2004: Tucked into the Annals of History

2004

This is a year that can be summed up quite simply. It has not been a year so much as the year.

This has been perhaps the most active cycle of 366 days ever, and the fact that its a leap-year only adds another day of action. Whether its been games, politics, war, religion, or people, things have spun wildly out of control. A brief look at some of the phenomena that happened this year:

1) The Halo phenomena, Halo 2, the sequel to the sleeper hit Halo, was released with hype and fanfare that would have even started the PR for Lord of the Rings. Microsoft spared no expense marketing the game, and the hype over-exploded the game. (I personally thought it was decent, but a far cry from the Second Coming that was pandered to me by the Corporation). This was the first time that a console game has ever had such a big release, and Master Chief will forever hold the seat of media stardom labelled "World's first Mega-Release:

Halo 2: 2004"

2) The US election. This is a phenomenon that last happened in the 1930's. It proves that not only is it acceptable to be an UltraCon, but fashionable as well, minus the voting fraud. All the lying and cheating aside, this is going to be another mind-bogglingly stupid four years of politics. So stupid, that many people with brains will simply stop talking, because the perfect counter to intelligent debate, aka, bigotry and assumption, are being shipped out en-masse from White House headquarters.

To you, Mr. Bush, we have the sign:
"I am the Elephant. I run, you clean up after me."

3) The Religious Meltdown. This goes hand-in-hand with the political Right-Wing mess. All factions of Christianity are at an uproar with each other over gay rights, whilst silently in the background, super-conservative factions are pressing into service an agenda that would make Jesus do cartwheels. Religious dogma is subtly being injected into the governments, and our enlightened perceptions of the world are rapidly slipping backwards into the days of the Crusades, the Inquisition, and the years when the earth was flat.

4) Iraq. Speaks for itself. Political mess, religious turmoil, bloodbath, all of these are true. People are so bent on killing, oil, money, and power, that nobody even knows whos who anymore, and its just a mad dash between the USA and a desperate, sinister, fragmented enemy for whatever shards are left of the shattered nation.

5) The Quake. Boxing Day horror, a 9.0 on the Rhicter scale, and it was so powerful that it caused the earth to shift on its axis. The resulting tsunami has been responsible for over 120,000 deaths at the time of this press, but final estimate are somewhere between 500,000 and a million. And out of all of this, the "developed nations" have thrown pocket change out of their cash reserves, the US especially. Levelling a multi-billion dollar deficit on new tanks and rockets, when 1/50th of that money would have put the Red, White, and Blue as the highest contributor to the national disaster relief.

6) Media. This is the year it ends. CNN, Fox, newspapers, local. No. It doesn't exist anymore. They report what they're told, and unless you see it for yourself, it didn't really happen that way.

The example: The Levelling of Falluja. The actual military operation didn't start until almost two weeks after the media release.

More on the year later, I'll likely be typing well into 2005, which henceforth shall be known as the year of:

Terribly Swift Painful Year of Ramifications