Like many others in the media and blogosphere I made a number of predictions for 2005. Some turned out to be correct; some wrong; some spectacularly wrong. Here’s how I made out:
There will be two U. S. Supreme Court vacancies to fill before year’s end either through death or retirement. My first guess would be Chief Justice Rehnquist. I guess I’ll tap Justice O’Connor as my second guess since she may be waiting to see if she’s appointed Chief Justice. She won’t be. | ||
The Iraq elections will come off at the end of this month and there will be a good turnout including among the Sunnis. The elections won’t do much to quell the violence there but the new government may have a freer hand in doing so. | Some could quibble about the Sunni turnout but I’m counting this as a successful prediction. | |
No appreciable Social Security reform (although there may be some legislature passed and packaged as such). | ||
Dow stays below 11,000. | ||
Howard Dean will not be named chairman of the Democratic party. | I’m sorry to say I underestimated the foolhardiness of the national Democratic Party. | |
Flu pandemic. | This one was a stretch and I’m glad to have been wrong. | |
Major development in solar power generation. My guess: much cheaper solar panels. | I’m going to count this one as correct. | |
No major improvements in either spam control or net security. | ||
Iran tests nuclear weapon. | Again I’m glad to have been wrong but nonetheless this will be on my 2006 prediction list. | |
No UN official or employee does a day of jail time for corruption related to Oil-for-Food scandal. | ||
Kofi Annan continues to serve out his second term as UN Secretary General (and in all probabilty will complete his in 2006). | ||
Ben Affleck will not marry in 2005. | ||
Britney Spears’s marriage will not survive 2005. | The year isn’t over yet but I’m counting this one as wrong. | |
The Passion of the Christ will be nominated for one or more Academy Awards but won’t win any. | ||
“Hot pursuit†military action into Syria before year’s end. | At least three newspapers (including The New York Times) have reported this so I’m counting it as correct. | |
Osama bin Laden will not be captured. At least 3 more audio tapes will appear apparently from OBL. No video. | Despite the lack of OBL audio tapes I’m still counting this as correct since the major prediction was correct. | |
Former president Ford dies. | ||
Former president Carter doesn’t. | ||
All of the following will either have announced their campaign for the Presidency, formed exploratory committees, or will obviously be campaigning for the job: Joe Biden, Howard Dean, Hillary Clinton, Rudy Giuliani, Bill Frist, John McCain. | I’m counting this as correct. It sure looks obvious to me. | |
No major Chicago professional sports team will win a championship in 2005. | This was my surest prediction and the one that was most spectacularly wrong. Who’da thunk it. Go Sox! |
13 right; 7 wrong. Of the popular culture predictions 2 right; 4 wrong. My popular culture predictions were, by and large, terrible but my political, geo-political, and economic predictions were pretty darned good if I do say so myself.
I’ll have my predictions for 2006 up later today.