Investors are sure to have mixed feelings about the celebration tonight after closing out their best year since 2003—but also finishing up the worst decade for the markets since the 1930s. Despite the incredible gains made this year, stocks dropped sharply on the final day of trading in 2009, as investors guessed that the strengthening economy would lead to a pullback in government stimulus money, but even so the Dow rose 18.8 percent on the year, Standard and Poor's index jumped 23.5 percent, and Nasdaq was up 43.9 percent over 2009. The recovery is even more impressive when counted from the market's bottoming-out last March: The Dow is up 59.3 percent from that period, and Nasdaq is up 78.9 percent.

As midnight rolled around across Asia and Europe, revelers said "good riddance" to 2009, which, as French President Nicolas Sarkozy said, "has been difficult for everybody." Sydney put on a fireworks display that was estimated to have been attended by more than a million people, while Hong Kong residents watched fireworks set off from the top of the city's skyscrapers. In Moscow, President Dimitry Medvedev thanked his constituents for "bearing up together" during the "not very easy" year that was ending; at the Vatican, Pope Benedict XVI performed the year-end service a week after being knocked down during a Christmas Eve Mass. Meanwhile in New York City, the NYPD prepared for the famous ball drop in Times Square, which as many as one million people are expected to attend.

Federal district Judge Ricardo Urbina dismissed all charges against five Blackwater security contractors who had been accused of opening fire into a Baghdad crowd and killing 17 Iraqis in 2007, citing prosecutorial misuse of evidence. Urbina said the government had overstepped its boundaries while making its case and used evidence it was not supposed to have, finding that the Justice Department's case was constructed from "statements compelled under a threat of job loss in a subsequent criminal prosecution." The incident led the government to place stricter limits on the use of Blackwater—now called "Xe"—and other security contractors.

The TSA isn’t the only one with screening problems: The suicide bomber who killed seven CIA workers in Afghanistan on Wednesday was invited onto the base and was not searched beforehand, sources tell the Associated Press. They say he was being looked at as an informant and it was his first visit to the base. The presence of a CIA debriefer from Kabul at the base suggests he was brought in to give intelligence.

Even before the attempted Christmas Day airplane bombing, the United States backed an airstrike in Yemen on Christmas Eve. But that attack appears to have failed to kill one of its targets, Anwar Awlaki. A Yemeni journalist tells ABC News that he has spoken with Awlaki since the attack. “He said the house that was attacked was two or three kilometers away from him and he was not there.” The bombing was supposed to hit a meeting of Al Qaeda leaders in Rafd. Awlaki, a radical cleric who was in contact with Nidal Malik Hassan, the alleged Fort Hood shooter, and is believed to have been in contact with the accused Christmas Day bomber, Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, denies being a part of al Qaeda. The Wall Street Journal says Awlaki is “emerging as the central focus” of the attempted Christmas Day bombing.

The Montana Supreme Court has ruled that doctor-assisted suicide for the terminally ill is legal, and that physicians who help their patients "die with dignity" are shielded from prosecution. Ruling on Baxter v. Montana, a case filed by a Billings truck driver who wanted his doctors to administer a lethal dose of medication after being diagnosed with leukemia, the court said it found "nothing in Montana Supreme Court precedent or Montana statutes indicating that physician aid in dying is against public policy."

Bet she wishes she could take this one back: The TSA’s acting administrator (the nomination of the man Obama appointed for the job is held up in the Senate) released an end-of-the-year message to employees that celebrates their “very good year” at noon on Christmas Eve—just hours before the failed Christmas Day bombing. Still, the memo does not mention other snafus like a critical report by the inspector general of the Department of Homeland Security and the accidental posting online of documents that reveal airport-security procedures. 

Bust out the Champagne: The three major stock indexes are set to post their best year since 2003. Despite the yearly gains, however, the close of the Aughties also mark the first-ever negative decade on a total-return basis for Wall Street. Economic data on Thursday also showed jobless claims fell about 22,000 to 432,000, though economic experts caution the drop may be due to the holidays, and anything above 400,000 is considered very high.

While most countries praise top scholars, the regime in Iran is trying to derail top students' academic and professional careers by punishing and beating them for their accomplishments. On Wednesday, students in northeastern Iran were attacked and beaten by a pro-government militia, only one of several attacks since Sunday's protests. University students dubbed as "star students"—meaning they are considered a threat by the intelligence ministry, as opposed to ranking at the top of their class—are the targets of these attacks, and have been arrested and banned from education as part of Iran's aggressive policy toward them. Some students believe their "star" status comes from political activism, but several graduate students (even those who are not politically active), have been subject to arrest. Former education minister Mostafa Moin says over 1,000 graduates have been blocked from higher education since the practice initiated in 2006.

Pastor Rick Warren’s evangelical megachurch congregants in California are under the gun since their spiritual leader posted an “urgent letter” on his blog asking for $900,000 in donations before the New Year. Warren told the Saddleback Church members online that the church needs the money to make up for a massive holiday-giving deficit, though he claimed they were on budget all year before this past weekend. “It’s basically having to do more with less,” a church spokesman told the Associated Press. “The seasonal Christmas offering was down significantly and, commensurately, the need for services the church is expected to provide is up.” On a non-holiday Sunday, the church’s offering is approximately $600,000, which is collected from over 80,000 members from five different locations, according to Reader’s Digest. Saddleback congregants have raised considerable funds quickly before, according to their Web site, including $1.7 million for Katrina victims in 2005 and $1.6 million for those affected by the 2004 Pacific Islands tsunami.

A radio show staffer has confirmed that Rush Limbaugh was taken to a Honolulu hospital with chest pains late Wednesday, but said the conservative talk-show host is now "resting comfortably," CNN reports. Medics reportedly ferried Limbaugh from the Kahala Hotel and Resort, where he was vacationing, to Queen's Medical Center in serious condition. The hospital would not confirm or deny Limbaugh's presence. Earlier this week, Limbaugh was seen golfing at a nearby country club.

James Cameron’s Avatar could not evade the first family, which went to see the country’s No. 1 film Thursday morning. Barack and Michelle Obama brought their daughters, Sasha and Malia, to a movie theater near their rented Hawaiian vacation home before noon to see the visually stunning 3-D film in a theater all to themselves, according to officials. Before heading the movies, however, the president, a self-described movie buff, worked on getting to be another kind of buff at gym facilities at the nearby Marine Corps base. After the movies and gym session, however, the Obamas plan to return to the White House in 2010, just a few years short of Avatar’s 2154 setting.

IPhone calls aren’t the only thing that AT&T is dropping these days: The company has ended its sponsorship with Tiger Woods, according to TMZ. AT&T offered no explanation for the move. Accenture also dropped Woods as its sponsor, while Gillette has announced that it will scale back his role.

In a year in which Michael Jackson has received an array of posthumous tributes, the Library of Congress will end things with yet another nod to the superstar's greatness. Jackson's 14-minute short film "Thriller" was announced as one of 25 works chosen to be preserved in the U.S. National Film Registry for 2009. The Library of Congress said that the John Landis directed video featuring Jackson as a zombie "revolutionized the music industry."

Obama's Hawaiian vacation isn’t much of a break. On Thursday, the president will receive a preliminary report on the attempted Christmas Day bombing of Flight 253 over Detroit. The report will focus on how alleged bomber Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab was able to board a flight to America despite his suspected terrorist ties, and will explore how to avoid such incidents in the future. White House officials said Obama was unlikely to comment publicly about the report, although he'd probably talk with his national security team several times during the day. Meanwhile, the Detroit Free Press reports that Abdulmutallab took a two-week-long course on Islamic manners and history at the non-profit Al Maghrib Institute in Houston, Texas in 2008, a privilege for which he paid $2,250. The institute's vice president stressed that the organization discourages talk about jihad and terrorism.

Fires, flooding, and cyclones wreaked havoc on Australia in 2009, but the nation is putting the past behind them as they entered 2010 with fireworks and celebration. "We are all now engaged in nation-building for recovery, nation-building for the future," said Prime Minister Kevin Rudd. To celebrate, over 1.5 million people gathered around Sydney Harbour to watch 5,000 kilograms of explosives in what Australian politician Kristina Keneally called "the best show on earth." Melbourne and Brisbane also displayed big firework shows, but most Aussies across the nation rang in the new year with the grand old tradition of beer drinking.

On October 23, volunteers counted 1,700 sea lions at San Francisco's famous Pier 39, but by November 21, that number dropped to 927. Seven days later there were 20, and now there are a scant half-dozen. Biologists don't understand why the sea lions left, but it's been a strange year for the barking mammals. A spike in birth rates in 2008 taxed local food supplies and led to record rates of starvation and injury among yearlings, but shot the number of adults on Pier 39 to record highs months later, before the speedy exodus began. The sea lions established themselves on the pier in 1990, when a large herring run seduced them into San Francisco Bay.

The Taliban claimed responsibility for a suicide bomb attack on a military base in eastern Afghanistan Wednesday that killed one Afghan and eight Americans working for the CIA. It was the worst loss of life for the U.S. in Afghanistan since October. A spokesman for the Taliban said in a statement that an Afghan National Army member wore an explosive vest, and detonated himself inside base's gym. In a separate incident, a roadside bomb in southern Afghanistan killed four Canadian soldiers and a reporter from the Calgary Herald—the first Canadian journalist to die in the country—and the most Canadians killed in a single incident in 2009.

In a sign that Iran's crackdown on anti-government protests is escalating, the country's state-run news media reports that its parliament is now calling for the arrests of opposition leaders Mir Hossein Mousavi and Mehdi Karroubi, who ran against President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad earlier this year, in addition to Fa'ezeh Hashemi, daughter of former president Ayatolla Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani. "They must not remain on the sidelines and be safe," legislator Hassan Noroozi said. "Those who issue statements and invite people to create chaos in the streets and attack one another must be dealt with according to Islamic laws."At least seven demonstrators were killed Sunday in protests against the government.

A New Year's Eve terrorist attack may be brewing in Bali, according to the U.S. government. The local U.S. Embassy there emailed U.S. citizens on the resort island, quoting the local governor as saying, "There is an indication of an attack on Bali tonight." The Bali Tourism Board also distributed the warning, and wrote in an email, "While Indonesia's counterterrorism efforts have been ongoing and partly successful, violent elements have demonstrated a willingness and ability to carry out deadly attacks with little or no warning." Indonesian authorities did not release additional details, nor did the governor's office confirm the warning. Indonesia is the world's most populous Muslim-majority nation, and has had trouble with Islamic militants in recent years. In 2002 a bomb in a Bali nightclub killed 202 people, many of them foreign tourists. The bomb was blamed on Islamic militants. Suicide bombings killed seven people and injured 50 at the Ritz-Carlton and J.W. Marriott hotels in Jakarta six months ago. 

Former VP Dick Cheney accused President Obama of "trying to pretend" the nation isn't at war with terror—and the Obama administration is fighting back via the White House blog. In a post entitled "The Same Old Washington Blame Game," communications director Dan Pfeiffer said not only does Obama understand the gravity of the situation, but he understands it better than Cheney did: "The difference is this: President Obama doesn't need to beat his chest to prove it, and—unlike the last administration—we are not at war with a tactic ("terrorism"), we at war with something that is tangible: al Qaeda and its violent extremist allies. ... Vice President Cheney and others seem to be more focused on criticizing the administration than condemning the attackers, this president is not interested in bellicose rhetoric, he is focused on action. Seven years of bellicose rhetoric failed to reduce the threat from al Qaeda and succeeded in dividing this country." Yowza.

Pulling a knife on someone on Christmas—nothing a good heart-to-heart can't get over, right? Brooke Mueller, wife of Charlie Sheen, has asked the judge who placed a restraining order on Sheen to modify the order and allow her and the actor to contact each other "so they can work on resolving the conflicts in their marriage." According to Mueller's lawyer, Yale Galanter, the domestic disturbance on Christmas was "one bad night," and the two still love each other.

The embattled Washington Times announced it would shrink dramatically Wednesday, cutting two sections entirely. Employees were gathered and told by publisher Jonathan Slevin to collect packets that would privately reveal whether they had been laid off, kicking off a wave of cuts that the paper's executives warned earlier this month would include about 40 percent of all staff. The paper's managing editor, David Jones, was among those let go, along with managing editor for digital operations, Jeffrey Birnbaum. Metro and Sports will no longer exist as standalone sections beginning after Friday. "Our market-based, forward-looking plan is both a response to the recessionary economy, continued downward financial pressures on the news industry and our transition into a 21st-century multimedia enterprise," Slevin said in a statement.

Stop if you've heard this movie before: Faced with an incoming asteroid with the potential to wreak untold destruction if it reaches Earth, a team of astronauts devise a plan to knock the object off course and avert disaster. Russia has apparently decided to dust off the old script by concocting a plan to coordinate with American, European, and Chinese space agencies to knock out an 885-foot wide asteroid, Adolphis, that is expected to pass by Earth. While the asteroid was initially thought to stand a significant chance of striking Earth in 2029, further studies have shown the odds to be extremely low. Nonetheless, the head of Russia's space agency, Anatoly Perminov, has suggested the object could still pose a threat. "People's lives are at stake. We should pay several hundred million dollars and build a system that would allow [us] to prevent a collision, rather than sit and wait for it to happen and kill hundreds of thousands of people," he told London's Telegraph.

In the wake of news about the Christmas bomber’s vast al Qaeda network in Yemen, Yemeni security forces attacked an al Qaeda hideout, wounding several and arresting one, as a high-ranking official vowed to wipe out the terrorist group in that country. "The [Interior] Ministry will continue tracking down al Qaeda terrorists and continue its strikes against the group until it is totally eliminated," Deputy Interior Minister Brig. Gen. Saleh al-Zawari told military officials in the province of Mareb, one of three areas said to be home to al Qaeda operatives. The raid on the safe house came thanks to a tip; the house's owner was arrested, and security forces are pursuing those who fled.

She waited two years to announce her split from Kelli Carpenter, and during that time Rosie O’Donnell found a new love interest, artist Tracy Kachtick-Anders. The pair were recently photographed holding hands. Kachtick-Anders is a gay-rights activist and mother of six—both of which she has in common with O’Donnell, who is vocal in the gay-rights fight and has four children of her own. Kachtick-Anders also founded the Open Arms Campaign, a nonprofit that recruits families for adoption. O’Donnell’s rep confirmed the relationship rumors after the couple was seen vacationing together in Miami.

It's a cruel irony that nature's most adorable animal steadfastly refuses to make more of itself, even on the brink of extinction. With less than 3,000 giant pandas in the wild, China's Chengdu Giant Panda Research Institute is crucial to preserving the population—but the notoriously picky animals are refusing to play along. This year only four new baby pandas were born after 18 in 2008, a drop off Chinese researchers attributed to the pandas being "too exhausted" to procreate. Half of this year's panda output come from a bear named Li Li, who gave birth to twin females Wen Li and Ya Li over the summer.

Millions of homes could see Fox News dropped from their cable package if News Corporation fails to reach a deal with Time Warner on a new contract by Thursday night. The two have been locked in a standoff over distribution rights, with Fox insisting it receive a dollar per month per cable subscriber for access to its shows and live broadcast events, a number that Time Warner feels could create a difficult precedent for other stations. Prospects may be bleak for the two sides to reach an agreement before tonight's midnight deadline and News Corp. has refused an offer to enter arbitration. “At this time, it looks like we will not reach an agreement, and our channels may very well go off the air in Time Warner Cable systems,” News Corp. president Chase Carey told employees, according to The New York Times.

This ought to go a long way toward ensuring that future Democratic presidential contests are not as drawn out as the one between Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton in 2008: The Democratic Party is looking to eliminate superdelegates from the party’s national convention. Superdelegates are elected officials and party leaders who are free to cast their vote for whomever they want; under the new rules, the Democratic National Committee would require them to cast their vote in accordance with the results from their state.