OPINION: A Glimpse At 2012 America

Time Magazine named its person of the year this week. It was the protester. I don’t have a problem with it naming a person of the year or the protester. It was a choice I agree with. But, I thought, well enough for Time magazine, good enough for me. It jumped the gun with its timing, as it does every year.

Usually I wait for my New Year’s predictions, but this year I decided to do it the week before Christmas and not wait till next week. So, here they are:

President Obama wins re-election:

I think the president will win this election handily. Why would I come up with that prediction when his polls are low and the country is not happy with his leadership? It is a simple answer.

If the nominee is Gov. Mitt Romney, and the president debates him, it is going to be obvious to the American people that he will not be the kind of leader they want in terms of creating jobs and moving the American people forward. George W. Bush, a graduate of Harvard Business School, was also supposed to be the businessman America needed. He got us into two expensive wars and busted the budget that had finally come to be balanced.

If the nominee is Newt Gingrich, then the American people will be treated to a great debate on the economy and the direction of the country. Speaker Gingrich is so smart that the debate will be really interesting and will engage the American people in the solving of our problems. In the end, however, I think the American people will decide that he is too much of risky deal and will go to the voting booth and select President Obama. If by some chance Ron Paul is the nominee, the American people, while agreeing with a lot of what he has to say, will feel he is too “out there,” and he will not be elected.

I think the president can go to bed this Christmas safely knowing he will be re-elected. He will have to work for it, but he will be re-elected.

Syrian “President” Assad will be deposed:

Year 2011, the year of the Arab Spring, saw changes in governments in Tunisia and Egypt and some major changes in others. By the most recent counts, more than 5,000 protesters have been killed. The U.N. Security Council is considering action, and clearly the various CIA-type organizations from different countries are helping the opposition. It may take some months, but with recent army defections in Syria, there is almost no way he can stay in power. The Arab League has rejected him, and with major trade sanctions there is no way he can survive. His best hope is to recredential himself as a physician and have a nice life on the millions of dollars he undoubtedly has socked away.

The Supreme Court finds that Obama’s health-care plan is legal:

Most of the justices believe Congress can make laws and that the laws it makes should be upheld. Although Congress might find some parts of the law to be unconstitutional, I think the law will move forward and stay law in 2014.

Congress will pretty much stay the same:

I don’t think the House will turn over to the Democrats, and I don’t think the Republicans will take back the Senate. The Republicans will pick up some seats in the Senate and lose some in the House, but look for it to be pretty much the same configuration it has been this election cycle.

Iran continues to make noise, but no action is taken except via drones:

Iran will play its version of the kids game “mother may I” and try to taunt the rest of the world, but no major progress in their goals will be made. Iran will continue to be an election hot point, but neither Israel nor the U.S. will make moves to be more aggressive, other than surveillance by drone.

The Keystone XL pipeline will stay the political hot potato it is now:

It will take much more of the up-front Democrat-Republican partisan wrangling than the unemployment insurance or the payroll tax reduction that has surfaced. Most Republicans agree on both issues, even though they are loath to say it. The real disagreement is over energy policy and the XL pipeline.

These are just a few of my predictions and I might add some in the next few weeks. Of all my predictions, I am sure of President Obama’s re-election. That might irk some readers, but we can check in next year and see if President Obama is re-elected.