Top 10 most significant events of the past 20 years

[Rocknrule]

A 25 year anniversary thing in USAToday got me thinking: what do you think the top 10 most significant events of the past 10 years were?

My list:

1. 9/11 (obviously)
2. Iraq war
3. 2000 election
4. Clinton impeachment
5. O.J. Simpson
6. Oklahoma City
7. Katrina
8. Virginia Tech
9. Asian Tsunami
10. (undecided between Beslan massacre, Waco, Columbine, Rodney King, 7/7, 3/11, or DC Sniper shootings)

[BushOut06]

1. A few more things

Hurricane Andrew
Global warming (although don't know if that qualifies for an event)
Collapse of USSR
Bosnian/Serbian/Croatia/Kosovo conflict

Don't know if I'd really put OJ on that list, or even Virginia Tech for that matter. Sure, those were huge moments for the US, but I don't think either of those really had any effect on the rest of the world.

[Gidney N Cloyd]

2. I'd lump 1, 2, 3 and 7 into one category and call it Bush Giant Clusterfuck.

[valerief]

3. 10 years or 20? The msg body varies from the subject line. Also,

in the U.S. or world? Most significant or just "bad" things? The personal computer has been very significant over the past 20 years.

[Bucky]

4. The post Rodney King LA riots is a much bigger deal than VA Tech

Not to belittle the loss of life, of course.

But placing the 2004 Tsunami lower on the same scale with the OJ Simpson trial seems a little unbalanced. I think the coming housing bubble-pop will shape life in the coming decade far more than the Murrah Building bombing.

The invasion of Iraq goes on the top of the list, I think. This choice changed what should have been a police action in Afghanistan and a few other scattered al-Qaeda hotspots into a global meltdown of the world's only superpower.

Speaking of global meltdowns... where is the degradation of the arctic and antarctic icecaps on your list? That alone is worth any other ten events you could put on this list.

[riverdeep]

18. Yeah, terrorism is just a blip in history

compared to environmental collapse. But that doesn't happen in a nice bite-size 'event', so it escapes notice.

[indepat]

5. The felonious five's felonious (imo) decision in December 2000 installing junior as our

decider (#3) gave us the Constitution shredding in the aftermath of #1 and the cover for #2. May all five ponder holistically the consequences of their politically-corrupted decision every remaining day of their lives on this earth.

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

6. God, I don't know.

1. Rwandan Genocide
2. Darfur Genocide
3. Iraq Genocide
4. Bosnia/Kosovo etc. Genocide
5. Asian Tsunami
6. Collapse of communism
7. Chechnya
8. Soviet & American wars in Afghanistan
9. Theft of elections, U.S.
10. African famines in Somalia, Ethiopia.

Things like V. Tech and O.J. are utterly insignificant in comparison. 9-11 has got to be the most overrated event in the history of ever.

[uppityperson]

9. Thank you bornagain.

Very much so. OJ was distraction, VTech nasty but an isolated incident, but 9/11 counts since it has been used for Iraq occupation/no habeas corpus/etc/etc.

[HereSince1628]

7. I'd put pardons & commutations of the Iran-Contra Players

up on that list. That was a significant slip down the slope to the disintegration of constitutional law in the US.

I'd also consider the Republican Contract On America on the list, too. It's the basis of renewed class warfare for the past 15 years aimed at crushing the social reforms of the New Deal and the Great Society in order to bring about a nation under Neo-Liberal Economic Ideology of the late 1920's and early 1930's.


I'm not sure Clinton's impeachment means diddly. Now, FEAR of impeachment by Pelosi that will be one of the great non-events of the 21st century...and it's likely to lead to the reorganization of the United States as a Bolivarian phalangist state modelled on Chile under Pinochet.

[book_worm]

8. O.J. ?

that was just a media circus in my opinion, not really significant except for the families of the victims.

[Adenoid_Hynkel]

13. I'll agree it was significant in that it marked the death of journalism

the second CNN went with gave-to-gavel coverage of the trial, the tradition of murrow and cronkite was lost

[BlueJazz]

10. Even if we go back only 20 years ...the biggest "Screw the People" thing was..

..Ronald Reagan.

[warren pease]

11. A few more...

The ongoing democratization of Latin America, despite BushCo's best efforts to support and ruling class assholes.

The rise of China as a dominant economic and military power.

The formation of the EU and its growing influence as a social-democratic counterweight to the US privatization model.

US media consolidation and corporatization, and the role that's played in driving the country toward fascism by their uncritical reporting of and disgusting cheerleading for this insane administration for 6+ years.

The ever-widening gap between the rich and the rest, and the potential for violent "redistribution" that gap creates.

Related to the above, the successful program of wealth redistribution from bottom to top that's been the dominant but unspoken theme of the US tax code and military budgets since long before the past 20 years.

The massive deficits, falling dollar, sub-prime lending, disappearing middle class and how they all combine to turn the US into a third-world debtor nation.

The Bush Doctrine, which reserves to the US the "right" to use nukes as first strike weapons and has contributed further to the perception of the US as the world's most dangerous and out-of-control rogue state.

The national impeachment debate and its exposure of congress and its so-called leaders as either grossly incompetent, unacceptably craven or criminally complicit in the crimes of the Bush administration.

Oh, and anything Paris Hilton or Lindsey what's-her-ass do supercede any or all of the above in relative importance...


wp

[uppityperson]

12. Berlin Wall beats out a lot of those, unless you mean strictly recently affecting USA

[hang a left]

14. Mine:

Whittier Earthquake 1987
My sons being born
San Fernando Earthquake 1993
Divorcing my first husband
The Laguna Beach Fires 1991
El Nino 1994
Princess Diana's Death
Clinton Impeachment
Selection 2000
9-11

The life of a beach dwelling DFH.

[JCMach1]

15. Note, this is the American List Apparently in the OP

There was no..

No 2nd Intifada
No Rabin Assassination
No War in Kosovo
No Rwanda
No Darfur

Should we go on...

[WinkyDink]

16. SElection 2000 X 10. PERIOD.

[shimbo]

17. End Of Cold War

Internet
End of Cold War / Berlin Wall / Russian Collapse
911
Nasdaq Crash
Stem Cells
Tiananmen Square Uprising
Tsunami of 2004
Rise of China in manufacturing
Rise of India in outsourcing
Iraq War

[Donald Ian Rankin]

19. Is this "for America" or worldwide?

If it's worldwide then I think that, of your list, only numbers 1,2 and perhaps 9 ought to feature, and 2 is arguably a direct consequence of 1.

[Rocknrule]

20. I should've clarified it's for America mostly

Otherwise, Beslan, 7/7, 3/11, and other things like Diana's death would be higher on the list

[LanternWaste]

21. How many is a brazillion?

Getting asked to show a receipt at Circuit City...

:hide:

(I couldn't help myself....)

[LeftishBrit]

22. Those that occur to me:

(1) 9-11
(2) Iraq war
(3) Rwanda genocide
(4) Tsunami
(5) End of Soviet Union
(6) Good Friday Agreement re Northern Ireland (I may be biased as it's local for me)
(7) Mandela's release from prison and end of apartheid in South Africa
(8) Global warming/ Kyoto
(9) Tianmen Square
(10) Fraudulent 'election' of Bush 2000


But the more one lists, the more come to mind. I didn't include Darfur as it is ongoing,
but so is the Iraq War. Then there is Bosnia; on the positive side, establishment of
democracy in some former South American dictatorships; and much else. I'd have included
the end of Thatcherism in Britain, only it didn't really happen.