2010 Predictions

We tax all the others and pass the revenue on to you

I made some bold predictions in the first half of '09.  Even got some of 'em right in the face of some skepticism and even derision.  I didn't do much prognosticating in the second half and I wish I had.

Here are some of the things I think we'll see in 2010, in no particular order:

• California will become an even bigger financial mess, requiring massive bailouts of its bloated entitlement economy.  There won't be a corresponding reduction in those entitlements because that would cost too many CA pols their legislative sinecures.
  
  
• As a predictable result, CA will suffer more arbitrary revenue-generating measures that won't be called taxes... but are.  There will be cut-backs in programs that they have come to take for granted, and increases in programs you've never heard of.
  
  
• Oregon will more and more resemble California.
  
  
• There won't be a significant overhaul of the Tax Code.  It's not much of a vote-getter these days and Congress won't have time or political courage for the hearings.
  
  
• The IRS will receive massive new funding in support of health care but there won't be a corresponding increase in revenue.
  
  
• We'll hear more about mileage taxes to supplement, not replace, gas taxes.
  
  
• There won't be any major Wall Street reforms.
  
  
• Iraq will end in a whimper, spun as a victory.  It will cost nearly as much to prop up their government as when the war was being waged.
  
  
• Afghanistan will suffer at least one major disaster, prompting the prez to convene a committee to "re-think our overall strategy and the price of our commitment."  The phrase "open-ended" will be repeated ad nauseum. 
  
  
• There will be more than one significant terror attack on American soil.  We will be unprepared and have no meaningful response.
  
  
• Iran will succeed in its nuclear arms development program.  We will not have a cogent response nor will we be able to convene an international one.
  
  
• Russia will resume its role as world bully and we won't push back. [See Ukraine and Georgia.]
  
  
• We will ignore China's offenses to mankind's sensibilities on the grounds that, well, we owe 'em too much money.
  
  
• When unemployment goes back to single digits it will be hailed as a vindication of the administration's economic plans.  The prez's promise that it wouldn't exceed 8% if Congress passed the stimulus bill we be ignored.
  
  
• There will be another stimulus package, even though it might be named something else.  It won't work, either.
  
  
• GM/GMAC and Chrysler will continue to be suppurating sores on the American body.
  
  
• The mid-term elections will be claimed as victories by both parties.  Only the American citizenry will lose.
  
  
• Hugo Chavez succeeds in delivering a death blow to whatever residual freedom still exists in Venezuela.
  
  
• Cap-and-trade will fizzle.  Same for climate change.
  
  
• Oregon goes to the Rose Bowl for the second straight year... and wins this time.

Got any predictions of your own?  Share 'em here

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Prediction is very difficult, especially if it's about the future.

Neils Bohr