2005: The Year in Review

The first of the `year in review' type articles have begun appearing in our national newspapers, and Mr Minotaur and I realised just what an extraordinary year it has been. For John Howard, it's possibly been the greatest year of his political life (a Federal Opposition MP I recently talked to summed up the year in one word: `Demoralising'). However, as David Marr suggests in his beautifully written summary of the year in today's Sydney Morning Herald, it could well be Howard's Indian summer. Despite Howard's strong support, think how quickly and without warning Bob Carr's considerable political capital ran out. Glen Milne - hardly a strident Howard critic - makes a similar warning in an intriguing article for The Australian today.

But back to 2005. Would you believe, that it was the year in which we saw ...

• The aftermath of the Asian tsunami, which killed over 300,000 people


• The retirement of Mark Latham from the leadership of the Federal Labor Party and from politics


• The resignation of NSW Treasurer Michael Egan


• The return of Kim Beazley to leadership of the Labor Party


• The Sea King helicopter crash in Nias


• Guantanamo Bay detainee Mamdouh Habib released


• The Macquarie Fields riots


• Thousands take to the streets in several protests against the industrial relations changes


• DIMIA disgrace itself with the Cornelia Rau and Vivian Solon scandals.


• The resignation of NSW Premier Bob Carr and Morris Iemma's succession as leader of the NSW Labor Party


• The discovery of Tony Abbott's `long lost son', Daniel O'Connor - who soon afterwards became the world's luckiest young man, when a DNA test swiftly revealed that Abbott was in fact not his father.
  
• The resignation of John Anderson as Deputy Prime Minister and Nationals leader.


• The London terrorist bombings


• The identity of `Deep Throat', the informant that lifted the lid on the Watergate scandal, finally revealed as FBI agent Mark Felt


• The deaths of Pope John Paul II, Joe Bjelke-Petersen, and Yasser Arafat.


• The disastrous handling of New Orleans' Hurricane Katrina and the deaths of several hundred impoverished residents


• 80,000 Pakistanis and Indians die in an earthquake in the Kashmir region


• A second wave of bombings in Bali which killed 23 people


• The ousting of John Brogden in favour of Peter Debnam, and Brogden's subsequent suicide attempt


• The Maroubra, Marrickville, Macquarie Fields and Werriwa by-elections


• The defeat of the Liberal Party in the Pittwater by-election


• The Cross City Tunnel shermozzle


• The execution of Australian citizen Van Tuong Nguyen in Singapore


• The passage of legislation enshrining VSU, the full sale of Telstra, industrial relations changes, Welfare to Work ... and all the rest ...


• 5,000 people riot on Cronulla Beach over tensions between local Anglo-Australians and Muslims.

That's quite an extraordinary list, but I'm sure there's some things I've forgotten ... any suggestions?