Finally, the Predictions for 2024

Some guts and clairvoyance for now, and we will, finally, keep score

Devotees of this space will know that we embrace the special genius and charisma of courage! Let us make our predictions for 2024. Keep score!

In no particular order . . . .

Ukraine will end the year in roughly the same place. At the end of the year, there will be no major difference in borderlines or territory controlled.

Score: 1/1. This is about right.

Yahya Sinwar, Hamas’s demon of Gaza, is captured or killed. He will take hostages with him.

Score: 1/1. Dead as Caesar. And it appears he ordered the murder of six hostages who had been with him toward the end.

At least one of Ismail Haniyeh, Moussa Abu Marzuk or Khaled Mashal, the ghastly Hamas terror leaders living in Qatar, will be assassinated. Qatar will protest. Their protest will not matter or change any policy anywhere, including in Qatar. Update as of January 2, 2024: Saleh al-Arouri, a comparably top Hamas leader, is assassinated in Beirut, along with another half dozen terrorists.

Score: 1/1. Haniyeh was assassinated in July 2024 in Tehran while at the official super duper Iranian regime guest house.

Gaza will have no Palestinian-led government. Israel will start to carve its buffer zone.

Score: 1/1. Nothing official yet. But as of now it looks that way, at the least.

Hezbollah will not escalate to a hot war. They will continue to trade blows with Israel. But this will not turn into a full-blown conflict.

Score: 0/1. Hezbollah did escalate to a hot war. Lost. Then brokered a ceasefire.

Main global threat of the year will be Iran’s continued development of near-nuclear-bomb-level fissile material. Tehran will accelerate if they can. A preemptive strike by the United States or Israel is on the table. Such an attack will not result in a war. Update as of April 13, 2024: your devoted scribe was in Israel for the cowardly and hugely unsuccessful Iranian bombardment of Israel. Israel’s pinpoint signal-sending response right next to Iran’s nuclear program tended to affirm this prediction.

Score: 1/1. This is a squishy prediction, in some sense. But it seems more true to me than not.

Vladimir Putin ends the year alive and in charge of Russia. His power will consolidate and yet wane as Russia slides into its newfound status as China’s client-state.

Score: 1/1.

Biden wins unless Nikki Haley is Trump’s VP nominee. Which she won't be. But if she is . . . .

Score: 0/1. This one turned out to be extremely inaccurate.

The United States ends 2024 with materially the same feckless immigration policy. Nearly ceaseless border crossings continue. The legal war between DC and Texas escalates. Immigration becomes the biggest threat to Biden and is still not enough for him to lose (unless Haley is on the GOP ticket).

Score: 1/1. But it seems help is on the way. This has now proven to be the worst immigration policy and implementation in American history.

Claudine Gay is no longer the President of Harvard. She commences a new extended chapter in her life, consecrated to recriminating — and suing — Harvard or other parties on the basis of discrimination. Update as of January 2, 2024: Claudine Gay is resigning. Update as of January 3, 2024: Gay publishes op-ed in New York Times taking precious little responsibility and citing as the ultimate cause of her toppling a combination of racism and a rightwing conspiracy to undermine educational and other institutions.

Score: 1/1.

Rishi Sunak sinks the Tories. The Conservative Party has the better case for the UK, but Sunak lacks the qualities necessary to lead a party to electoral victory.

Score: 1/1.

Trump is convicted in Georgia and federally. He is jailed. Update as of May, 2024: Trump is convicted of all 34 counts in his NYC indictment.

Score: 0/1. Well, you can’t get ‘em all right. Some might perhaps give me partial credit for the NY convictions, but I don’t, as they did not figure into the prediction.

NoLabels does not run a presidential ticket. They conclude they are more spoilers for Biden than not. They succeed in pulling Biden to the center. Update as of April 4, 2024: NoLabels decides NOT to field a presidential candidate.

Score: 1/1. Was it a shame?

Some brave soul or another makes and distributes a mainstream movie or publishes a mainstream book in which DEI or MeToo don’t automatically carry the day. And in this work, unlike in some of the recent assays, the criticism of DEI is neither quaint nor of the “it’s cool but at least let’s admit it’s incomplete” variety but instead full-throated. Millions consume it. A new market opens. A girl can dream.

Score: 0.5/1. One of my loyal readers pointed to Juror #2, which seems to qualify as non-woke but was hardly a blockbuster. But the rise of the Alternative Mainstream Media — podcasters and the like — does suggest to me that entertainment is indeed getting more ideologically diverse. But has that yet arrived in Disney or Marvel or Action or RomCom Land? I don’t think we are there yet. Are we?

A visible European rational-immigration or anti-immigration politician is assassinated by an Islamist. Regular battle lines are drawn. Something may start to feel different. Update as of May 31, 2024: Michael Stürzenberger is stabbed in Germany by an Islamist.

Score: 1/1.

Islamist terror strikes at least one major European city. The incident is bloody. Regular battle lines are drawn. Something may start to feel different.

Score: 1/1. Too many to name. But at least the Amsterdam Pogrom of November 2024.

European countries consider wide-ranging expulsion policies for illegal immigrants from Muslim countries. Policy proposals are rejected for now. Regular battle lines are drawn. Something does start to feel different. Update as of January 2024: far-right party in Germany is punished for considering such deportations. The policy proves politically radioactive for now.

Score: 1/1. It’s on the table now in elections across Europe. Especially after the fall of the Assad regime, which has caused mainstream German parties to call for the expulsion of Syrian refugees. The policy is less radioactive than I had predicted.

S&P ends year up 10%.

Score: 1/1. Up about 25%.

QQQ ends year up 20%.

Score: 1/1. Up over 25%.

IWM ends year up 30%.

Score: 0/1. Up over 10%.

OIH ends year up 20%.

Score: 0/1. Down over 15%.

BTC hits $70,000.

Score: 1/1. BTC crossed $100,000.

Euro depreciates 10% vs. the USD.

Score: 0/1. Euro is down about 6% vs. the USD.

None of the above or below or anything else I write is financial advice. FFS. I can’t believe I have to write this. But that’s that.

Score: 1/1. Still not giving advice. FFS.

Leeds United returns to the Premier League. (If you know, you know: I have a horse in this race.) Update as of May 26, 2024: Leeds United loses to Southampton at Wembley Stadium in a regrettable 1-0 final playoff result. The girl must continue to dream.

Score: 0/1. We keep hope alive.

Netanyahu is no longer Prime Minister of Israel. He loses the job as soon as the first election takes place, if not sooner. Israel can’t find another stable national leader. There is a cycle of leadership confusion for a while, extending into 2025, at least.

Score: 0/1. Interesting.

Biggest use case of AI is software (re)development. I have a horse in this race, too (cf. modelcode.ai).

Score: 1/1. That’s my call, and I’m sticking to it.

Self-driving makes a comeback. After a bad 2023, self-driving cars get another look and take off again. Not on highways, but in closed-circuit campus-type uses and then in smaller cities.

Score: 0/1. The year 2024 saw more setbacks than gains for self-driving. But the trend is still good for the future, I’d say. I also used Waymo a bunch of times in SF. It’s pretty marvelous.

Faith gets more regard. One senses a shift in the wind. One might call it another Awakening. One might call it a working conclusion that the social-media-consumerism nexus is increasingly viewed as a rootless societal failure and, in some quarters, evil. Can the West defeat reemergent barbarism with better weapons, superior life sciences research, and media reach alone? Or is a value system required? And if so, where does one find or locate such a value system? Witness the conversion of famous atheist Ayaan Hirsi Ali Ferguson to Christianity. Or the advocacy of Catherine Pakaluk, who explains that women of faith have more kids, and that faith, not tax policy, is the most promising solution to global depopulation. This prediction is hard to measure. But watch for more consideration of faith, perhaps measured by more articles in the “MSM” on the subject.

Score: 0/1. I don’t see it yet, beyond some early signs. Do you?

Donald Trump and Elon Musk have health scares. Ones we learn about. Americans realize they don't really want one and really do want the other. Update as of January 7, 2024: WSJ reports that investors, board members, and others involved with Musk’s companies have expressed concern about his use of legal and illegal drugs.

Score: 0/1. Not really.

Warren Buffet dies. Exit smiling. Berkshire Hathaway becomes more valuable.

Score: 0/1. Though he must be smiling.

A US billionaire founds and funds a new professional news gathering organization. Fed up with the status quo, this billionaire doesn’t buy an old existing outlet to keep it alive or to reform it. It’s a new entity.

Score: 0/1. I am not aware of any.

Milei’s reforms in Argentina start to work. Visibly.

Score: 1/1. If I could give myself 2/1 for this one, I would. ;)

China does not invade Taiwan. Nor does China make a blockade of Taiwan.

Score: 1/1.

Killing of African Christians by Islamists manages to become front-page news in the West. This is sustained for a period of months. Some US or Western news organization sends real-live journalists to cover the conflict and keeps them there for a while. Consequences follow. (See prediction in re faith.)

Score: 0.5/1. This is just starting to manifest. In fact, I kinda believe I was “saved by the bell” by this eleventh hour article in the Wall Street Journal on this exact topic. But I have nonetheless scored myself a half-point because it does appear very hard to get the MSM to pay attention or spend resources on on-the-ground coverage in places that don’t have good hotels or large US Federal spend.

A new shooting war starts with Russia, Venezuela, or Pakistan as instigators. Your guess as to who is the recipient of this military largesse.

Score: 0/1.

Microdosing overdose kills or permanently maims a prominent Silicon Valley type. Reformers and regulators pay attention. Update as of January 7, 2024: WSJ reports that investors, board members, and others involved with Elon Musk’s companies have expressed concern about his use of legal and illegal drugs.

Score: 0.5/1. No actual incident of note of which I am aware. But the concern is now hitting headlines.

One major national professional licensing organization (APA, AMA, ABA, etc.) sees a major breakaway schism. The anti-science, anti-knowledge, anti-merit movement meets at least one professional org comeuppance. Update as of August 2024: The American Society of Plastic Surgeons (ASPS) tiptoed (or zig-zagged, for the specific purposes of this prediction) in this direction by stating it had not endorsed any practice of treatment of adolscents with gender dysphoria.

Score: 0/1. I still think this will, should, and must happen. But it has not.

Antisemitic incidents in the United States triple. At least one major pro-Palestinian entity is named to the federal list of terrorist organizations.

Score: 1/1. Literally tripled. See this, for example, from CNN. It is true that no pro-Palestinian group was named to the federal list of terrorist organizations, I have nominated a rule-icle that only the bold-texted part is the actual prediction, while the rest is color or addendum. Otherwise, I would have scored myself a 1/2 point! ;)

Final score: 21.5 points out of a possible 38 (excluding the financial advice comment as an actual winnable point.)