Howdy! Now, Herman Cain‘s campaign may be behind the political ad everyone’s talking about at the moment, but the cutest ad (you guys, it’s seriously cute, just you wait) comes courtesy of Rick Perry, from way back in 2009.

The 70 journalists killed in 2009 with motive confirmed make it the deadliest year for the profession since the Committee To Protect Journalists began keeping record in 1992. According to the group, which divides journalist deaths by “murder,” “crossfire/combat” and “dangerous assignment,” there have been 797 journalists killed since 1992. Today, NPR has a report on this year’s numbers.

It’s the end of the year, the time for handy lists and timelines recapping the touchstones of the past 12 months, freezing them in our ever-shortening collective memory.

Of course, some people just have to be different. Mediaite contributor and White House reporter Tommy Christopher pulls back the curtain on covering politics in 2009, and shares photos and videos that have never been seen before. Find out who the Secret Service did manage to keep out of the White House, what Joe Biden told his young mentorees, and much more.

Many are extremely happy to see this year come to a close, but we shouldn’t confuse the roller coaster with what is actually a stunning conjunctural moment. 2009 was a year riddled with the collisions of many different trajectories — and they all collided with techology. More than anything, this was the Year of Transparency.

How did people act during The Aughts? Well, they were snarky. Sometimes dead? And gay! But almost all of it happened online, according to a Harris Interactive poll which put weekly internet usage at a whopping 13 hours in 2009. That’s almost twice as many hours as in the year 2000.

As the decade’s close drew nearer it seemed prudent to actually call it something, and the Oh-Ohs, Double-Os and Two-Thousands frankly sound dumb. “The Aughts” is nice, clean, short, simple and definitive, and also sounds vaguely British which means it’s classy. That is why, here at Mediaite, our end-of-decade retrospective series is called…The Aughts. This new decade has snuck up on us, but we’re not letting the old one go just yet.