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12/29/2009
Lance Burri: A Wish List for 2010
Aught-Eight ended “like a long exhale,” or so I wrote a year ago, and 2009 began “like a day-old balloon: still floating, but slack.”
It sure didn’t stay that way. Aught-Nine ends more with “good riddance” than with retrospection.
My wish list for 2009 was, for a nice change of pace, relatively accurate. The sun did shine. Snow did (and continues to) fall. Kids got owies, and I spent more time on my computer than working in my yard, but that wasn't all. Makes me wonder whether I should start making predictions again.
Probably not.
Anyway. A new year dawns. In 2010:
Son #1 gets his second-ever deer: a buck, but not as big as mine. And this time he’ll only make one big bag of jerky instead of four.
The Daughter will be accepted to the college of her choice and will begin her freshman year with a well-thought-out financial plan. Her father will narrowly avoid an embarrassing public display of emotion on moving day, but will manage to embarrass her at least twice in front of her future dorm-mates.
The wife and I will go dancing exactly once, but only because we were invited to a wedding.
In state politics: our Democrat majorities will struggle with their agenda, trying to ram through every liberal policy possible while also trying to center-ize themselves in time for November.
Scott Walker will defeat Mayor Tom Barrett in the gubernatorial election despite Barrett’s brave interference in what turns out to be a rare October snowball fight.
One legislative house – preferably the Senate – will flip to a Republican majority.
On the national level: health care “reform” will either fail entirely, or will pass in such watered-down form that a leading “progressive” pundit will call it “the emptiest 2,000 pages of legal text in the history of legal text.”
Guantanamo Bay will remain open. Afghanistan will improve, but teeteringly. Iran, North Korea, Yemen, and at least one formerly unforeseen hotspot will keep Hillary Clinton’s “3 a.m. phone call” commercial among the top-viewed videos on YouTube.
Democrats will fail to significantly increase taxes, angering their base even further.
The economy will improve slightly, but no one will really notice until the mainstream media begins touting the "recovery" in time for the 2010 elections. Whether it will help or not…who knows? Republicans will make major electoral gains, but will fail to win a majority in either house.
It’s just too much ground to get back all at once.
The Green Bay Packers will zealously overhaul their offensive line, helping Aaron Rodgers win the 2010 MVP.
Brett Favre will return for one more season with the Viqueens, and will break the NFL records for fumbles and sacks while his team fails to make the playoffs, or at best stumbles into a wild card spot. Potential labor strife in the NFL will never get past the word “potential.”
I have no idea what will happen to the Brewers and the Bucks, but Danica Patrick will win at least one NASCAR race.
And, as usual:
I get better at everything. Better at writing, better at working, better at Dad-ing and better at husband-ing. It's no secret how. It’s just a matter of doing it.
Politics doesn’t get any nicer, bipartisan, cooperative, or any less nasty, but we’ll all be a little less uptight about that.
George Lucas finally admits that there’s way too much money in the franchise not to make the final three Star Wars movies, not to mention the inevitable re-make. Josh Whedon will agree to write and direct.
And, the prediction I can’t do without:
The kids learn to pick up after themselves without being nagged.
Hey, it'll happen. Someday.
Lance Burri blogs regularly via his site, The TrogloPundit.
COMMENTS
I have to agree with Lance up and down the wish list EXCEPT on one item.
The Republicans SHOULD make great gains in the US congress, but not enough to have a majority ... totally agreed. My addendum would be that a FEW Tea Party candidates win seats which, in combination with the Republicans, take the majority away from the Democrats.
The Republicans have betrayed our trust, fiscal conservatism was the banner they wrapped themselves in - but they shed that banner once elected. They do not deserve a majority at this time, yet their numbers need to increase ONLY to stop the runaway freight train which is liberal spending and progressive invasiveness in to our lives. Add a few Tea Party candidates to keep both parties from running amock and 2010 could be the start of a MUCH better era for our nation.
Jeff Riedl (Tue Dec 29 08:56:53 2009)
Don't even think about changing the mentality. The R's shed the banner because the fat cats that funded their elections were not replaced. Same guys now own the new politicians.
Until the Right and Left come together and demand public funding of campaigns, it will remain the same, year after year.
Jack Lohman (Tue Dec 29 10:03:00 2009)
I am in basic agreement with both Lance and Jeff.
Not sure I disagree, but on this I surely hope Lance is wrong: that is, the failure to wrest from the Democrats control of either the Senate or the House of Representatives. I see 2010 as pivotal to both our prosperity and our freedom. If Dems remain in full control, expect them to do much to consolidate their power, to further their agenda of rapidly undermining our constitution, our liberty and our prosperity. Expect them to be bolder in their attempts to institutionalize corruption, attack their political enemies not for any real crime, but for NOT believing in the socialist/statist/fascist/communist agenda they have in mind for us. For lessons on how this might proceed, look at the histories of Revolutionary France, Germany 1933, Russia 1918.
Overstatement? Hyperbole? Maybe, maybe not. I just hope we do not have the opportunity to find out.
That said, it is likely that even a Republican sweep will have less effect than partisans on either side would have you believe-unless we elect the RIGHT Republicans.
Add to Lance's predictions that there will be more calls for war, many more restrictions on our liberty at home.
and that economic recovery will be but a precurser to a more vigorous downturn from which we may never recover-UNLESS we start electing statesmen.
Ken Van Doren (Tue Dec 29 10:21:10 2009)
And by all means, Ken, let's leave the money in the system. That helps us keep score.
Jack Lohman (Tue Dec 29 13:06:56 2009)
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