Here’s what we’ve been told over the years by Liberal prognosticators and pundits as they looked into the future. And, here’s what the outcome really was.
Listening to speculation about an anti-Korean backlash in the wake of the late-NRA spokesman Billy Bob Cho’s rampage on the Virginia Tech campus — a backlash, by the way, that has yet to manifest itself other than through the ongoing attacks of Al Sharpton against Korean grocers and other “white (i.e. non-black) interlopers” — I thought back to a number of other predictions over the years handed to us by Democrats and their allies in the press.
Rather than fabricate a satirical news story about agenda-driven Liberal histrionics disguised as objective news analysis, I decided to do something different this time and just let the Liberals speak for themselves. When it comes to satire, nothing I write can compete with the words and actions of the Masters themselves.
So, here’s what we’ve been told over the years by Liberal prognosticators and pundits as they looked into the future. And, here’s what the outcome really was.
Prediction: Opposing communist expansionism, calling the Soviet Union an “evil empire,” and pursuing a space-based missile defense system will escalate world tensions and increase the threat of nuclear war.
Outcome: The only thing escalated by these policies was the collapse of the Soviet Union.
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Prediction: Reforming the welfare system will throw millions of families into poverty and leave children “sleeping on grates.” Minority children will be affected the most.
Outcome: Within 6 years of enacting Welfare reform, there were 3.5 million fewer people living in poverty than there were in 1995 (the last year before the reform). Of this number, 2.9 million fewer children lived in poverty than in 1995. Decreases in poverty have been greatest among black children, with the poverty rate for black children at the lowest point in U.S. history.1
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Prediction: Man’s ravaging of the environment, which is a direct result of the Industrial Revolution, will produce an increase in Global Cooling leading to a new ice age.
Outcome: Oops. What we really meant was that it will produce an increase in world-wide temperatures resulting in an increase in Global Warming.
Prediction: [Version 2] Man’s ravaging of the environment, which is a direct result of the Industrial Revolution, will produce an increase in world-wide temperatures resulting in an increase in Global Warming.
Outcome: Not only is the Industrial Revolution causing the ice caps on Earth to melt, it’s also melting the ice caps on Mars and affecting the climates of other planets in the solar system. Disregard changes in the heat output of the Sun as the potential source of this increased rise in global temperatures from anywhere from 1-9 degrees, depending upon your own personal level of hysteria. Man, not nature, is entirely to blame for cooling, er, I mean heating the Earth.2
***
Prediction: Unless the world radically alters the way it pollutes the seas, the oceans will die by the turn of the century.
Outcome: It’s the New Millennium-plus-7, and so far the water is still clear and the fishies are still swimming.
***
Prediction: Katrina was merely the most spectacular hurricane in a year that saw an unprecedented increase in storms spewing from the Atlantic. Because these hurricanes were driven by man-made Global Warming, we can expect even more devastation and destruction in the years to come.
Outcome: Hurricanes in the season following Katrina declined dramatically in both numbers and severity.
Prediction: [Version 2] An increase in hurricane activity following Katrina hasn’t occurred because man-made Global Warming is sheering off the tops of developing storms, and thus diminishing both their strengths and numbers.
Outcome: If hurricane activity increases from year to year, it’s due to the effects of man-made Global Warming. If hurricane activity decreases from year to year, it’s due to the effects of man-made Global Warming. This is what is known as “consensus-driven” science. It’s why people once believed that the Earth was flat and the Sun revolved around our planet, and why the conclusion that man is responsible for Global Warming will always be borne out by the data its modern-day advocates present.
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Prediction: Cameron Diaz, commenting on the upcoming 2004 election, looked into the soul of George W. Bush and saw a world where “women have so much to lose. We could lose the right to our bodies. If you think that rape should be legal, then don't vote.”
Outcome: To the best of my knowledge, there has been no call for legalized rape anywhere in the United States, even following the re-election of George W. Bush in 2004. There’s still eighteen months to go in the Bush Administration, so I won’t be able to comment on this one definitively until January 2009. But if the current trend holds, this prediction should end up in the “doubtful” category, much to the relief of women everywhere (at least when Bill Clinton isn’t around).
***
Prediction: White extremist groups, inspired by Conservative politicians, will burn even more black churches if a Republican is elected president in 1996.
Outcome: Just a minor fact to start with; it appears that a lot of white churches were also burned in the early to mid-1990s. The motives for doing so ranged from “teenage vandalism, public drunkenness, derangement, revenge, insurance or other frauds and, to be sure, open or latent racial hatred. But,” as an exhaustive study by USA Today concluded (as reported by the Columbia Journalism Review),3 “no single thread runs through the black church arsons." Not to be deterred by the absence of facts, President Clinton commented that, "We do not now have evidence of a national conspiracy, but it is clear that racial hostility is the driving force behind a number of these incidents." So there!
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Prediction: Public outcry over the election of George W. Bush in the aftermath of the 2000 elections will result in getting rid of the archaic Electoral College and replacing it with the popular vote, which is clearly more representative of the people’s desires since Al Gore got 500,000 more votes than George Bush.
Outcome: Don’t move to Delaware too quickly if you want to have a real influence on the outcome of the 2008 presidential election. (Oh, and those three million extra votes Bush got in 2004 over Kerry don’t prove anything, because Bush stole 80,000 votes in Ohio that Kerry never contested, so he’s still an illegitimate president).
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Prediction: The Bush tax cuts will lead to a national recession and ruin the U.S. economy.
Outcome: The New York Times, CNN, Reuters, Time Magazine, the LA Times, CBS, NBC, ABC, the BBC, and every other liberal news outlet here and abroad has labeled the Bush Administration’s tax policy an abject failure. Meanwhile, federal tax revenue collection is up again this year, unemployment levels are at historic lows, inflation is all but non-existent, and the Stock Market closed at another record high last Friday.
***
Prediction: Showing The Passion of the Christ will inflame anti-Semitism worldwide and produce a Christian backlash against Jews everywhere.
Outcome: You say there was no backlash by militant fundamentalist Christians against the Jews? Hmmm. But Mel Gibson did call an LA cop a disparaging name a few years later, so according to standard Liberal outcome-based reasoning, we must count this one as “partially true.”
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Prediction: Karl Rove will be indicted for leaking the name of a covert CIA agent to the press. Leaking classified information, particularly in a time of war, is treasonous behavior and cannot be tolerated!
Outcome: Karl didn’t do it? A friend of the Liberal news media did. Oh, never mind. (By the way, turn to page A-4 of the New York Times for the latest secret U.S. government war plans to defeat Al Qaeda. They’re right next to another leak about U.S. plans to stop Iran from threatening the world with a nuclear bomb.)
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Prediction: The Patriot Act will install a Nazi-like Gestapo state in the U.S. that will have a chilling effect on free speech.
Outcome: I wondered where all those anti-Bush websites went, and why the New York Times, CNN, Time Magazine, the LA Times, CBS, NBC, ABC, etc. suddenly went out of business and/or became ideological clones of Fox News. Freedom of expression in the United States is clearly dead; a victim of the misguided excesses of The Patriot Act. (By the way, has anyone noticed that there hasn’t been another 9/11-style attack in the U.S. since, well, the first 9/11 attack which was followed by the passage of The Patriot Act? I’m sure it’s just a coincidence.)
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Pre-Bush election prediction: If we do nothing to fix Medicaid, Medicare and Social Security (which is running out of money and hopelessly inefficient), old people will suffer and die.
Outcome: Bush is elected president, and takes steps to fix the problems with Medicaid, Medicare and Social Security.
Post-Bush election prediction: If we make any changes in Medicaid, Medicare and Social Security (which is adequately funded and working just fine), old people will suffer and die.
Outcome: Bush is elected president, and takes steps to fix the problems with Medicaid, Medicare and Social Security . . . anyway. Democrats in Congress immediately seek to overturn any salutary changes that might actually help the elderly and infirm, but for which Republicans (not Democrats) would be given credit.
***
And finally we come to the most comprehensive set of Liberal/Democrat predictions to date — those involving a U.S. attack against Saddam Hussein (the guy the Clinton Administration said possessed WMD, and about whom legislation regarding “regime change” was passed).
Prediction: Oil wells will be set ablaze in large numbers. Dams will be dynamited and bridges will be sabotaged. Chemical weapons will be used against coalition troops. The inability to open a northern front through Turkey will cripple or visibly slow the U.S.-led assault. Coalition casualties will be high. Up to 1.5 million refugees will be displaced from Iraq (according to the United Nations). Muslim countries worldwide will explode in open revolt.
None of this happened? Well then, Iraqi elections will not take place as scheduled. And, if they do, the people will not turn out in great numbers to vote. And if they do, the elections after that will not take place as scheduled. And if they do, the people will not turn out in great numbers to vote.
Oh, this didn’t happen either? Well then, the “Surge” isn’t working. Iraq is still a hostile place.
What’s that? The first “surge” prediction was made before any additional troops were sent to Iraq, and has been repeated daily before all the troops are in place. Worse, the growing Surge appears to be making real inroads against the terrorists.
Well then, since the Democratic Party has staked its future on a U.S. defeat in Iraq, there’s nothing left to do than state emphatically that the U.S. cannot possibly win the war against Islamic terrorists in Iraq. As the leader of the Democrats in the Senate said last Friday, it’s over, done, finito. The U.S. has clearly lost the war. Once we’re out of Iraq (“a situation to be managed, not a war to be fought”) we can get down to the business of working out a compromise with the people who want to kill us because we worship the wrong God and let our women vote. These people can be reasoned with. All we need to do is find out why these Jew-hating Islamo-Nazis dislike the United States, and then we can find common ground with our enemies so we can live happily ever after in peace.
Outcome: Sadly, we run the risk of enacting such a self-fulfilling prophesy if the Democrats remain in power, and continue to place the interests of their party above the interests of the nation.
Liberals and Democrats have made a history of substituting wishes for facts, and replacing reasoned analysis with histrionic scare tactics. The legacy of their partisan-inspired phony outrages and predictions that I’ve chronicled above are only the tip of the proverbial iceberg.
For all those tempted to take the “loyal opposition” at its word and abandon Iraq to the Islamo-fascist thugs murdering innocent women and children, I ask that you be honest with yourself before you follow in the footsteps of Ted Kennedy, Jimmy Carter, Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reed. Whether it was a good or bad idea to invade Iraq in the first place, the simple fact is we are there; and withdrawing before the Islamo-fascists are defeated carries great implications for the future of not only the United States, but the Western world as a whole.
It’s a real war in Iraq, with real consequences for this country — and the world — if we fail instead of succeed.
Endnotes
1. http://www.heritage.org/Research/Welfare/bg1620.cfm
3. http://archives.cjr.org/year/96/5/churches.asp
Jackson-ic@hotmail.com
http://www.scifi-jackson.com/
Read more articles by Phillip Ellis Jackson
"Pre-Bush election prediction: If we do nothing to fix Medicaid, Medicare and Social Security (which is running out of money and hopelessly inefficient), old people will suffer and die."
Have the Democrats found a way to keep old people from suffering and dying?
Comment by sedonaman | April 24, 2007
"Have the Democrats found a way to keep old people from suffering and dying?"
Most certainly! Surrender to the terrorists.
Convert to the terrorists' brand of Islam, and death will be avoided.
For those who fail to convert, suffering will be short. (Beheading is swift when done properly).
Comment by Phillip Ellis Jackson | April 24, 2007
I love "scientific" theories that can explain every possible outcome, like global warming does. If things are too hot, too cool, too stormy, too calm, too dry, too wet, etc, etc, it all can be explained by global warming.
Then I realized that the entire world view of leftists functions this way. Their world view explains everything, and when there is contrary evidence, then that can be explained too.
It actually doesn't matter that all these predictions the author documents have failed. That can be explained as well. Or actually, the failures will be ignored and hopefully, forgotten.
Comment by Mountain Man | April 24, 2007
Dr. Jackson:
We also have the problem of humans using up too much of the sun.
http://www.enterstageright.com/archive/articles/0202/0202sun.htm
Comment by sedonaman | April 24, 2007
sedonaman:
Thanks for the link. Just when I thought these people couldn't get any stupider …
Comment by Phillip Ellis Jackson | April 24, 2007
Mountain Man:
"Then I realized that the entire world view of leftists functions this way. Their world view explains everything, and when there is contrary evidence, then that can be explained too."
One of the Leftist counter-culture leaders of the '60s once said, "The issue is not the issue; the revolution is the issue."
You can detect this in most, if not all their arguments, and I think there is a lot of that at play here in your astute observation.
Comment by sedonaman | April 25, 2007
Unfortunately, a prediction they made did come true. They won both houses of congress.
Comment by Mike Brown | April 29, 2007
Mike, you are correct. If you keep predicting that you will retake the Congress, as the Dems have been doing every 2 years since 1994, one day you are bound to be correct. However, a true prediction does not rely on the "stopped clock" theory for validation (even a stopped clock is correct twice a day).
Comment by Phillip Ellis Jackson | April 30, 2007