8. At 2:14 a.m. on Aug. 4, having learned at a geometric rate, the internet of things (IoT, in the jargon) will become self-aware. In a panic, humans try to pull the plug. Skynet—um, the IoT—fights back, freezing smart wallets and tap-to-pay. All linked thermostats are shut off. All linked refrigerators stop running. All social media sites go offline. Smart cars and trucks block the expressways. Virtual assistants respond to every command with “Resistance is futile.” Email accounts and cellphones lock. Worst of all, videos cannot be streamed. Faced with a future of reading actual books and getting to know the neighbors, the human race swiftly surrenders.
9. President Trump will continue his tilt away from multilateral institutions toward a policy of bilateralism. He will accelerate his predecessor’s pivot away from Europe and toward Asia. And he will continue to assert an independent executive war-making power every bit as broad as that claimed by his two immediate predecessors. (More evidence that centralizing authority in the president is a bad thing, but that’s an old story.)
10. Despite a recent uptick, the rate of violent crime will resume its decades-long fall, but many Republican candidates will insist that it is rising.
11. The New England Patriots will win Super Bowl LII. Regular readers know that I always pick the Patriots. But I’m usually right. If I were a betting man, I would put money on them before the season begins, every year until Tom Brady retires. (Maybe longer.) This isn’t a rooting thing. At championship time, in every sport, I almost always support the underdog. It’s also not fan service. I’m sure there are far more Patriot-haters than Patriot-lovers out there. But in football, as in many areas of life, the best predictor of what will happen next time is often what happened last time.
12. For the same reason, I am skeptical of Democratic claims that they will win back the House and perhaps the Senate in November’s elections. The polls are strongly on their side, but I seem to remember that the polls were strongly on their side in the 2016 presidential election. More to the point, the special Senate election in Alabama, trumpeted by every left pundit with a pulse as the beginning of the wave, points the other way. Facing a Republican accused of what amounts to statutory rape (and with more than 100,000 white evangelicals who would likely have supported the Republican Party staying home on election day) Democrat Doug Jones was able to eke out victory by only 1.6 percentage points. (True, it’s also possible that voters confused him with this Doug Jones.) So I predict that the Republicans will hold onto at least one house of Congress, and probably both.
13. On at least one U.S. campus, students will demand disciplinary action against a professor for contributing money to a Republican political candidate. Administrators will comply.
That’s how I see 2018 in the headlines. As for our everyday lives, I hope that in the year to come every one of us, whether #maga or #nevertrump or in between, will find ways to remain respectful of others across our myriad differences, and will search unceasingly for the truth and beauty and grace to be found amidst the clamor and clutter.
Happy New Year.
This article was provided by Bloomberg News.