Written By Sherwood Kohn
“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times; it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness; it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity; it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness; it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair; we had everything before us, we had nothing before us; we were all going directly to Heaven, we were all going the other way.”
– Charles Dickens, A Tale of Two Cities
How prescient. Dickens, writing in 1859, might well have described the year just past. We narrowly avoided an economic meltdown, a second Great Depression, and the unemployment rate in Carroll County, according to the Maryland Department of Labor, stayed close to 6 percent. But the national jobless rate rose to more than 10 percent.
The federal government bailed out the nation’s largest financial institutions, saving big banks, mortgage companies and Wall Street in general from disaster. But two thirds of the domestic auto industry – General Motors and Chrysler – foundered, and millions of people lost their retirement savings. Millions more lost their homes to foreclosure. Some big investment firms, regaining confidence after taxpayer money brought them back from the brink of insolvency, resumed handing out billions of dollars worth of bonuses to their executives.
The United States began pullings its troops out of Iraq, but in the face of heightened attacks, seriously considered sending more troops to Afghanistan.
Medicine made significant advances, particularly in stem cell and genetic research, but the H1N1 flu virus infection became a pandemic and health care reform seemed elusive.
President Obama was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, but much of the world continued to be afflicted with wars, terrorism and threats of nuclear and climate catastrophes.
The state of public education in the U.S. appeared to be improving after a long period of crisis and decline, but a college education currently costs more than many middle class families can afford, and a vocal segment of of the population has demonstrated a significant deterioration in basic knowledge and civility.
Locally, Carroll Magazine expanded its circulation base to 52,000, attracting more advertising and encouraging readers to come forward with stories, thereby increasing interest in its articles and stimulating further community involvement: a benevolent cycle of growth and development.
But elsewhere, publications were dying. Newspapers cut their staffs and some went out of business entirely. Conde Nast closed Gourmet Magazine, which had been in business for 68 years. Scripps halted publication of its Rocky Mountain News after 150 years of covering the Denver area. The era of print is giving way to an age of electronic media.
As Dickens observed, the state of mankind is ambiguous at best. There are good times and bad. But every New Year brings with it renewed hope and a chance to brighten things up in the coming 12 months. We remain optimistic, and we wish you the best of 2010.
