…in the lousiest decade in living memory. It can’t end too soon. Sure, we had all sorts of things to be happy about. For one thing I think the ‘aughties will become known as the era personal tech came into its own: laptops, iPhones, Blackberries, and more keeping us connected to the world at large wherever we are and giving us huge leeway in personalizing the experience. But does that make up for eight nightmare years of misrule that sped us down the path to global economic collapse? Not quite. Let us hope the ‘teens will be a time of prosperity. Kind of like the ’90s. You know, we may have had a philandering dolt with dubious taste in interns as president and a pronounced gift for acting even dumber than Tiger Woods in the aftermath. But at least we wrapped up the decade with a nice fat budget surplus. And the music was better then too.
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Ken Chamberlain
December 31, 2009 at 6:29 am (UTC -6) Link to this comment
There will be good times, and there will be bad times. That's life.
JD
December 31, 2009 at 8:12 am (UTC -6) Link to this comment
although technically, the decade ends in 1 year – but why split hairs? I'd just as soon cut it short too.
Martin
December 31, 2009 at 8:28 am (UTC -6) Link to this comment
I think we do decades differently than we do centuries. I don't know of anyone who thinks 1990 was in the '80s. It's all informal anyway.I just stepped outside and the weather here in Austin is perfect! At least this horrible era is ending on a high note.
DavidCT
December 31, 2009 at 8:59 am (UTC -6) Link to this comment
I have not argument with you about the leadership for the past decade but to blame him for every thing that went wrong gives him too much credit. Leaving the foreign policy blunders aside, the root of much of the economic collapse was millions of people making poor financial decisions. You can blame banks, mortgage companies and the credit card companies but in the end it comes down to poor personal decisions. Much of this can be attributed to poor critical thinking skills. Religion is one of the biggest promoters of poor thinking skills. The promotion of faith, acceptance of authority and inner knowledge over reality are not a good toolkit for dealing with the world we actually live in. As the new year approaches it is a time to renew our commitment to resist this flawed worldview and continue to show that there are better alternatives. Wishing for a better decade – let's work to make it happen.
Sparrowhawk
December 31, 2009 at 9:09 am (UTC -6) Link to this comment
All I know is, if the world doesn't look like Back to the Future Part II by 2015, I'm gonna be pissed.I want my auto-lace-up shoes, holographic sharks and rehydrate-able pizzas, damnit.Flying cars…not so much, actually. Sounds kind of horrifying given the type of driving I see people doing in normal cars.
Sparrowhawk
December 31, 2009 at 9:11 am (UTC -6) Link to this comment
As for the whole "what's a decade question", just count the years2000 was a year, 01 was a year, etc etc.0-9 comprises 10 numbers, ten years = decade.
Martin
December 31, 2009 at 9:34 am (UTC -6) Link to this comment
DavidCT: By "him" I'm sure you're referring to Bush, whom — you will find if you look over the original post one more time — I did not in fact name. I mentioned 8 years of awful leadership, and certainly Bush was a major player in that arena. But there's plenty of blame to spread around, of course.
DavidCT
December 31, 2009 at 11:43 am (UTC -6) Link to this comment
@ MartinI realized that you were being more inclusive and should not have been singling out one person for general poor leadership. My point was about poor decisions on the part of many individuals that cannot be completely blamed on their leaders. This is not limited to the US. The level of unsupportable real estate debt is even worse in the UK. There is more than enough dumbass to go around.It is another great day in central Texas. I'll wait till next year to go back to fighting foolishness. That will have to include my own.Happy New Year!
Wired For Sound
December 31, 2009 at 12:12 pm (UTC -6) Link to this comment
Politically, the 00's were like a bad hangover from the Reagan years.
soul_biscuit
December 31, 2009 at 1:06 pm (UTC -6) Link to this comment
The problem with that, Sparrowhawk, is that if you keep reckoning decades backward, you get to years 1-9, as there is no year zero. That's 9 years. That leaves us with 200 decades and one nonade. Not a real problem, I suppose, but it's somewhat inelegant.
Guillaume
December 31, 2009 at 1:23 pm (UTC -6) Link to this comment
So I am not the only who thought the decade sucked big time. On a personal level, I did fine, but our time in history really was a giant step backwards. Hell, the new millenium started off with 9/11, easily the worst beginning for the last three millenia. I said it began with 9/11, since as I have learned in my history of literature classes, a century, a millenium or any new era does not start with an arbitrary 00 or 01, but with an event that will change history. We can safely say that the last decade saw irrational thoughts and fanatism dominate public life. Let's hope secular humanism will make a come back in the Western world at least.
Sunstreaked
December 31, 2009 at 2:39 pm (UTC -6) Link to this comment
I've recently found The Atheist Experience – first on YouTube and then this blog.My eyes are now permanently crossed from reading and watching so much over the past few days!Wishing all of you a very Happy New Year. Thank you all for all you're doing!
Martin
December 31, 2009 at 2:43 pm (UTC -6) Link to this comment
I'm sure a lot of us could stand to be a little less foolish. I, as much as anyone.
Martin
December 31, 2009 at 2:44 pm (UTC -6) Link to this comment
Glad to have you, Sunstreaked.
Sunstreaked
December 31, 2009 at 3:37 pm (UTC -6) Link to this comment
Thanks, Martin.Grinning here – let me clarify something if I'm gonna post here. My pic is not me, but something I participate in elsewhere. I'm also a she, not a he, as the pic implies.Just thought I'd throw that out as I always have to explain it at some point!
Wired For Sound
December 31, 2009 at 6:06 pm (UTC -6) Link to this comment
Well, the 00's gave us YouTube, which gave The Atheist Experience (among others) global exposure, so the decade didn't completely suck.It's kind of frightening to think that millions of people probably never even heard an atheist argument prior to YouTube. There's no going back now, thank Zeus.
Jennifer Juniper
January 2, 2010 at 1:48 pm (UTC -6) Link to this comment
Not sure I'm with on the music front…
Ing
January 5, 2010 at 8:49 pm (UTC -6) Link to this comment
"the root of much of the economic collapse was millions of people making poor financial decisions. You can blame banks, mortgage companies and the credit card companies but in the end it comes down to poor personal decisions. Much of this can be attributed to poor critical thinking skills."And the big stinking fertilizer that let those roots take hold was Clinton being a dumb-ass and removing the restrictions that prevented people from being insanely stupid.