Happy New Year!

Happy New Year Everyone! As of right now I have no special plans for tonight. How about you what are your plans for the big evening?

As we say so long to this year and the start of a new decade lets look back at some of the big stories for the year and the decade.

The big story has to be the 9/11 attack and the war that came after the attack. The war is still on going in both Iraq and Afghanistan. There seems to be little end in site. The attack and war started under past President George W. Bush. President Bush was the 43rd of this country and served two terms 2001-2009. He was the second President with the name Bush. His Father George H.W. Bush also served as Vice President and President of the United States.

Now as we move in to 2010 the current President Barack Obama is faced with running the war. A war he campaigned to be against. Yet now he is supporting the war by sending more troops. He has upset many of his supporters.

That is about the biggest national story.


The Other story big story of intestrest has to be the election of Barack Obama. Some one I did not support and his numbers have fallen faster then any Presidents. Yes even faster then President Bush's. Obama and the media are claiming he is the first black President elected. He is not he is the first Muslim elected President.

Local story's include a year that is seeing three city councilors not run for re-election, the most I can remember in some time. The three that elected not to run again, Gary Kruase, Gary Eckonburg ( who was appointed after Rienhart won another seat), Greg Gilbert.

Gilbert also is leaving the council after serving 12 years (3 terms). He lost two bids to become Mayor in that same time frame. Gilbert was a councilor that was always endorsed by the AFL-CIO.

Speaking of the council this years election was a heated one. It saw in the final four two men and two women looking to fill two seats. In the end both of the men where elected to the council Dan Hartman and Jim Stauber who will be serving his third term. The at-large was heated because of a number of issues that came up. Beth Olson on of the candidates had her background looked in to. It found that she was arrested at the visit of President Bush. She also is part of the gay community that was an issue for some people. That included local talk show host. The issue did not matter to me.

The other women Becky Hall how has ran a couple of other times and ran good campaign ran a poor one this year. Hall was the big conservative in the race and she finished fourth in both the primary and the general election. I don't believe her problem was her politics for the most but how she ran the campaign. Some also thing a web site hurt her. The web site Duluth Citizens Blog, http://www.duluthcitizensblog.com/ .

Another story was the election Mayor Don Ness who used to serve as Jim Oberstars right hand man here in Duluth. Ness is a young man who most consider the front runner for Oberstar's seat when he decided to retire. I only consider this to be true if Oberstar retires in the next couple of years.

This blog Duluth Politics has 1,233 post to date sense it started in 2005. The biggest year of post came back in 2006 when I had 404 post this year we are getting close to 330post. Next year I am hoping to post a lot too.

As I have said many times I am very proud of this blog and how many readers it has. I wish more people would take part in posting but blogs are much like radio talk shows. Only a small number of people post. On that note if there is something you would like me to talk about here send me an email duluthneedshelp@yahoo.com . I have a couple of ideas for early next year.

This year saw a lot of post about Mayor Ness, the Duluth City Council, unions and more here on the DP.

I look forward to next year and again Happy New Year!