever 0-16 team. Although the recession hit hard, the entertainment industry made a few strides with superhero movies like Iron Man and The Dark Knight. Here’s a recap of what 2009 is up against.

Government officials and celebrities showed their true colors throughout the year. The true criminals and scumbags captured the headlines. Before the Rod Blagojevich controversy, there was Eliot Spitzer and his prostitute (she then made a singing debut out of the exposure). Really though, who cares about “Client #9” and Ashley Alexandra Dupré? Apparently Time believes that was the number one scandal of the year and there was no mention of our governor within the top ten.

O.J. Simpson is finally getting the jail sentence many believe he deserved years ago. I guess what happens in Vegas doesn’t always stay in Vegas.

The good side of politics came with our new president-elect, Barack Obama. It shows that our nation has finally progressed past racial barriers, and it’s about time.

On a sad note, death was prevalent for the famous in ‘08. The most shocking death of the year came early with Heath Ledger. An accidental drug overdose took the life of an actor that redefined the role of the infamous Joker in The Dark Knight.

Here’s a short list of other celebrities no longer with us: Bettie Page, Isaac Hayes, Bernie Mac, Michael Crichton, Charlton Heston, and George Carlin.

History was made within the National Football League. The Patriots were near perfection at the beginning of the year, but the choked in the only game that mattered. At least we can rely on the Detroit Lions to pick us up and set the bar with an NFL record of zero wins and sixteen losses. We may never again see this feat.

Michael Phelps came in a distant second to Detroit with history-making performances. So he won 8 gold medals against the best of the best swimmers in the Olympics. The suit did all of the work anyway. I’m totally kidding, that was the single most impressive athletic accomplishment of the year. The next best athletic achievements came from Jamaican sprinter Usain Bolt.

The Cubs blew it again…I guess that’s old news though.

Television was entertaining this year. The Office, How I Met Your Mother, and House are still three of the best shows on television. If you haven’t seen Steve Carell’s character Michael Scott on The Office, you’re missing out. Heroes took a fall this past season, but still a decent show if you’re a fan of superpowers and unrealistic twists. No matter how tacky It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia (with Danny DeVito) is, I can’t get enough of it. Finally, The Shield ended their reign this past year, and not a minute too soon. I enjoyed the show for a few seasons, but it was time to put that dog to rest.

The most important subject to mention of the entire year is the music. Some bands hit, like TV on the Radio and Coldplay, and one totally missed, Guns n’ Roses. Chinese Democracy started in the mid ‘90’s and should’ve stayed there. Go away Axl, you creepy, creepy looking man…thing. Coldplay is always golden in every aspect of their career. I’m looking to the start of 2009 with Tonight: Franz Ferdinand. A brilliant album I’m still listening to is from The Killers, Day & Age.

There were so many other stories out there, but everything is debatable and some of the stories are too depressing to think about. The one thing that did happen on the LAST day of 2008 was the arrest of Charles Barkley on a DUI suspicion, awesome (apparently a handgun and prostitute are involved, as well). We started 2009 with the Winter Classic between the Red Wings and Blackhawks at Wrigley Field. Nice transition from the old to the New Year. Kudos to you professional sports! Happy New Year, let’s hope for the same excitement this time around.

The Democrats have done it. They won the presidency and solidified their majority in the House and Senate. Following the announcement that Barack Obama had won, gay people everywhere flooded the streets to have HIV infecting sex.

But something more important than the world’s largest public orgy happened yesterday, for the first time in history, a black man will be president.

Now that’s something. That says something about the evolved nature of this country. When the daughter of George “Segregation today, segregation tomorrow, segregation forever ” Wallace votes for black man, that is history.

The moment that left many (myself included) a little choked up, was when a camera scanning the crowd stumbled upon a teary eyed Jesse Jackson. Seeing Jackson overcome with emotion reminds us what we have a nation have been through. Jesse Jackson knelt on the balcony of the Lorraine Hotel next to Martin Luther King Jr. while his life slowly bled out of him. And not quite fifty years later, a black man is in the White House. Jackson’s emotions say it in a way that words like “historical” and “significant” and “monumental,” just can’t convey.

Change “could be” to “is” and you’ve got your cover for next week.

There is a saying in Ohio:

“The two most important people in Ohio are the governor and the quarterback for Ohio State.

And the governor is not number one.”

If that’s true, then Terrelle Pryor is the most important person in the state of Ohio. He is (regrettably for an Illini fan) an incredibly talented young quarterback whose collegiate and professional future seem very bright.

He is also black. Which, if you know anything about football, really shouldn’t come as that much of a surprise. There is also another young, promising black American making headlines these days. You might have heard of him.

And the people at this McCain/Palin rally in Strongsville, OH seem like they’re willing to overlook the question of race in the former case, but not the latter.

There are plenty of reasons to vote for McCain (or so I’m told) but one of them is not “because Barack Obama is a one man terror cell,” or because “he’s got the bloodlines and the name [of a terrorist].”

Call me crazy, but does anyone think for one second that republicans would be insinuating that the democratic nominee is a terrorist if he wasn’t black, or if he didn’t have an unusual name?

What would happen if Terrelle Pryor’s mother had named him Terrelle “Hussein” Pryor?

“Why can’t we all just get along?”

Rodney King said that. He said that was after the cops who beat him 3/4 of the way to death were acquitted by an all-white jury. He said that while many of the black citizens of Los Angeles were dragging white truck drivers out of their cabs and beating them 3/4 of the way as well.

It’s a pretty simple question, right? But it’s a far more complex answer.

To underscore how complex and difficult an answer to King’s question may be to find, ponder this:

Today, the first black American to be a legitimate candidate for president will once again take the national stage in the first of a series of debates. It’s pretty amazing to think that this debate will take place at Ole Miss, a university that rioted when the feds tried to integrate it. Where, not five years ago, the mascot was a fucking slave owner named Colonel Rebel.

Col. Rebel

It’s a big step forward, no doubt. But tonight also highlights how fucking backward we still are. Guess who is showing up to the debate?

These guys:

The KKK is planning to show up and distribute literature and membership applications to the crowd in and around the debate tonight, according to Time magazine. And their idiotic ramblings may not fall on deaf ears. Many of the black students at Ole Miss (now 14% of the student body) have reported acts of racism or violence perpetrated against them by white students.

In essence, Barack Obama could be the President of the United States of America, but he would still get a beer can thrown at him if went to the wrong frat party at Ole Miss?

Why can’t we all just get along? It’s a long story, Rodney.

Source: http://www.time.com/time/politics/article/0,8599,1844872,00.html?cnn=yes

http://www.cnn.com/?refresh=1

If you have been following the back and forth partisan politics of the 2008 Presidential Election, you probably found yourself reading a news story a few weeks ago about a Congressman from Georgia who referred to Barack and Michelle Obama as ‘uppity.’

Uppity.

Yeaaaaaaaah, uppity.

The best (and by best, I mean worst) part about the controversy surrounding Representative Westmoreland’s statement is that he claims to be ignorant of the FACT (yes, no debate here) that ‘uppity’ is an undoubtedly racially charged word. In fact, when asked to clarify his statement, he responded with a hearty “yeah, uppity.”

Not only does this cause me to question Westmoreland’s humanity, it also draws attention to how very little he knows about the history of his own state.

The first use of the word ‘uppity’ can be found in the Uncle Remus tales, a blatantly racist set of stories first featured in the ATLANTA CONSTITUTION (!!!!) in the 1880s. It was used to describe African-Americans (often by other African-Americans) that seemed to be striving to rise above what their critics believed to be their station in life.

Earlier, I said that the worst part about this whole situation was Westmoreland’s ignorance about the history of the word ‘uppity.’ Coming in at a close second is that most of the population of the United States didn’t know that ‘uppity’ had racial connotations either.

Luckily for me, I have the great fortune of a college education that includes an African American Studies course with Dr. James Anderson.

Although this personal tidbit may seem irrelevant, it seems to be the crux of the problem.

People in the United States today, yesterday and sadly, tomorrow, do not have a sufficient knowledge of the history of race relations. And the skies aren’t getting any sunnier.

Instead, many Americans have chosen to fight the racism that still exists by pretending that it doesn’t. As the international community saw with the rioting in France in 2005, this method isn’t exactly highly effective at dealing with cultural differences.

I honestly can’t tell you where exactly I’m going with all of this. I can tell you that claiming that racism is not still a real problem in the United States today is just as ignorant and unbelievable as anything Representative Westmoreland could possibly get caught saying.

On a lighter note…

Source: The Hill
Dictionary.com
Colbert Nation