I
haven’t written about
politics for some time, mostly because of certain keywords that permeate
modern discourse: “Hateful”; “vindictive”; “mean”; “hypocritical” …
okay, some of them aren't so new. Also, certain trigger words that cause
those reactions, such as "politics", and "Have a nice day".
(By
the way, "Have a nice day" is going to be my reply to any particularly
wrathful comments to this post. It's time to steer away from useless
shouting.)
Still, I do have a
history of making predictions, so here’s what I think is going to happen over
the next few years. Just to be clear, my Presidential prediction success rate is running at about 50%.
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| There's a chapter on politics in this book. But the rest of it's pretty good. |
The Democrats will win
control of the House of Representatives. This one’s crazy easy: The party
opposing the sitting President almost always makes gains during off-year
elections. The Dems also have their usual advantage of a fawning mainstream
media, so I’m pretty confident of this one. We also had more than
one “October Surprise”, and all of them screamed “go blue”.
The Republicans will
maintain control of the Senate, although just barely. This will result in a
scenario in which half of Congress actively does everything in their power to
keep President Trump from doing anything, including picking out ties, having brunch,
or watching the Superbowl. As far as actual work getting done, things won’t look much different.
Keep in mind that over
the last several decades Democrats controlled Congress much more often than
Republicans did, which helps explain why they’ve been so irate the last
couple of years. I understand: I’d prefer to be in charge, too.
I could be wrong on all
of this; conservatives are just as fired up right now as liberals are, but they feel
saying so often leads to them being personally attacked, so many are keeping a
low profile. On a related note, remember when we could disagree and still be
nice to each other? No? Well, I was younger, then.
What I can guarantee is
that political ads will continue to be more and more vicious, which is also a
pretty easy call. In my area they’ve given up on words like “misleading” and
gone straight to calling each other liars. We’re getting closer and closer to political
campaigns looking like the Red Wedding in “Game of Thrones”. I predict that by early
2020, ads will start with wishes that opponents campaign in Iowa without their
overcoats. They'll end with suggestions that the other guy get tarred (with toxic sludge) and feathered (with arrows).
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| Can't we all just get along? No? Okay. |
It’s no great leap to say
all this animosity and lack of general niceness is connected. We probably won’t
get back to any form of civility until someone from outside the country attacks
America again, or a comet takes out New Jersey, and possibly not then.
By the way, I predict the
2020 Presidential campaign will begin December 2nd, 2018. The fact
that more and more Americans are becoming infuriated by the extended campaign
seasons hasn’t gotten through to politicians any more than anything else has.
In 2020 the Presidential
election will be won by Democrat Kamala Harris, after the other Democrats maim
each other into bloody pulps in the primaries. She’ll have a majority of a few
million and barely squeak by in the electoral college, which supporters will
declare a landslide. I don’t know much about Harris, but she’s from California,
so she’ll have her home state locked up. Her mother is Indian and her father
Jamaican, which means any criticism of her can be stomped down with cries of
“racist!” I’ve read up on Harris a
little and I’m not overly impressed, but I suspect she really doesn’t give a
darn what I think.
President Trump, taking his cue from the Democrats after the 2016 election, will pout.
Other predictions for the
next few years:
A terrible storm will
cause damage somewhere.
A politician will fall out of grace because of something that ends with “gate”.
Entertainment award shows
will continue to ditch celebrating entertainment in favor of being political.
Some cool new technology
will sweep the world.
A major business will go
bankrupt.
Oh: And the American
economy will turn down, headed toward a recession by the end of 2019, and be in
full recession sometime in 2020. Our economy goes in cycles, and we’ve been
riding a wave for too long—the wave is overdue to crash. I’m just the
messenger.
Of course, by the time
most of that happens you’ll have forgotten I wrote this, so right or wrong, I’m
safe.
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| Thus, I've earned the right to complain. |
