As has been my practice I made some predictions for 2006. Some were right; some wrong; some spectactularly wrong. Here’s how I did:
The major accomplishment of the new Democratically-controlled Congress will be an increase in the minimum wage | Credit where credit is due: they also enacted an increase in CAFE standards but the major accomplishment was an increase in the minimum wage. | |
There will be no major Social Security, Medicare, or immigration reform | ||
The Congress won’t be able to resist conducting investigations of the last six years of the Bush Administration | I’ve been impressed at how restrained the new Congress has been but I think there’s been enough investigation that this qualifies as a correct prediction. | |
Neither the U. S. nor Israel will bomb or invade Iran | ||
The number of U. S. forces in Iraq will not go below 100,000 | I wish I’d raised the ante on the bets I’d made on this one. If I had, I’d be wealthy man today. | |
The surge in Iraq won’t accomplish much | Like practically everybody else I underestimated how fast the situation in Iraq could change. I don’t believe that it’s possible to disaggregate the effects of the surge, the Sunni awakening, ethnic cleansing, just plain fatigue, and who knows what all else but I think some credit is undoubtedly due to the surge itself. | |
Either Iran or North Korea (maybe both) will test a nuclear weapon (or fake such a test). Not much will be done about it. | ||
There will be a major terrorist attack in Europe. Mostly likely target: Britain | Do the abortive car bomb attacks last summer count? I’m giving myself half-credit for this one. | |
China (whose diplomacy has been excellent for a long time) will stumble | China has stumbled but in an unexpected way. Product defect issues has shaken confidence in Chinese imports. | |
Windows Vista won’t live up to either sales or technical expectations. It will catch on anyway once SP1 has been released. | Microsoft’s problems with Vista have probably just begun. I continue to suspect that it will dominate. | |
There will be a technological breakthrough that will gain critical mass. Possibly electric cars. Possibly a battery technology. | I’m disappointed that this prediction looks like it has failed. | |
As people bear more costs for their own healthcare pressure will increase for reform. Not much will happen. | ||
Barack Obama’s repute will peak. | There are some signs that this prediction has proved correct i.e. if Obama doesn’t come in at least second in Iowa. However, at this point Sen. Obama looks to be more than a flash in the pan. | |
George W. Bush’s repute hasn’t hit bottom yet. | I was pretty clearly right about this but it now looks as though his repute is climbing again. I doubt it’ll ever be as low as it was last spring. |
Nine and a half out of my thirteen predictions turned out to be correct for a total of 73%. My track record continues to be pretty good and, oddly, the same as last year.
I’ll have my predictions for 2007 up tomorrow.
You know, if you’d stop making wrong predictions your score would go way up.
By the way, I think you get credit on the technological prediction for the stem cell breakthrough. I don’t know what you meant by critical mass, but that was big, and it was essentially technological.
There have been lots of important technological developments this year. Possibly the most important have been developments in solar panels leading to dramatic cost reductions but I don’t think any new technology has achieved critical mass this year.
An example of a technology gaining critical mass is back in the 1870’s when the power jigsaw was invented (first foot or water powered). Guys started going from town to town with the gadgets and within a couple of years practically every house was covered with gingerbread.
Something similar happened in the mid 1990’s when the Internet took off or 1983-1986 when the personal computer took off.
It’s a combination of invention and salesmanship.
You’re one of the few observers who concedes that you saw the Surge as a likely failure. Most everyone did, including me. Instead, I’ve seen rationalization- usually, it wasn’t the Surge at all, it was Sunni rejection of al Qaeda. Doesn’t matter really- Petraeus saw an opportunity and ran with it. It’s just refreshing to see someone admit they were wrong… rarely happens- at any level.