Even though he came in a close second in the popular vote, George W.
Bush wins enough electoral votes to become president, and the term
"hanging chad" becomes a household phase.
Florida also grabbed the spotlight earlier in the year during the
Elian Gonzalez custody dispute.
Other top news stories of the year included the bombing of the USS
Cole; soaring oil prices; the Firestone tire recall; the court-ordered breakup of Microsoft; the mapping of the human genetic code; the much-ballyhooed arrival of the Year 2000; the toppling of the Milosevic regime in Yugoslavia; and the multi-million-dollar verdict against the tobacco industry.
The 43rd Annual Grammy Awards sees U2's "Beautiful Day" take
top honors as record and song of the year; while the Baha Men snag the
best dance track trophy for "Who Let The Dogs Out."
SSTFY does "The Pajama Game" and
holds a special 35th Anniversary Reunion Party, drawing hundreds of
alumi from around the country.
The September 11th attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon and the ensuing war on terrorism was the world’s leading news story in
2001 -- a watershed event with international repercussions.
Other top stories of the year included the post-9/11 anthrax scares,
the recession that hit the United States; the Bush inauguration; the execution of Timothy McVeigh for bombing the federal building in Oklahoma City; the
escalation of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict; Vermont Sen. Jim Jeffords' decision to quit the Republican Party and become an independent, tilting control of the U.S. Senate to the Democrats; the power crisis in California; and the beginning of a drought along the East Coast.
U2 strikes gold for a second straight year, winning four Grammies for
their album All That You Can't Leave Behind; newcomer R&B
artist Alicia Keys takes home five trophies for her debut album Songs
in A Minor.
In January, President Bush cast Iraq as part of an "axis of evil" (with Iran and North Korea). The war of words escalated in subsequent months: The White House called for a regime change policy and accused Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein of developing chemical, biological and nuclear weapons.
From the Middle East through the Indonesian archipelago, terror left
its horrific mark across the world in 2002. In Israel, violence raged
when a series of Palestinian terror attacks and Israeli retaliation in
the West Bank and Gaza created a circle of death and destruction. The
bloodiest terror of the year occurred in Bali, Indonesia, where more
than 180 people, about half of them Australians, died after a van laden
with explosives and another, smaller bomb blew up outside a packed
nightclub; al Qaeda operatives took credit for the attacks. The siege of
a Moscow theater by Chechen militants -- and Russia's use of a narcotic
gas in an attempt to free hostages -- ended with 170 deaths.
Enron, Arthur Andersen, Merrill Lynch, WorldCom, Johnson & Johnson, Global Crossing, Citigroup, Kmart: The list reads like a who's who of what were once some of the United States' most well-known and well-respected businesses. But these and several other entities came under fire in a wave of embarrassing and, in most cases, self-destructive corporate scandals.
Allegations of illicit sex and molestation and widespread cover-ups rocked the Roman Catholic Church. The Boston Archdiocese was at the epicenter, but the crisis affected parishes from Los Angeles to New York and caught the attention of Pope John Paul II.
Singer/Songwriter Norah Jones plowed through the 45th Annual Grammy
Awards show, taking home five of the top trophies including Record and
Song of the Year ("Don't Know Why"), Album of the Year, Best
New Vocalist and Best Female Pop Vocal Performance.
After months of heated debate about how to pressure Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein, especially on the issue of his alleged weapons of mass destruction program, the U.S.-led coalition on March 19 attacked the Middle Eastern country. The ensuing military campaign included the large-scale aerial bombing of Baghdad dubbed "shock and awe," the controversial rescue of POW Army Pfc. Jessica Lynch and the fall of Baghdad. By summer and into the fall,
President George W. Bush and his chief international ally, British Prime Minister Tony Blair, fended off criticism about a lack of recovered chemical, biological or nuclear weapons and continued bloodshed. But they, and much of the world, rejoiced in December after Saddam's capture.
Sixteen days after the space shuttle Columbia launched from Kennedy Space Center on its 28th mission, NASA lost contact with the spacecraft just minutes before its scheduled Florida landing. Seven astronauts -- six Americans and one Israeli -- died when the shuttle broke apart in what one witness described as a "ball of fire" about 38 miles above the Earth.
In early 2003, Californians pointed fingers as their state -- one of the nation's most powerful, economically and politically -- struggled with a $38 billion budget deficit and a continuing energy crisis. Republicans set their sights on
and managed to oust Democratic Gov. Gray Davis. One of Hollywood's own took Davis' place -- bodybuilder-turned-actor
Arnold Schwarzenegger.
As many as 60 million Americans and Canadians lost electricity August 14 in one of the biggest blackouts in U.S. history. Outages stretched from Ohio through much of Pennsylvania, Vermont, New York, Michigan and the Canadian province of Ontario. Investigators later traced the outages to three power line failures in Ohio.
"Clocks" by Coldplay took Record of the Year honors at the
46th Annual Grammy Awards show, while the trophy for Song of the year
went to "Dance With My Father" by Luther Vandross and Richard
Marx. OutKast's "Speakerboxxx" was named Album of the
Year, Evanescence was named Best New Vocalist, the Best Female Pop Vocal
Performance award went to Christina Aguilera, Justin Timberlake took the
trophy for Best Male Pop Vocal Performance and George Harrison was
honored posthumously with the award for Best Pop Instrumental Performance.
An intense race for the presidency led to the re-election of President Bush over Democratic challenger John Kerry. As in 2000, the election came down to one state. This time, it was Ohio's 20 electoral votes that put Bush over the top. Unlike 2000, Bush also won the popular vote with 51 percent to Kerry's 48 percent. The election further tipped the balance of power decisively into the Republican corner in Washington as the party won larger advantages in the Senate and House.
Insurgents in Iraq used car, suicide and roadside bombings to chip away at U.S. and coalition efforts to reconstruct the country and institute the nation's first government since the fall of Saddam Hussein's regime. Terrorist and insurgent groups took up the grisly practice of kidnapping and beheading foreign hostages, bidding to compel countries to leave the U.S.-led coalition. U.S. troops mounted an offensive in the fall to retake control of towns, such as Falluja, widely seen as hotbeds of the insurgency.
Terror attacks killed hundreds in 2004. Nearly 200 people died in explosions that struck train stations in Madrid in March, attacks later blamed on al Qaeda. In Russia, Chechen rebels seized control of an elementary school and took hostages. After two days, the siege ended bloodily with more than 300 adults and children dead.
The year ended with one of the most horrific natural disasters in
recorded history: a 9.0 earthquake in the Indian Ocean that spawned
devastating tsunamis that killed at least 250,000 people from Thailand
to Somalia. Tsunamis left hundreds of thousands more without homes,
food, fresh water or power and struck both impoverished villages and
rich tourist sites, sparing few areas in the waves' path.
For 86 years, and especially since the club traded then-pitcher and
future slugger Babe Ruth, Boston Red Sox fans have watched their team
fall short of a championship only to watch their bitter rivals, the New
York Yankees, rack up 26 titles. Finally, in the fall, they had very
good reason to celebrate. The club became the first in baseball history
to rally from a 3-0 series deficit to win the American League pennant,
the comeback made that much sweeter given they steamrolled the Yankees
to do it. Boston then went on to win the World Series, sweeping the St.
Louis Cardinals, who had ended the regular season with the best record
in Major League Baseball.
