The 90's: The Last Great Decade? Part 3: Politically Incorrect

Part Three: Politically Incorrect

1) Bill Clinton's Sexual Harassment Trial, Monica Lewinsky and Impeachment
--My daughter, whose name is Monica, was 3 years old when all of this hit the fan.  She was confused as to why her name kept getting mentioned on TV.

--"It depends on what the meaning of 'is', is."

2) Viral Horror
--The Blair Witch Project

3) Tech Boom
--Pixar
--Steve Jobs returns to Apple after a 10 year absence.

4) Hard Drugs
--Viagra

5) Public Enemy No.1
--Osama Bin Laden attacks two U.S. embassies.  On August 7, 1998 truck bombs explode in the U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania.

--Clinton retaliates, but is accused of trying to sidetrack the American people from the Lewinsky scandal.

6) Sit Down Com
--Seinfeld rules the American airwaves.  It was the biggest hit of the decade.

--I'm not surprised, since it is one of my all-time favorite shows.

7) The West Wing
--A liberal's fantasy White House

8) The Famous Royal Couple Splits & Diana's Death
--Princess Diana does a tell all interview, which is unheard of in British royalty.

--After going against convention, Princess Diana goes on to become one of the most loved women in the world.

--The world is in shock and mourning when Diana is killed in a car accident.  I will never forget that day, because the footage was never ending on the TV.  Her funeral is watched by 2.5 billion people.

9) World Trade Organization
--An anti-globalization protest of the WTO in Seattle lasted for 5 days and caused $29 million in damages.

10) The Shooting at Columbine High School
--I will never forget this day, it brought tears to my eyes.  Dylan Klebold and Eric Harris murdered 14 students and 1 teacher.

11) The Internet Bubble
--Theglobe.com is a sensation overnight.  Everyone goes crazy, but then theglobe.com isn't making a profit, so their stock plummets.  The bubble bursts and people lose a lot of $.

12) Y2K--The Millenium Bug
--Many people were genuinely freaked out about this and really thought the world was going to come to an end.  People stocked up on food and water, etc... I figured if anything really bad happened I'd be dead anyway, so why be psycho about it.  I remember that I even forgot about the panic until the day after New Years, and then I realized I was right about not freaking out.

Previously:
Part One: Great Expectations
Part Two: Friends & Enemies

The 90's: The Last Great Decade?--Part 2: Friends & Enemies

Part Two: Friends and Enemies

1) Waco: David Koresh vs. the Government
--The ATF, then the FBI tried to enter David Koresh's Branch Davidian compound.  They had 305 guns and there were allegations of child abuse.  When the ATF tried to raid the compound 4 ATF agents were killed and 6 Branch Davidians.

--The FBI then engaged in a 51 day standoff that ended on April 19th, 1993.  The FBI went in, a fire was started (most likely by Koresh) and 50 adults and 25 children died, including Koresh.  This initiated a lot of anti-government sentiment, which contributed in part to the OKC bombing 2 years later on the exact same day.

--Amazingly, Janet Reno, who oversaw this fiasco, was never held accountable.

2) X-Files: The nation's obssession over aliens and ufos.

3) Tonya Harding vs. Nancy Kerrigan
--On January 6th, 1994 someone attacked Olympic skater Nancy Kerrigan by whacking her in the knee.  It was discovered that Harding's husband and bodyguard were responsible.  Harding has always denied that she knew anything about the attack beforehand, but many believe that she master minded the whole thing.

4) Jerry Springer and the rise of Trashy Tv Talk Shows
--Jerry Springer went from politics, to news to hosting one of the nation's trashiest talk shows.  The sad part was the world was captivated and his ratings skyrocketed.  He was called the "Mayor of Dysfunction Junction".

5) Black Hawk Down
--I have researched and talked a lot about this event.  It is one of Bill Clinton's many failures which led to Osama Bin Laden's view of the U.S. as a "paper tiger", and ultimately led to 9/11.

6) Medicated America
--Actresses such as Roseanne admit to using prescription drugs for depression and anxiety.  The world learns of a new set of drugs known as SSRI's.

7) The rise of Rap music and Rappers

8) Oklahoma City Bombing
--On April 19, 1995, exactly 2 years after the Waco siege, Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichols planted a car bomb by the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building.  The bombing killed 168 people and injured 600.  Before 9/11 this was the largest terrorist attack in the U.S.

9) The rise of Rush Limbaugh and conservative talk radio
--One of the best things about the 90's.

10) Bill Clinton and the Government Shutdown
--Congress led by Newt Gingrich and the President got into a battle and the government shut down for 27 days at the end of 1995 and the beginning of 1996.  As usual, the media made the Republicans out to be the bad guys, and the Republicans caved.

11) Mobsters John Gotti vs. Sammy the Bull Gravano
--Gotti is the head of the Gambino crime family, and is a media whore who becomes popular until he is brought down by his second in command, Sammy the Bull Gravano.

12) New York City is rescued by Rudy Giuliani
--When Giuliani is elected as Mayor of New York City, crime was at an unbelievable high of  2,200 murders a year.  He implemented a no tolerance policy.  The # of murders per year was 2, 245 in 1990, and by 2010 it had dropped to 536.

--Two very popular Tv shows took place in New York City in the 90's.  Seinfeld is regarded as pre-Giuliani New York City, and Friends is post-Rudy.

13) Howard Stern--Father of a VERY Dysfunctional Family

14) Homosexuality comes out of the closet
--Roseanne and Ellen have gay people coming out of the closet.  The horrific murder of Matthew Shephard who was gay also takes place and gives rise to hate crimes laws.

15) Macarena song takes the country by storm
--Everyone is dancing the macarena.  It helped bring out Latino singers such as Jennifer Lopez and Ricky Martin.

16) The Internet
--Who knew when this was invented in 1991 (not by Al Gore ;-)) how much it would change our daily lives.  There was confusion on how to use it until Google comes on the scene and gives people an easy way to search the internet.

17) The OJ Simpson car chase, trial and verdict
--91% of Americans watched the verdict live.  It was the country's own version of a soap opera.  And one of the biggest miscarriages of justice.  The message was, if you have enough $, you can get away with murder.

Previously:
Part One: Great Expectations

The 90's: The Last Great Decade? Part 1: Great Expectations

--The National Geographic Channel did a short mini-series entitled, The 90's: The Last Great Decade?  It has 3 parts, so I thought I'd do a post on each part and give a rundown.

--Since, the 90's was when I entered adulthood, I remember almost everything that is mentioned very well.  In many cases, I remember where I was and what I was doing when the events unfolded.  Yet, I did learn some new things, because for the first 3 years of the 90's I was in college and paying no attention to the outside world.

Some of the contributors who were interviewed as part of the series:
-Rob Lowe (he narrates all 3 episodes)
-Newt Gingrich
-Tucker Carlson
-Jerry Springer
-Colin Powell
-P.J. O'Rourke
-Monica Lewinsky
-Detective Tom Lange
-Matthew Perry
--Roseanne 

Part One: Great Expectations

1) Gulf War
--On August 2, 1990 Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait.  CNN was the first news organization to air live from Baghdad when a war had started.  Kuwait is liberated.

2) Humvees and Hummers
--The humvee got a lot of good press from the war.  The humvee led to the creation of the hummer.  Arnold Schwarzenegger ended up buying 2 of the first ones.

3) Roseanne
--She credits herself in this series as being the one who got President Bill Clinton elected.  I'm not sure thats true, but even if it was, it definitely isn't something to brag about ;-).

4) Clinton's Election
--I had all 4 of my kids while Clinton was in office.  It was because of his presidency that I woke up and started paying attention to politics and current events.  I was outraged by his lack of morality.

This series credits Clinton and his team with inventing the spin machine for how to get out of tough spots, and Clinton had many.  James Carville was the leader and can probably be credited for keeping Clinton from being impeached.

5) Vanilla Ice and the Hip Hop Culture
--Vanilla Ice had a quick rise to fame, even though it didn't last long.

6) The Fresh Prince of Bel-air
--The series credited Will Smith and cast on the Fresh Prince with giving a new and better image of the black man.

--My oldest son used to get very excited when this show came on and would "dance" in his high chair to the theme song.  The show always came on when I was fixing supper.

7) Rodney King
--This was an event that I didn't know much about because I was in college when it happened.  And while I was outraged about about the Rodney King beating, and think the police shouldn't have been acquitted, it doesn't excuse or justify what happened afterwards.

--I was horrified as I watched the footage of black men beating and almost killing Reginald Denny.  Denny's skull was fractured 91 times.  Titus Murphy was one of the four people who rescued Denny and got him to the hospital.  He was a true hero.

--The riots ended up killing 55 people and causing $1 billion in damages.  How is killing innocent people and ruining businesses in your own neighborhood going to fix police brutality?

8) Clarence Thomas
--There are few things that outrage me as much as Anita Hill being used by liberals to try and destroy Clarence Thomas's life, character and chance to be a Supreme Court Justice.  Thank goodness she wasn't successful, but it bothers me to this day that many still mistakenly believe he was guilty.    Anita Hill is a disgrace to all the women who have been genuinely sexually harrassed.

--And the U.S. is fortunate that Thomas is on the supreme court, he is an honorable man.

9) Thelma and Louise
--A rogue movie in the 90's.

10) The Rise of the Bimbo
--Anna Nicole Smith got a breast enlargement and it led to a huge rise in women getting the surgery.

--She was one of the first people to become famous for no rhyme or reason, but many would follow.

11) The Decade of the Internet
--The world wide web transforms people's lives.

--Bill Gates makes computers accessible and affordable for everyone.  By 2013, Gates is the world's #1 philanthropist.

--In the 80's, there was a movie called, Revenge of the Nerds.  In the 90's, the movie actually happens.

12) Generation X
--Nirvana is one of the many voices of Generation X.  Kurt Cobain commits suicide.

13) Reality TV
--The Real World launches a new genre of TV, reality TV.

--Court TV airs the Jeffrey Dahmer trial live.

14) The 1993 World Trade Center Bombing
--It was treated as a criminal justice matter and the men who were responsible were arrested.  It should've been seen as an act of war.