It wasn’t the best of times or the worst of times, but 2014 did have some highs and lows. So as we head into a new year, here’s a quick review—and a look at why 2015 could see real progress for peace, freedom, and prosperity.

5 (political) reasons 2014 sucked

1. Civil asset forfeiture is still going strong. 2014 was the year many Americans heard of civil asset forfeiture for the first time—which is a good thing—but unfortunately it continues to be not only legal but also an extremely convenient way to bolster city budgets in near secrecy. If you aren’t familiar with this obscurely titled police practice, civil asset forfeiture allows any cop or (or IRS agent) who finds you “suspicious” to just take your money or stuff without charging you with any crime. It’s exactly as shady (and life-ruining) as it sounds, and as 2014 draws to a close, this legalized theft continues apace.

2. Militarized policing is out of control. Particular since the brutal death of Eric Garner at the hands of the NYPD was caught on camera this summer, police misconduct has led the news cycle for months. We’ve learned that police are scanning our social media activity to “predict” crime and label us dangerous; and the Supreme Court decided cops can stop us for violating nonexistent laws if they think those laws are real. Meanwhile, minority communities are subjected to unfair targeting, and police are armed like soldiers—which tends to cast ordinary people as the enemy. This year, it has become evident that police brutality problems are too widespread to attribute to “a few bad apples.”

3. We’re stuck with two major parties—and they’re not very different. My takeaway from the 2014 elections? Yawn. As I wrote in the run-up to Election Day, it doesn’t matter that Republicans won the Senate if they don’t actually limit government. I predicted then that not much would change for the better, and so far it seems like I was (sadly) right. Republicans and Democrats are exactly the same in lots of important ways, but unfortunately the design of our electoral system means we’re stuck with them for the foreseeable future.

4. Our foreign policy remains out of control and often counter-productive. After more than a decade of war, 2014 brought—you guessed it!—more war. The United States has the foreign policy our Founders warned us about, and the results are just as bad as they predicted. Wasteful, unaccountable, and ineffective, our government’s persistent interest in going “abroad in search of monsters to destroy” is making more monsters, as the explosive growth of the American-made ISIS in Iraq amply demonstrated in 2014.

5. The media isn’t helping. Instead of seeing us through all this mess, 2014 witnessed another 12 months of general unhelpfulness from large swathes of the American news media. From false objectivity to refusing to foster real debate to hyperventilating over unimportant details, much of what passes for journalism is more trouble than it’s worth. As Mark Twain almost certainly did not say, “If you don’t read the newspaper, you’re uninformed. If you read the newspaper, you’re misinformed.”

5 reasons to be optimistic in 2015

1. Violent crime is down and the prison population is on the decline. Yup, America is safer than it used to be. In fact, in 2013 (the latest year for which we have comprehensive data), there were fewer violent crimes than any year since 1978 (pretty remarkable when you remember how much our population has grown since then). Murder and non-negligent manslaughter declined even more, with the lowest count since 1968. Also, 2014 was the first year in decades to see the national prison population decline—major good news since the “land of the free” has the highest incarceration rate in the world.

2. After 100 years, the drug war is finally beginning to end. 2014 marked 100 years of the war on drugs: In 1914, President Wilson signed the Harrison Narcotics Tax Act, which kicked off national efforts to control the sale and manufacture of drugs. Like its successors in the modern drug war, the Harrison Act spiked the prison population over nonviolent “crimes” and played on unfounded fears of immorality and minorities. Today, however, the failed drug war is thankfully beginning to lose steam as marijuana is legalized and/or decriminalized for medical and recreational use in more and more states.

3. Normalized relations with Cuba could introduce our southern neighbors to freedom. It’s rare indeed that I find myself applauding policy decisions from President Obama, but he got it right on Cuba (heck, Ron Paul has been saying we should end the embargo for years). Cutting off this starving island nation from free trade has not ended communism; it has only made life even harder for the Cuban people. While the results of normalizing relations with the Cuban government have yet to be seen, for any supporter of free markets—or anyone who empathizes with Cuba’s plight—this development is a reason for optimism.

4. Young people expect something new from our government, and we really like liberty. Millennials get a lot of grief: Apparently we’re the “cheapest generation,” the “self[ie] generation,” and the “me me me generation.” But we’re also the most politically independent generation America has seen in years. We’re much more likely than our elders to be skeptical of Washington; we don’t have much faith in the political establishment; and we’re sick and tired of getting the same outdated ideas and politicians from both major parties. What do we like? In a word, liberty.

5. We don’t have to wait for government to get its act together to get stuff done. This last point is always true, but it also always bears repeating: We don’t need to wait for the government to fix our problems. We can fix them ourselves. Government is notoriously lethargic, so it’s simply not practical to wait for every problem to be solved by the state or for top-down solutions to emerge. In 2015, no matter how much politics continues to suck, we can—and, I hope, will—make a real difference in our communities and around the world.