2004 predictions

[GePap]

The elections will be nasty, both in the country and here in Poly.

Things in afghanistan will deteriorate though not catastrophically.

[Bereta_Eder]

Originally posted by Buck Birdseed
Olympics in countries smaller than greece:

Summer:
Stockholm 1912
Antwerp 1920 (okay, about the same size)
Helsinki 1952

Ok, OK, I should have said the smallest and financially weaker together.

Nice propaganda there by PASOK though had us all conveinced we were the smallest one. Then again I'm so uninterested about the subject I didn't ever bothered to check it out. Thanks Birdseed.

[Sandman]

George Bush will return to the Whitehouse after an even dodgier election, which involves Arnie pulling strings to see California fall to the Republicans. There will be open talk of amending the American constitution to allow for a third and fourth term for Bush. The whisperings of a second American civil war will become that little bit louder.

Iraq will continue to smoulder, although the reporting of casualties will dwindle. The familiar pantomine that is the Israel/Palestine conflict will continue to grab headlines.

The world will continue to ignore Africa, despite at least one major natural disaster.

There will be another important politician assassinated in an EU country. European nationalism will become stronger in the core of the EU. Britain will not join the euro, and it will look increasingly unlikely that it ever will. The royals will suffer their most serious scandal yet, and cries of 'republic' will grow ever louder.

China and Taiwan will improve their diplomatic relations. North Korea will embrace free-market reforms. China's economy will grow.

Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas will break gaming records, but its release will be marred by bugs (on a console!) and repetative gameplay. A GTA MMORPG will be announced.

A series of big-buget flops finally kills off the super-hero revival. Fantasy films start to become more common. It is announced that the Hobbit will be filmed as a TV mini-series, starring some of the LOTR cast.

[Vlad Antlerkov]

Politics: The Dem primaries become Dean vs. Clark. (Yes, it's a two-man race, just not the one Kerry, Lieberman, et al would like. ) I won't predict anything about the general election, other than it'll be really bloody close, resulting in a Florida-like controversy in some crap state like NH deciding the election.

Now, regarding baseball, which is all that really matters...

AL East: Boston, Yanks (WC), Toronto, Baltimore, Tampa Bay (with the Sox, Yanks, and Jays winning 95+ games and separated by only 5 games tops, and the Orioles barely reaching .500)
AL Central: Minnesota, KC, ChiSox, Cleveland, Detroit (KC finishes above .500, Tigers lose 115+)
AL West: Oakland, Anaheim, Seattle, Texas (Sorry.)

NL East: Philly, Atlanta, Florida, Montjuan, Mets (Phils win despite Bowa)
NL Central: Houston, Da Cubs (WC), St. Louis, Pittsburgh, Cincinnati, Milwaukee (Wood, Prior, or both misses half the season due to injury and overuse, otherwise Cubs win division)
NL West: Arizona, SD, SF, LA, Colorado (Pass.)

AS game: AL
AL playoffs: Boston over Minnesota, Oakland over Yankees, Oakland over Boston
NL playoffs: Houston over Philly, Cubs over Arizona, Houston over Cubs
WS: Oakland over Houston in 7 games

AL MVP: Manny Ramirez (now, the question is, can Manny be motivated enough?)
NL MVP: Albert Pujols (Bobby Abreu gets no mentions at all. AGAIN. )
AL Cy: Roy Halladay
NL Cy: Roy Oswalt
AL ROY: Joe Mauer (with a respectful nod in the direction of Bobby Crosby)
NL ROY: Khalil Greene (I won't give this to Kaz Matsui, not because Matsui has lots more experience--which is a BS excuse to not vote for him anyway--but because Greene will be better, IMHO. Kaz's older brother probably should have won the AL ROY last year, but I didn't mind Angel Berroa winning it, FWIW.)

Absolutely Random Postseason Heroes (the "Aaron F. Boone Award"): Brad Ausmus in the NL, Chad Bradford in the AL.
Absolutely Random Great Seasons (the "Esteban Loaiza Award"): Pokey Reese, Cristian Guzman, Bobby Kielty in the AL; David Bell, Jeriome Robertson in the NL.
Bizarre Trades/Signings (the "Jay-Buhner-For-Ken-Phelps Award"): Magglio Ordonez plus cash to Arizona for a bucket of warm tar (read: Shea Hillenbrand) at the deadline.

[Jaguar]

By the time Kerry Gephardt and Clark finish fighting for the #2 spot in the Democratic primaries, Dean has already run away with the nomination.

Things actually become pretty quiet on the War on Terror front. The attacks in Iraq begin to dwindle, and no change occurs in Syria or North Korea. Random lefties whine about detainees still, and they occasionally fiddle with the terror alert color code, but Israel and Palestine become the media's favorite terrorism story again.

The economy rises steadily, and Republicans make as big of a deal out of it as possible. Democrats try to find some obscure statistic where things got worse, and then point to it as proof that the economy is not on an upswing.

Because of quiet on the terrorism front and a good economy, Dean loses his spark. Bush raises gay marriage as an issue, Dean takes the bait and says he supports it. This, in addition to gains in the war on terror and the economy, allows Bush to hand Dean's ass to him in the election. Bush wins 35+ states.

New England Patriots make it to the Superbowl, but lose to an NFC team nobody expected to win by making crucial fourth quarter errors.

Fez comes back to the OT for a short while, and then leaves.

Osama bin Laden remains at large.

Half Life 2 is finally released in May, and everyone loves it at first, but then sours on it and decides it was not a worthy successor to the original.

Halo 2 is also released, and has excellent AI, beautiful graphics, and many expansive levels with awesome outdoor environments. But the indoor parts of the game are still bland and boring.

Harry Potter VI will still be nowhere close to done. The third movie will be quite good.

The last episode of Friends won't be very good.

Return of the King will reach one billion dollars in revenue.

The Redskins will continue their revolving-door coaching system, and have an abysmal 6-10 season.

McDonalds continues to run "I'm lovin' [sic] it" ads ad nauseum.

China and Taiwan continue to shout at each other, but don't do anything.

The Honorable Judge Arthur Vandelay sentences the "New York Four" to one year in prison.

[Imran Siddiqui]

Return of the King will reach one billion dollars in revenue.

VERY doubtful!

[Jaguar]

I had to make one outlandish prediction, because all of my other predictions were too reasonable and likely.

[RGBVideo]

Ok, OK, I should have said the smallest and financially weaker together.

Helsinki 1952.

[Agathon]

Originally posted by Jaguar Warrior
By the time Kerry Gephardt and Clark finish fighting for the #2 spot in the Democratic primaries, Dean has already run away with the nomination.

That's not hard to predict.

Things actually become pretty quiet on the War on Terror front. The attacks in Iraq begin to dwindle, and no change occurs in Syria or North Korea. Random lefties whine about detainees still, and they occasionally fiddle with the terror alert color code, but Israel and Palestine become the media's favorite terrorism story again.

I don't think the attacks will dwindle. In fact I think they may get worse. However, the reporting of them will dwindle which is as good as reality for Bush's purposes.

Because of quiet on the terrorism front and a good economy, Dean loses his spark. Bush raises gay marriage as an issue, Dean takes the bait and says he supports it. This, in addition to gains in the war on terror and the economy, allows Bush to hand Dean's ass to him in the election. Bush wins 35+ states.

If this happens, or something like it, the US will become a pariah among developed states. Everyone else is getting progressive, the US is getting more mediaeval by the minute. Overt Anti Americanism becomes a sure fire vote winner everywhere except Britain and Israel.

Fez comes back to the OT for a short while, and then leaves.

Osama bin Laden remains at large.

These two events thus providing a crucial clue in the quest for the true identity of the terrorist mastermind.

[KrazyHorse]

Originally posted by Imran Siddiqui

Return of the King will reach one billion dollars in revenue.

VERY doubtful!

If you include foreign take it's very doubtful that it won't.

[Agathon]

Some more serious predictions then:

1. The Liberals under Paul Martin win a landslide election in Canada. The New Democratic Party under Jack Layton wins so many votes that it becomes a de facto opposition party. Apart from those in the wilds of Alberta and Canada's hate criminals, nobody pays attention to the United Conservative Party.

2. Howard Dean becomes the democratic nominee. He attempts to get Wesley Clark to be his running mate and has some difficulty doing so.

3. US forces "find" Osama Bin Laden about a month or so before the election guaranteeing a Bush win. Bush takes the win as an opportunity to make new laws further restricting abortion.

4. The rest of the world minus Israel and the desperate British Tories become even more politically and ideologically estranged from the United States.

5. Newcastle United will not win a single football trophy.

6. The Toronto Maple Leafs will falter in the third round of the Stanley Cup playoffs.

7. The advertising campaign for the Linux operating system will become more prevalent as will the presence of the OS and related OSS in the business world. The SCO suit will be exposed for the fraud that it is and that company will implode.

8. Microsoft will announce further delays to its new "Longhorn" OS. Bill Gates will give away a lot of his own money.

9. Apple Computer will announce that the new version of Mac OS X (codenamed "Hyena" or something equally embarrassing) will ship in the first quarter of 2005. Apple will release a new Office suite based on KOffice or some less elaborate alternative to replace the ageing Appleworks. Steve Jobs will appear to announce these things wearing a black mock turtleneck and blue jeans with no belt.

10. Apple will continue to dominate the online music business and the portable music player market. The ipod will continue to be the number one selling portable player mainly due to the fact that Apple will introduce a new low cost version at January's MacWorld Expo. At least one of the other "major" players in online music retail will go out of business (probably Napster, which by all accounts "sux").