A number of notable events occurred last year, most of them not particularly good. Here is my recap of what I consider the most significant.
The year began with the legalization of recreational marijuana in Colorado. “Ganjapreneurs” quickly sprang into action, creating a billion dollar industry around the production and distribution of traditional marijuana “doobies,” as well as novelties, such as edible marijuana products.
The state has also cashed in on pot, collecting $50 million in sales tax revenue alone.
In February, the winter Olympics in Sochi, Russia, were barely over when Vladimir Putin sent Russian troops into Ukraine and seized the Crimean Peninsula — home to Russia’s Black Sea fleet. The invasion was in response to a move by Ukraine, a former Soviet Republic, towards closer ties with the European Union.
The seizure of Crimea appears to be a fait accompli, but fighting continues in the western part of the country, where ethnic Russians seek to break away from Ukraine and align the region with Russia.
On March 8, Malaysian Airlines flight 370 disappeared from radar under mysterious conditions, setting off a massive search for the missing Boeing 777 and its 239 passengers and crew. The search focused on the Indian Ocean, but the absence of any debris leaves open the slim possibility that hijackers may have landed the plane somewhere.
On the night of April 14, the Islamic terrorist group Boko Haram raided the predominantly Christian town of Chibok in northern Nigeria and kidnapped 276 girls from a boarding school. Sixty of the girls have managed to escape. But Boko Haram claims the rest have converted to Islam and been married off.
The group’s raids on Christian communities continue; just two weeks ago they kidnapped over 100 women and children from a town near Chibok. But such events are no longer considered newsworthy in the U.S.
May began with the revelation that hundreds of veterans had died while on phony waiting lists created by V.A. administrators so they could collect bonuses for providing prompt medial care to veterans.
The month ended with President Obama’s surprise announcement that — without notifying Congress as required — he had traded five Taliban terrorists for the release of army sergeant Bowe Bergdahl. The army’s investigation into charges that Bergdahl was a deserter was completed months ago. Yet the results still have not been made public.
On June 10, the world was shocked when fighters from ISIS captured Mosul, the second largest city in Iraq, and a center of oil production. As ISIS forces advanced toward Baghdad, it became clear that (a) the Iraqi army had collapsed and (b) ISIS was a far more powerful force than previously imagined.
In July, Israel sent its troops into the Gaza strip in an effort to stop rockets being fired into Israel from Gaza by the Palestinian terrorist organization Hamas. Israel was heavily criticized by many because much of the fighting was in urban areas and an estimated 2,000 Gazans were killed, including 500 children, and 11,000 wounded. A cease-fire was declared Aug. 26, after Israel had destroyed dozens of tunnels dug by Hamas to smuggle terrorists into Israel.
On Aug. 9, Michael Brown, an 18-year-old black man, was shot and killed by a white police officer in Ferguson, Mo., following a strong-arm robbery of a convenience store. Brown was unarmed. His companion, Dorian Johnson, told news reporters that Brown was holding his hands up in the universal sign of surrender when he was shot.
The media ran with Johnson’s account, setting off protests and eventually rioting and looting in Ferguson.
Other eyewitnesses later told a grand jury investigating the shooting that Brown did not have his hands up, but was charging the officer when he was shot. Nonetheless, Johnson’s “hands up” claim became the symbol for a firestorm of protests over police shootings of young black men across the U.S.
On Sept. 9, following the beheading by ISIS of U.S. citizen Steven Sotloff, President Obama announced that the U.S. would begin bombing ISIS forces, and would send U.S. special forces back into Iraq to train and rebuild the Iraqi army.
He charged Sectary of State John Kerry with building a coalition of nations to combat ISIS. But support for such a coalition has been muted amid entangled Middle East politics, and ISIS’ reign of terror continues.
On Oct. 8, Thomas Duncan, a recently arrived Liberian national, died in a Dallas hospital from the Ebola virus. Sensationalism by the media triggered widespread fear and panic of an Ebola epidemic here. But to date, there have been only two transmissions of the Ebola virus in the U.S. Both were nurses who treated Duncan in the days before he died.
Known as “the care-givers’ disease” in Africa, Ebola is difficult to transmit until one is in the final, often fatal, stages of infection.
Republicans swept to victory in the November mid-term elections, picking up nine senate seats to take control of the Senate, and winning 246 congressional seats, to give the party the largest majority in the House in over 60 years. It remains to be seen how President Obama will interact with a Republican-dominated congress. But just two weeks after the elections, he announced a plan for granting amnesty to immigrants who have been in the U.S. illegally for five years or more. The move enraged Republicans and squashed any hope for comprehensive, bipartisan immigration reform.
The president followed this with a surprise announcement on Dec. 17 that he was restoring full diplomatic relations with Cuba. The move further enraged many Republicans, and led to more charges that the president was overstepping his constitutional authority. This sets the stage for a showdown with Congress after the newly elected republicans took their seats on Jan. 6.
Regardless of what one may think of these political events, 2014 was a very good year for investors, with the Dow Jones index closing above 18,000 for the first time ever. Drivers are thrilled with plunging oil prices that have gasoline selling for under $2 a gallon. And Southwest Louisiana is looking forward to an unprecedented economic boom driven by the low price of natural gas.
If there was an event last year that marked a turning point in history, it was probably the capture of Mosul by ISIS forces in June. With the world awash in oil due to U.S. hydrofracking, the ISIS threat set off selling by middle eastern oil states that began the decline of oil prices. Cheap oil is devastating the economies of oil-producing countries, including our two arch enemies, Russian and Iran. If the price stays low, it could mark the end of OPEC’s domination of world oil markets and redefine geo-politics.
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