Predictions for 2009
Bookworm on Dec 31 2008 at 4:21 pm | Filed under: Uncategorized
Given that I never would have predicted the biggest event of 2008 (namely, the media successfully anointing a socialist neophyte as our new president), the merits of my predictions are probably pretty small. Nevertheless, I can’t resist the chance to get in my two cents (which is about all my predictions are worth). Feel free to add your own:
1. In 2007, the subprime markets collapsed. In 2008, the money markets collapsed (hitting the really rich people who have the bulk of their wealth tied into the stock market). In 2009, we’ll discover how important the really rich people are to our economy when, in the absence of their investment and tax dollars, the job market contracts dramatically. 2009 is going to be the year that sees ordinary people taking severe economic hits through widespread job losses.
2. Israel will bomb Iran’s nuclear reactors — and may try to do so in the first two weeks of January, before Obama becomes president. This initiative will, of course, be quite a challenge, because Israel is already fighting Hamas, but Israel will either (a) have a two front war against a single enemy (always Iran) or (b) abruptly abandon Gaza and focus all its energies on Iran. In many ways, the fact that so many Arab nations are overtly or covertly supporting the initiative against Hamas is a good trial run for the support Israel can expect if it goes after Iran.
3. Biden’s pre-election prediction will come true and — God forbid! Truly, God forbid! — there will be a major terrorist attack against America, “testing” Barack Obama. If this prediction comes true, I hope Obama passes the test.
4. Congress’ approval rating will drop into the low single digits. Sadly, Republicans will be a part of this sorry spectacle and will not obtain any bounce enabling them to take over in 2010.
5. Traditional neo-Nazi groups will gain significant strength in Europe as the “men and women on the street” in Europe, frightened by the strength their liberal governments have given to Islamist groups, take refuge in organizations that they perceive as a strong bulwark against the the Islamification of Europe. They’ll try to tell themselves that, once they’ve taken their cities back from the Islamists, they’ll then ratchet down the age old racially inflammatory rhetoric that powered the neo-Nazis to the forefront, but by then it will be too late. They’ll merely have traded a frying pan for a fire.
6. Obama, immediately upon entering office, will socialize a large part of the American economy. He won’t raise taxes immediately, but he will use current tax revenue to have the government “rescue” (i.e., purchase) large segments of the economy. He will do so despite the fact that the 20th Century repeatedly and graphically demonstrated that putting the government in control of an economy destroys it.
7. Obama, aided by a complicit Congress, and an exhausted and frightened American population, will socialize medicine. We will all then get the benefit of equally bad medical care. As for me, I prefer a world where people can at least live in hope of qualifying for good medical care.
8. England will see increasingly violent clashes between Catholics and Muslims, which, because of immigration from Central Europe and Pakistan and because of high birth rates, are the two largest growth groups in England. The Pakistanis, who have been gearing up for this fight longer and are less bound by European cultural norms, will win this one over the long run. (As I’ve noted, the rest of Europe will cluster behind neo-Nazis, but I think England has moved beyond that option.)
9. Obama will not manage to walk on water, deeply disappointing his acolytes.
10. Speaking of Obama’s acolytes, the Times will either file for bankruptcy or will be forced to become a public, rather than a family-held, corporation.
11. Even as the public figures out that “global warming” is a scam, Obama will have so many true believers in high government positions, it will be too late to stop them from engaging in a variety of acts that will harm both America’s economy and her security.
12. And my last prediction, which I’m absolutely certain will come true: A Hollywood star will be in a car crash that involves substance abuse.
Your predictions?
Cross-posted at Right Wing News
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9 Responses to “Predictions for 2009”
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4. Congress’ approval rating will drop into the low single digits. - From the high single digits. That one’s cheating, Book! Seriously, I can see Congress taking full blame for Obama initiatives - as they should, if they’re stupid enough to enact them. But I suspect he’ll be playing Yertle the Turtle, unsullied and shining, on their backs as they slog through the mire for at least a few months. Too many people have too much invested in their illusion of him, and they’ve got to blame someone.
Re #10 -In Connecticut, there’s a state representative who’s pushing for the government to bail out the local newspapers. So you see, there’s a third option for the Times, given all Pinch has done for Obama…I mean, it is the newspaper of record and all.
What a depressing list.
Ellen DeGeneres and Portia De Rossi will file for divorce.
Predictions for 2009…
Given that I never would have predicted the biggest event of 2008 (namely, the media successfully anointing a socialist neophyte as our new president), the merits of my predictions are probably pretty small. Nevertheless, I can’t resist the chance to….
Oh and Josh Brolin will get an Academy Award, if not for W then Best Supporting nod for playing Dan White in the latest work of gay martyrology, Milk.
If your predicitons are worth two cents, what would that squealing pig from Massachusetts’ be worth? And he’s in Congwess!
Prediction: Russia faces a collapsing economy and pressures from Siberian and other regions for secession. Europe’s economies are in full collapse, the EU is further discredited, crime rockets up and Muslim “youths” and Leftists engage in more street riots. Russia tries to distract internal dissension by putting trying to extort concessions from Europe (best guess: Ukraine, the Baltic States) by withholding energy, military pressure, etc. The EUros cave.
Prediction: Economic and social onditions finally collapse in the UK. The government is finally completely and irrevocably discredited. There is a backlash against Labor and the EU.
Prediction: The European wing of Nato pulls out of Afghanistan. U.S. has to go it alone. Pakistan and India’s crisis explodes.
Prediction: There is a major attack on the U.S. and/or international U.S. interests. Obama votes “present”.
I really hope that all my predictions amount to nothing.
Oh, here’s another prediction: more record cold weather in 2009 and the ice caps will expand.
The Obama Administration will be the second one in American history to preside over the detonation of a nuclear device over a city.
Book,
I think all of your predictions are good ones, but some of them will happen in 2010 or even 2011. You’ve got 2009 written down as a VERY portentous year!
It takes time to prepare the major terrorist attack. For all my libertarian, fiscal-conservative disgust with President Bush, he must receive credit for the disruption of major terrorist activities. Under Obama the terrorist networks will pull it back togeether, and launch their successful assault(s) perhaps late in 2010, or in 2011. The major biological or nuclear attack won’t occur until then. I don’t know that the terrorists will be so bold as to hit the USA - we’re still the most prepared, after all - but hit somewhere in the West, they will. A VERY major attack, with a minimum of 50,000 dead, a maximum of two million, in late 2010 thru early 2012 is my best prediction.
(The minimum involves a biological attack that does not succeed in achieving maximum lethality; the maximum is the large nuclear device that does succeed, near the heart of a major city during the working day. The Islamic Jihadists had better be careful in getting what they wish for - an America unleashed would not be a pleasant thing at all to comprehend. After a major nuclear attack, the Islamic Jihadist forces’ only hope might then be that Obama hangs on thru 2012, giving them time for our rage to ebb… so that the subsequent President no longer might have the full desire of the American people to exact total retribution. The closer to 2012 the attack occurs, the more likely our reaction will be maximally severe.)