Ceasefire

I was convinced that Bibi would be a dick and insist on delaying the deal until after Trump gets into office, as a final snub of Biden and a way to curry favor with the new administration. But it looks like it is a done-enough deal to announce and will go into effect on Sunday (the last day of the Biden Administration).

For the past year what each party would agree to was clear, but they just seemed to be irreconcilable. Since January 2024, Hamas has offered to release all the hostages in return to a permanent ceasefire and a full Israeli withdraw from Gaza. Israel has insisted it only be a temporary ceasefire without any withdrawal. It looks like what they got is a partial release of the hostages, a partial withdrawal of Israeli forces, and a six-week ceasefire.

In my opinion this is absolutely good news. I even see a possibility that this could turn into a permanent ceasefire because Trump is so determined to get credit for not having a war in Israel on his watch, he is going to put a lot of pressure on Netanyahu to not restart hostilities when the six week period expires in early March. (That would also require Hamas to release the remaining hostages that aren't covered by this deal--I don't know if they would do that without a full Israeli withdrawal from Gaza.)

I also wonder what this means for Netanyahu's future. Not long ago the Israeli public seemed done with him because of his failure to prevent the 10/7 attack and his criminal case was looking increasingly threatening. But now that he is an indicted war criminal and enough time has passed to dull some of the calls for new leadership, will Israelis rally enough support to him to survive?

Can he also name it X?

Honestly, I'd rather have it owned by China. On the other hand, I guess we could let Elon destroy TikTok like he did Twitter. That's one way to get those kiddos off the app.

Trump's mental decline is not newsworthy

Yesterday the President-elect suggested that he may order an invasion of Denmark, a NATO ally, to seize one of its territories for the purpose of conquest.

It was barely a story in the news. In the NYT print edition (not that print matters anymore but the paper's decision does show its priorities) the story about Trump's threats to Denmark, in addition to his threats to Canada and Panama, was on page A13.

Seriously, this guy is losing his fucking mind in broad daylight in front of the whole world just 13 days before he assumes the most powerful position on the planet.

What is a "truce" anyway?

One of those funny-not-funny thing is how Israel keep warning the the truce with Hezbollah "might collapse" when for the past few weeks Israel has been bombing alleged Hezbollah positions in Southern Lebanon and Hezbollah has shot rockets into Israel (it says as punishment for Israeli violations of the truce). Meanwhile UNIFIL, the UN Peacekeeping force in Southern Lebanon, has recorded over 100 Israel violations of the ceasefire agreement in Lebanon, as well as what it called Israel's "flagrant violation" yesterday.

If the truce does collapse, as Israel warns, how will we even tell?

2025 Predictions

Here we are, another prediction time. As I've done (almost) every year since 2008, I will give you what I predict will happen in 2025 so that I can check my answers at the end of the year and post them so everyone sees how completely full of shit I am. As always, these predictions are what I think will happen, not what I necessarily want to happen.

Also, I try to only make predictions that are objectively measurable. In other words, I want to be able to give each one a thumbs up or thumbs down rating at the end of the year without a lot of judgment calling. To the extent I can, they will be clear true/false type predictions or based on some numerical rating that I can check at the end of the year to come up with a clear conclusion whether I got the prediction right or wrong.

Okay, enough stalling. Here is what I got:

1. All of Trump's cabinet appointees who are put to a vote in the Senate (both in committee and in the Senate at large) will pass. Some may drop out before they get to a vote (like Gaetz already has) but everyone who it put up for a vote will be confirmed.

2. Elon Musk will no longer have any role in the Trump Administration (this prediction includes the prediction that either he won't be in charge of DOGE, or that DOGE won't exist by the end of the year)

3. The government will shut down at least once in 2025.

4. Mike Johnson will no longer be Speaker of the House at the end of 2025.

5. Trump will imposed new tariffs on Chinese goods of at least 20%. The tariffs will be broadly on all Chinese goods, with a bunch of exceptions for his friends and contributors.

6. The rate of inflation at the end of 2025 will be higher than 4%.

7. Trump's inauguration celebration in Washington will include at least one Nazi and/or Neo-Nazi incident (meaning a pro-Nazi demonstration or Nazi-violence or property defacement or damage).

8. Either Clarence Thomas or Sam Alito will announce their retirement (probably pending confirmation of a successor) in 2025.

9. The federal debt ceiling will be abolished in 2025.

10. Elon Musk will no longer be the world's richest person by the end of 2025.

11. Donald Trump will either die or have a major health crisis (meaning a hospitalization and at least a temporary incapacitation) in 2025.

12. Trump will issue an executive order to conduct mass deportations which will trigger lawsuits, family separations, and mass incarceration of migrants.

13. Trump will reduce the refugee cap to zero in 2025.

14. Congress will pass a bill that will either extend the Trump tax cuts originally passed in 2017 so that their expiration does not occur until after Trump's current presidential term, or make them permanent.

15. The filibuster for legislation will be abolished in 2025.

16. There will be some negotiated cease fire in Ukraine that effectively freezes the front lines but doesn't really resolve the conflict (meaning Ukraine won't agree to give up any territory permanently and Russia won't agree to alter any of its territorial claims over Ukraine) There will be at least one ceasefire violation after it is negotiated. (Actually, there will probably be several but at this point I'm going with "at least one")

17. The War in Gaza will be "over" in the sense that Israel will claim that something like an end to major military operations in the strip and all the hostages will be released or deemed dead. But Hamas will still exist, Israel will continue to kill people in the Gaza strip, and there will be no serious effort to rebuild the region.

18. The U.S. will institute some kind of sanctions against the International Criminal Court to retaliate against its criminal investigation and charges of Israeli officials because of their actions in Gaza.

19. The civil war in Sudan will still be raging at the end of 2025 even though there will rarely be any stories about it in the U.S. news media.

20. The Syrian provisional government that took over since Assad fled the country will still be in control of Damascus and nominally, at least, the rest of Syria. No major civil war will break out in 2025, although the regime will still be fragile and its future will still be in question.

21. The five former Soviet Stans (Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, Tajikistan, and the Kyrgyz Republic--not really a stan anymore even though most people still call it "Kyrgyzstan") will not have any change in their head of state in 2025.

22. Trump's approval in the 538 favorability average model will be underwater (meaning higher disapproval than approval) throughout 2025.

23. Congress will pass some kind of legislation that requires the federal government to buy cryptocurrency in 2025.

24. While there may be an effort to cut Social Security or Medicare in 2025, no such cuts will pass Congress.

I was thinking about doing a prediction about how the media will be cowed in 2025, but I can't come up with an objective/measurable prediction for that one that can cover all the ways our craven corporate media will cow-tow to the Shitler regime. Luckily(?) I may have a few years of this regime to come up with a measurable prediction. Silver linings, people!

Grading my 2024 Predictions

This is going to be grim (I write that before I cut and paste the list of predictions I posted at the beginning of 2024. I already know that most of what happened this year was not what I expected). But it is finally time to demonstrate just how full of shit I am when I predict stuff:

1. Trump will appear on both the primary ballot and the general election ballot of all 50 states and Washington D.C. in the 2024 elections.

Right. Starting off strong!

2. The current war in Gaza will be "over" in the sense that the year will end with a long-term ceasefire in effect (whether formal or informal), but Hamas will still exist and the humanitarian disaster that is Gaza will still be a humanitarian disaster.

Wrong. I mean that last clause is correct. But the prediction was that the war in Gaza would be over, not about Hamas' existence or the humanitarian disaster.

3. Netanyahu will not be Prime Minister of Israel at the end of 2024.

Sadly wrong.

4. There will be no new peace agreement between Israel and Saudi Arabia, or any other Arab nation, in 2024.

Right! The Biden Administration's belief that they could somehow get an Israeli-Saudi peace agreement out of the slaughter in Gaza was delusional.

5. Trump will not just be the GOP nominee for President in 2024, but no other candidate will win a single state, or come closer than being double digits (10%or more) behind him in the primaries or caucuses of every single state.

When I first saw this one I thought it would be right. But then I decided to actual look at the various primary results and there was this. So I'm going to have to rate it wrong.

6. Biden will be reelected President in 2024.

Wrong.

7. None of Trump's criminal cases will go to trial in 2024.

Wrong.

8. There will be at least one more corruption allegation against Justice Thomas and/or Alito in 2024, but it will not result in any real reforms of the Court.

Right! Here's one about Alito and here's one about Thomas. In fact, there were so many Thomas and Alito being bribed accepting gifts by rich people stories in 2024, I feel like I should get this one counted right several times over. And yet, not only was there no reform, there was no serious effort to get enforceable ethics on the justices of our highest court.

9. The Supreme Court will end 2024 with the same Justices that it began the year with.

Right, none died and none retired.

10. The war in Ukraine will still be going on, with only minor changes in the territory that Russia and Ukraine control in Ukraine by the end of the year.

I'm going to call this right even though Ukraine grabbed a chunk of Russia (which is slowly being whittled away by Russian and North Korean forces), and Russia seems to be advancing in the Donbas region. Even with those changes, the frontlines are fairly similar to where they were at the end of 2023.

11. The Democrats will lose control of the Senate but gain control of the House in the 2024 elections.

Half right! Or half wrong! Democrats lost the Senate and Republicans maintained control of the House, albeit with an even narrower margin than the super-narrow one they had in the past two years.

12. Mike Johnson will not be speaker of the House at the end of 2024.

Wrong. He might lose his speakership in the next few days, but as of December 31, 2024, he still has that gavel.

13. Trump will pick Vivek Ramaswamy as his running mate.

Wrong! I should have predicted that Trump will pick someone else as his running mate, then ignore him after the election in favor of Elon Musk, with Ramaswamy as Musk's vice-useless billionaire. What a super-predictor I would have been if I had said that!

14. Trump will mangle the name "Ramaswamy" on camera at least once in 2024.

Wrong. Surprisingly, I can't find any sign that this happened. If you can find any examples, let me know.

15. The UK will finally hold a general election in 2024 and the British Prime Minister at the end of the year will not be a Tory.

Right.

16. Ukraine will not hold a presidential election in 2024 because of their national emergency and Zelensky's approval will be lower at the end of 2024 than it was at the end of 2023.

Right on both counts.

17. The U.S. economy will not have a recession in 2024.

Right.

18. The Supreme Court will overrule the "Chevron deference rule" in Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo.

Right.

19. The Supreme Court will rule that Trump has no immunity (not even a partial or qualified immunity) from prosecution for anything he did after he ceased being president.

Wrong. I totally blew this one. I guess I still thought that even our corrupt Supreme Court was not that corrupt and detached from the text of the constitution.

20. The head of state in the five Central Asian stans will be the same at the end of 2024 as it today.

Right! I do some version of this most years, going back and forth predicting a change or no change. I'm usually right when I predict no change.

21. Biden's approval according to the 538 polling average will be higher at the end of 2024 than it is currently (as of 12/31/23 it is 39.3%), but his rating will still be underwater (meaning Biden's disapproval number will be higher than his approval number).

I'm going to call this half right. Biden's approval rating is only 37.4%, but he is definitely underwater. Am I being too easy on myself? I mean, Biden being underwater was the easier prediction to get right. Maybe I am being too easy, but this year I need it! I'm still giving myself a half point.

22. Trump will have some kind of health crisis in 2024, but he will not tell the public what it is. So he might just disappear from public view, or check into the hospital without any announcement of what happened (although it is possible some reporters will figure it out).

Wrong. If he had a health crisis, the coverup was so good no one noticed (I'm not counting getting grazed by a bullet on the ear. That's not the kind of thing I was predicting with this one). There was definitely no unaccounted for disappearance from public appearances.

23. 2024 will be the hottest year ever recorded, beating the current hottest year, 2023.

Right. The final official results won't be published until January, but the UN is already saying that 2024 was the hottest year on record.

The Tally
I got 12 right and 11 wrong, that's 52.174% right! Holy shit, I can't believe I got more than 50% right. I was sure it would be my worst rate ever, but I beat my success rate in 2015 and 2021!

Here is how I did on every prior year since I started doing this:

2008: 20 right to 4 wrong (83.333%) 
2009: 14.5 right to 7.5 wrong. (65.909%) 
2010: (none because Kazakhstan) 
2011: 15.5 right to 6.5 wrong (70.455%) 
2012: 15.5 right to 6.5 wrong again (70.455% again) 
2013: 15.5 right to 9.5 wrong (62.000%) 
2014: 17 right to 9 wrong (65.385%) 
2015: 11.5 right to 13.5 wrong (46.000%) 
2016: 17.5 right to 9.5 wrong (64.815%) 
2017: 18 right to 8 wrong (69.923%) 
2018: 14.5 right to 11.5 wrong (55.769%)
2019: 15.5 right to 11.5 wrong (57.407%)
2020: 10.5 right to 10.5 wrong (50.000%)
2021: 10 right to 13 wrong (43.478%)
2022: 14 right to 8 wrong (63.636%)

2023: 17 right to 6 wrong (73.913%)

Will I do any better in 2025? Tune in soon to see those predictions and then keep tuning in for a year to watch how wrong I turn out to be!

Too soon!

I've been working on my predictions for 2025 post (yes, I start working on that post before one minute after midnight on January 1st). One is about the inevitable Trump-Musk breakup, and I've been trying to come up with a good prediction of how it would happen.

But before I figured it out, it already started happening, still in 2024. Goddammit, Elon! Now I guess I gotta come up with some other prediction to replace it. That weirdo ruins everything.