Paul Gottfried

January 01, 2009

An enterprising member of our literary- academic establishment will soon be writing a book about how Lincoln invaded the South in a desperate attempt to prevent Hitler?s accession to power. Apparently the CSA was teeming with Nazi precursors, as Arthur Schlesinger once observed in The Vital Center, and now a book that will be highly praised in the national press will make the same point through several hundred pages. There may also be a bestseller this year (if one does not already exist) showing how Bach?s Magnificat encapsulated the plan for Hitler?s Final Solution, which was also cleverly hidden in Kant?s Critique of Pure Reason and, most egregiously, in Frau von Bismarck?s night pot.

Sarah Palin?s popularity among Republicans will continue to soar, and especially after she insists on firebombing Teheran in punishment for Iran?s failure to enact anti-discrimination laws for women. Sarah will also give a speech, calling for a League of Democracies that would embrace the entire solar system, and which would go beyond the now outmoded notion of ?global democracy.? Her son-in-law?s mother will be caught in flagrante delicto, distributing drugs to the governor?s family (I suspect that?s already happened). The drug-imbibing first lady-in-law of Alaska will then be given a suspended sentence on the condition that she enters a rehab center on the North Pole.

The media will continue to slime Bush with the hope of diverting attention from the ineptitude of his successor in getting the economy back on track. But GOP loyalists have no need to worry! Ob will continue to be pounded (as he was earlier this week in the New York Post) for being reluctant to go to war with Islamo-fascist Iran. Perhaps by the end of this year, however, the new president will start acting like a Republican. 

The only permissible political positions will continue to be leftist ones, namely the opinions of left-liberals and neocons. The usual types will continue to pollute our civic discourse, unless something truly apocalyptic occurs. I can?t imagine what that would be, but if Rupert Murdoch goes bankrupt, American political thinking might become more hygienic. And oh yes, Muslim Fundamentalists will continue to pour into European cities, while European governments continue to yammer about racism, anti-Semitism, and homophobia. The response of our ?conservative? media will likely continue to be ?Let them all in but please teach them about human rights and the Holocaust!?  What did the ancients say about quis vult perdere, prius dementat?

This website will continue to be a voice crying out in a leftist wilderness. But we may soon be able to trade in our slingshots for medium-range missiles. Hope springs eternal even for grizzled paleo warriors.

I would offer further predictions if I could think of any more, but at my age the past look a lot more eventful than the future.