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Yasser Arafat
Arafat is the Palestinian statesman who was the chairman of the Palestine Liberation Organization. -
PLO
The Palestine Liberation Organization with the purpose of the "liberation of Palestine" through armed struggle, with much of its violence aimed at Israeli civilians -
California v. Bakke
This Supreme Court case ruled that a university's use of racial "quotas" in its admissions process was unconstitutional, but a school's use of "affirmative action" to accept more minority applicants was constitutional in some circumstances -
Sandinistas
The Sandinistas were part of a leftist coalition that overthrew the Nicaraguan dictatorship of Anastasia Somoza and attempted to install a socialist economy. -
Religious Fundamentalism
Religious fundamentalists were people who made a return to fundamental principles, had strict adherence to those principles, and often by intolerance of other views -
Moral Majority
Moral Majority was a political group made up of fundamentalist Christians -
Saddam Hussein
Hussein was Iraq's tyrant leader at the time of the War on Terror -
Supply-Side Economics
Reagan's idea to cut taxes and government spending to stimulate economic growth via private enterprise. -
Trickle Down Economics
AKA the dumbest idea ever, the trickle down system claims cutting taxes on the rich will lead to more overall prosperity. Yes, of course, because if we give the rich bigger meals, they'll totally give the poor more scraps. -
Ronald Reagan
40th POTUS who believed in tax cuts and government deregulation; also believed gays should die -
Economic Recovery Tax Act
Cut income tax by 25% -
PACTO Strike
Resulted in about 11,000 air traffic controllers being fired -
Sandra Day O'Connor
First woman to be appointed to the Supreme Court -
Boland Amendment
Forbid the CIA or any other such intelligence agency from spending money to support the Contras directly or indirectly -
Beirut Bombings
This was a series of suicide truck bombings during the Lebanese Civil War that caused many U.S. military losses -
SDI
Otherwise known is the Strategic Defense Initiative, this was Reagan's intent to pursue a high technology missile defense system which was referred to as "Star Wars" -
Geraldine Ferraro
First female vice president candidate -
Iran-Contra Affair
This was a scandal that erupted after the Reagan administration sold weapons to Iran in hopes of freeing American hostages in Lebanon. The money from the arms sales was used to aid the Contras, who were anti-Communist guerrillas, in Nicaragua, even though Congress had prohibited this assistance. -
Iran Contra Affair
This was a scandal that erupted after the Reagan administration sold weapons to Iran in hopes of freeing American hostages in Lebanon. The money from the arms sales was used to aid the Contras, who were anti-Communist guerrillas, in Nicaragua, even though Congress had prohibited this assistance. -
Mikhail Gorbachev
Gorbachev was the head of the Soviet Union from 1985 to 1991. His liberalization effort improved relations with the West, but he lost power after his reforms led to the collapse of Communist governments in eastern Europe -
"Tear down this wall"
A famous speech given by Reagan in front of Brandenburg Gate regarding communism and Soviet influence in Germany -
INF Agreement
Gorbachev & Reagan agreed to remove and destroy all intermediate-range missiles -
"Read my lips, no new taxes"
This was the phrase said by George H.W. Bush as he accepted the Republican nomination, stating that he would not tax the American people further -
Tienanmen Square
Chinese Democrats were suppressed by the PLA. There is the famous video of the man standing in front of the tanks. -
Panama Invasion
Bush sent U.S. troops to Panama to take leader Manuel Noriega from power in order to stop him from using his country as a drug pipeline to the U.S. -
George H.W. Bush
42nd POTUS who followed many of Reagan's ideals -
Fall Of The Berlin Wall
The fall of the wall marked an end to Soviet influence in the country and allowed for Germany to become reunited -
"Ethnic Cleansing"
Slobodan Milosevic carried out his ethnic cleansing and war against NATO -
Nuclear Proliferation
The spread of nuclear weapons to nations who do not possess them -
Lech Wałęsa
He co-founded Solidarity, the Soviet Bloc's first independent trade union -
Persian Gulf War
After Iraq 's invasion of Kuwait, the US subsequently invaded Iraq to liberate Kuwait -
Glasnost & Perestroika
Glasnost was openness to end political repression and move toward a greater political freedom for Soviet citizens, and Perestroika was the restructuring of the soviet economy by introducing free-market practices -
Boris Yeltsin
Helped end the USSR as President of the Russian Republic -
Americans With Disabilities Act
This act banned discrimination against the disabled in employment and mandated easy access to all public and commercial buildings -
Start I and II
Start I was when the U.S. and the U.S.S.R. signed this treaty in July 1991 which called for a reduction in the number of long-range nuclear warheads and bombs held by each country by about one-third over a period of seven years. Start II was
the Strategic Arms Reduction Talks; it occurred in 1993 through 1994 between the U.S. and the U.S.S.R. to reduce the active deployment of ICBM's -
Breakup Of The Soviet Union
The Soviet Baltic republics of Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania declared their independence -
Clarence Thomas
He was nominated by George H. W. Bush to be on the Supreme Court in 1991, and shortly after was accused of sexual harassment by Anita Hill -
Ross Perot
He brought a record voting turnout and had the strongest showing for a third party candidate since Teddy Roosevelt -
Welfare Reform
Made deep cuts in welfare grants and required able-bodied welfare recipients to find employment -
West Bank and Gaza Strip
The Oslo Accords was the 1993 agreement between Israel and the Palestine Liberation Organization, or PLO, in which Israel agreed that the PLO could govern the West Bank and Gaza Strip in exchange for PLO recognition of Israel's right to exist. -
The Internet
The Internet was originally created in the 1960's as a way for government and universities to share information. In the late 80's the term for the connection was renamed to this term, and the world wide web was created in 1990; it was used to send graphics and multi-media across the globe. In 1993, the first browser was created. -
Bill Clinton Elected
The first Democratic president since Jimmy Carter -
The EU
The 1993 Treaty of Maastricht established both the European Union and the Euro. This created a political and economic union between the western European countries. More European countries were then added to include the Eastern countries. -
The Brady Bill
This bill was a gun-control law named for presidential aide James Brady who had been wounded and disabled by gunfire in the assassination attempt on Reagan in 1981. -
Newt Gengrich
Gingrich was a promoter of the "Contract with America," and was the first Republican speaker in 40 years. -
NAFTA
Otherwise known as the North American Free Trade Agreement, this act established free trade zone between Canada, United States and Mexico, net gain in jobs due to opening of Mexican markets. -
Failure Of Health Reforms
Clinton had campaigned on a promise to reform health care and Clinton gave his wife, Hillary Clinton, the job of heading the task force. The resulting proposal was based on the idea of managed competition: market forces rather than the government would control health-care costs and expand access to health care. -
Contract With America
The platform proposed smaller government, Congressional ethics reform, term limits, great emphasis on personal responsibility, and a general repudiation of the Democratic party. -
"Don't ask, don't tell"
A policy placed by Clinton that allowed gay and lesbian troops to be in the military as long as they kept the presence of their sexuality unacknowledged.
But straight people can talk about banging each other all the time? Funny how that works. -
The NRA
The NRA, or National Rifle Association, had a goal to protect the right to bear arms, and it was a majority Republican organization. -
Oklahoma City Bombing
This was a huge explosion that destroyed a federal office building in 1995 that took 168 lives. The bombing was done in retribution for a 1993 standoff between federal agents and a fundamentalist sect known as the Branch Davidians, which ended killing many Branch Davidians. -
Taliban
The Taliban are a group of fundamentalist Muslims who took control of Afghanistan's government -
Bob Dole
Dole was an attorney and retired United States Senator from Kansas, serving from 1969-1996; he was the longest serving Republican leader. He was also the 1996 presidential nominee for the Republican party but lost to Bill Clinton. -
Madeleine Albright
Albright was the first woman to become the United States Secretary of State. -
G-8
The G-8, or Group of Eight, was the international organization of the leading capitalist industrial nations: US, Britain, Germany, France, Italy, Japan, Canada, Russia. It largely controlled the world's major international financial organizations: World Bank, IMF, and GATT. -
Clinton Impeachment
The impeachment of Bill Clinton was initiated in December 1998 by the House of Representatives and led to a trial in the Senate for the impeachment of Bill Clinton, the 42nd President of the United States, on two charges, one of perjury and one of obstruction of justice. -
Deficit Reduction Budget
Clinton had better luck with a deficit-reduction bill in 1993, which combined with an increasingly buoyant economy by 1996 to shrink the federal deficit to its lowest level in more than a decade. By 1998 Clinton's policies seemed to have caged the ravenous deficit monster, as Congress argued over the unfamiliar question of how to manage federal budget surpluses. -
WTO
Otherwise known as the World Trade Organization, the WTO was formed as an international trade organization that prompted strong protests from anti-global trade forces in Seattle, Washington in 1999. -
Bosnia and Kosovo
The Balkan Wars were independence movements which were suppressed by Milosevic. Bombs and troops from NATO countries stopped the bloodshed in Bosnia 1995 and Kosovo 1999. The Balkan Wars were the worst event in Europe since WWII. (date is end date) -
Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac
They reassured investors who were worried about homeowners defaulting on mortgages by selling bonds to investors and using the funds to purchase mortgages from banks. -
Al Gore
Al Gore was Clinton's vice-president and a candidate for the 2000 presidential election. His running caused one of the closest elections in history and a fiasco with the voting system. -
Bush v Gore
A politically divided Supreme Court decision that declared Florida's mandates for recounting ballots during the disputed 2000 election was unconstitutional and the process was forced to stop, thereby guaranteeing Bush a victory. -
Housing Bubble
The Federal Reserve lowered interest rates in response to the end of the technology surge, encouraging investors to purchase real estate, causing another "bubble" and increased housing prices. -
George W. Bush
Bush was the Republican nominee in the election of 2000. He was the eldest son of George H. W. Bush. Many people found him to be reckless and thought he divided the nation. He challenged research on global warming, didn't support abortions, limited research on embryonic stem cells, and allowed Vice President Cheney to hammer out his administration's energy policy behind closed doors. -
No Child Left Behind
An education bill created and signed by the George W. Bush administration. Designed to increase accountability standards for primary and secondary schools, the law authorized several federal programs to monitor those standards and increased choices for parents in selecting schools for their children. The program was highly controversial, in large part because it linked results on standardized to federal funding for schools and school districts. -
aAl-Qaeda
This is an international alliance of anti-Western Islamic fundamentalist terrorist organizations founded in the late 1980s. Founded by veterans of the Afghan struggle against the Soviet Union, the group is headed by Osama Bin Laden and has taken responsibility for numerous terrorist attacks, especially after the late 1990s. Al Qaeda organized the attacks of September 11, 2001, in the US, from its headquarters in Taliban-controlled Afghanistan. -
9/11
Common shorthand for the terrorist attacks that occurred on September 11, 2001, in which 19 militant Islamist men hijacked and crashed four commercial aircraft. Two planes hit the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center in NYC, causing them to collapse. One plane crashed into the Pentagon in Washington, DC, and the fourth, overtaken by passengers, crashed into a field in rural Pennsylvania. Nearly 3000 people were killed in the worst case of domestic terrorism in American history. -
Osama bin Laden
Founder of Al Qaeda, the terrorist network responsible for the attacks of September 11, 2001, and other attacks. -
Hillary Clinton
Wife of President Bill Clinton, she was also the First Lady of the United States from 1993 to 2001 and also headed the committee of health-care reform. (date is end date) -
"Axis of Evil"
A term coined by President Bush in his 2002 State of the Union address; this "axis" included Iraq, North Korea, and Iran. -
John Kerry
Kerry was a Democratic senator from Massachusetts who ran unsuccessfully for president against incumbent Bush in 2004. A Vietnam veteran, he sought to portray himself as muscular in foreign policy even as he criticized the Iraq War. The election typified the stark partisan divide of the country, as he lost the popular vote. -
Hurricane Katrina
Katrina was considered to be the one crisis of the Bush administrations second term and in is inefficiency to deal with the crisis. It destroyed 80% of New Orleans and more than 1300 people died, while the damages were $150 billion. -
Kyoto Accord
Protocol to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change dealing with global warming. It is an environmental treaty with the goal of achieving "stabilization of greenhouse gas concentrations in the atmosphere at a level that would prevent dangerous anthropogenic interference with the climate system." -
Sarah Palin
Republican vice-presidential candidate with John McCain in the 2008 election, the second woman to run for vice president of a major party and the first Republican. Palin served on the city council and as mayor of her hometown of Wasilla, Alaska from 1996-2002 and then in 2006 was elected governor of the state. Relatively unknown nationally, Palin's social conservatism made her popular among the evangelical wing of the Republican Party, which had been distrustful of McCain. -
Barack Obama
Barack Obama set a historic landmark in American history – he became the first African American to become president, and seems to have brought the American dream to a whole new level. Barack Obama has had a presidency filled with highly debated issues and policies, including the most recent Medicare acts and the drawdown of American troops in Iraq and Afghanistan. -
John McCain
This Republican senator was a prisoner of war during the Vietnam War and is seeking the Republican nomination in the 2008 presidential election. -
Great Recession
Banks suddenly found themselves with billions of dollars of worthless investments on their books; in 2008, the situation became a full-fledged crisis, as banks stopped making loans, business dried up, and the stock market collapsed. -
DC v Heller
A S.W.A.T. officer with the Washington D.C. police department sued in the District of Columbia District Court for the right to carry a handgun off duty. The Supreme Court ruled that he had the right to carry a weapon for a lawful purpose, and the District Court's opinion was reversed. -
Tea Party
An American political movement known for its conservative positions and its role in the Republican Party. Members of the movement have called for a reduction of the U.S. national debt and federal budget deficit by reducing government spending, and for lower taxes. The movement opposes government-sponsored universal health care and has been described as a mixture of libertarian, populist, and conservative activists. -
Sonia Sotomayor
Sotomayor was the first Hispanic and third woman justice in the Supreme Court's history, confirmed in August 2009. -
Citizens United
This Supreme Court Case ruled that the government cannot cap campaign donations from corporations, and led to unlimited election spending. -
Arab Spring
This was a series of protests across the Middle East and North Africa in 2010. -
Affordable Care Act
An expansion of Medicaid, most of employers must provide health insurance, have insurance or face surtax, prevents rejection based on preexisting condition. Also referred to as "Obamacare", signed into law in 2010. -
Dodd-Frank Act
In July 2010, Congress enacted the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act (the Dodd-Frank Act) in response to the collapse of the economy that began with the 2007 meltdown of the mortgage lending market. -
Syrian Civil War
The Syrian leader, Bashar al-Assad used poisonous gas on the people in the country who were rising up against him. Military action was avoided when the Syrians agreed to give up all their chemical weapons. -
Mitt Romney
Romney was the Republican nominee for president in 2012, and was the former governor of Massachusetts. The Republican efforts to defund the Affordable Care Act resulted in the 2013 shutdown of the government, which lasted for 16 days and threatened default on the national debt. -
Boston Marathon Bombing
During this event on April 15, 2013, two pressure cooker bombs exploded, killing 3 people and injuring 264. The bombs exploded about 13 seconds and 210 yards apart, near the finish line on Boylston Street. The FBI took over the investigation, and on April 18, released photographs and surveillance video of two suspects. The suspects were identified later that day as the brothers Dzhokhar and Tamerlan Tsarnaev. -
Debt Ceiling
This is a legislative mechanism to limit the amount of debt that can be issued by Treasury by limiting money gov can borrow. -
Shelby County v Holder
This Supreme Court Case concerned constitutionality of two parts of the Voting Rights Act, one struck down because it was outdated and potentially limited voters' rights. -
Same-Sex Marriage!
Finally, same sex couples were free to get married in the United States!
