As usual, we had many predictions for 2023, too many to list them all. As before, I’ll only highlight the best, or worst, or funniest forecast every entrant gave. For exceptional predictors, I’ll give more.
I rate everybody’s set using math and science with secret patented formulas borrowed form string theory. Scoring was by number of correct predictions, weighted by what I perceived as their difficulty.
The WINNER, the BEST GUESSER OF 2022 was…
Nobody.
Yes, or I mean no. Some few people did okay, as long as okay means “Well, could have been better”. But nobody excelled. None of us hit notable targets.
Especially me. As with a few others who predicted the demise of certain important personages, me the man in charge of the Vatican, none of us got it right. A few foresaw the coming of the end of the Russia-Ukraine war—but it hasn’t ended yet.
More than a handful said Trump would drop out. No. Some said he would be handled by the Regime. Not yet.
There were a few vague stock market predictions, and the like, some near enough and some not far wrong, but none specific enough such that they would have been useful.
A lot of doom was foreseen, and we did have our share. Yet, I think, we were all under an impossible burden in 2023. I think it will come to be seen as a transition year. The time before the Big Change. Something is coming. It’s in the air. Everybody can sense it, but nobody can bring whatever it is into sharp outline. Not yet.
This accounts for the vagueness of last year’s predictions. So I, being the sole judge and arbiter, announce an amnesty for all blown predictions. All go into 2024 with clean records. The year of our Lord 2024 is bound to be tumultuous. Start thinking now of what the future will bring.
You have all weekend. On Tuesday, 2 January, we’ll begin making predictions for 2024.
Oh, Hagfish Bagpipe took the prize for the best prediction. But he always wins, so there was no surprise. Though Incitadus was right at his heels.
2023’s Predictions
Starting with the blog (Substack mirror is below) in the order in which they were made. Search for your name.
BLOG
Briggs
- “Pope Francis departs to his final reward.” Nope. Blew it. Maybe close, but wrong wrong wrong.
Pk
- “at least one US automaker declares bancruptcy.” Didn’t happen.
- “Scandal rocks Elon Musk who drops out of sight. Same with Tucker.” The opposite was true, for both.
Pk
- “at least one US automaker declares bancruptcy.” Didn’t happen.
- “Scandal rocks Elon Musk who drops out of sight. Same with Tucker.” The opposite was true, for both.
JR Ewing
- “After depleting its own war stockpiles, the US allows the Ukraine war to end with Russia keeping its conquered territories, including Crimea.” We’re still waiting on the land distribution, but I can’t see anybody now betting against Ewing.
- “The GOP starts its own January 6 hearings and it becomes clear that it was a premeditated setup to get Trump under the 25th Amendment.” The GOP is a branch of the Democrat party.
- “Trump flounders badly in the polls.” Well, he hasn’t broke the 90% barrier. Yet.
Nym Coy
- “The fed interest rate peaks at 5% and remains that high the rest of the year.” Close, close.
Michael Dowd
- “Trump announces he will not be a candidate.” Maybe they’ll announce it for him in the spring.
- “Biden will not be President at end of year.” An argument can be made he never was President.
JDaveF
- “Due to lack of fertilizer from Russia and Ukraine, worldwide famine will occur.” The UN and Bill Gates are working on it.
- “Rather than invade Taiwan, China will then invade South Africa, and establish a new Sub-Saharan slave trade, both for domestic labor.” Hey. It could have happened.
boyd stewart conklin
- “ABCDEFGTransgender fad fades.” Not yet.
Dan Diego
- “The Powers That Be will move to shut down all non-leftist social media.” They did, but not successfully, and some of their ploys were exposed. However, they made tremendous headway in Canada and Europe.
John Pate
- “The wild card to watch for is the UFO nonsense.” They keep trying, but so far it hasn’t stuck.
Stephen
- “The Russia/Ukraine war will spill into Europe.” Thank God it did not.
- “The Covid vaccine injuries will be too hard to ignore.” They are ignored.
- “Biden will suffer a major health scare and be hospitalized.” Optimist.
spaceranger
- “Alexandra Ocasio-Cortez and Elon Musk will come out about their relationship and become an A-List power couple.” Egads.
Jim Fedako
- “Putin announces a successor.” I have received no calls.
Stephen W. Shipman
- “Northern hemisphere experiences COOLER than usual temperatures as the cyclical decline in the number of sunspots continues despite a counter cyclical increase during 2022.” This happened in many places, alebit with the summer of propaganda, with media agencies battling to see who could make a weather map most resembling Hell.
Zundfolge
- “The left will finally discover something they can convincingly blame the vax deaths on and the public will mostly buy it.” They went instead with their old trick of ignoring they story.
- “China invades Taiwan and US sits on its hands.” Not yet.
- “Kanye West will come out openly as a Black Hebrew Israelite.” Few know of a certain secret ceremony in the West Wing…
Don B
- “The U.S. stock market bear will bottom in 2023.” The opposite happened.
- “A few countries recognize that nuclear power is important for having national economic security.” This one also didn’t happen, which is surprising.
Incitadus
- “Digital toilets will be hacked their contents ransomed online.” I don’t know how to check, but given some of the horrors we’ve seen this past year, like girls begging and barking for pseudo coins from anonymous soymen, it’s certainly possible.
Paul Murphy
- “Paul Ryan will become the establishment GOP candiate for 2024.” If you would have been right about this, I would have banned you from the blog.
Sander van der Wal
- “China will not invade Taiwan this year.” They didn’t!
The Invisible Hand
- “Canada will make international headlines for having a second Freedom Convoy after farmers aren’t allowed to purchase enough fertilizer that they need due to new regulations.” That would have been something.
- “After a botched mastectomy left her bed ridden in a hospital, Cher will catch covid and pass away.” No, but we did have the misfortune to hear from her.
Cookie
- “There will be a piviot away from China, the West ‘elites’ and whore media will now dress India up as the ‘wunder child’.” You did get the scare quotes around “elites” right.
Vermont Crank
- “Pope Francis will announce he has chosen his successor and attribute that to his desire to save money and avoid politics.” This is the best wrong guess of the year.
- “Civil wars begin in England Italy and France where whites rise against the NAFRIS.” People almost never rise up.
OT False Prophet Twice Stoned
- “Trump says something spectacularly stupid that completely alienates and dissipates his base.” Close: he did bruit the idea of Nikki “Israel First” Halley as VP.
- “Electricity becomes scarce and rolling blackouts start in the west.” Not yet.
Not Buying It
- “Charges will be laid against Donald Trump for J6. The trial will be set for the same time as Presidential campaigns and will be televised.” Sort of.
- “‘Died suddenly’ will become the leading cause of death.” We moved on to bigger better fears.
Milton Hathaway
- ” A Google search for ‘Epstein Island’ (with the quotes) will exceed 20M results” Strangely, our rulers have not yet turned on each other over this.
Heresolong
- “People will wrongly accuse me of not being funny.” Shamefully true.
Jan Van Betsuni
- “Julian Assange removed from Belmarsh Prison and placed in a UK Mental Facility.” This wasn’t too far wrong.
- “King Charles III publicly reveals belief in Extra-Terrestrials inhabiting Earth.” I don’t think he did, but I’m going to say he did.
Yancey Ward
- “Famine sweeps Africa and parts of south Asia by year’s end, and riots and wars break out everywhere as countries fight over food and water.” You can smell it in the air, can’t you. But it’s still a ways off.
- “One or more conservative SCOTUS justices die under mysterious circumstances, or are outright assassinated.” It is a constant surprise to me that there have not been more open assassinations.
Scott U
- “A female is elected or ‘made’ President 2024.” You might get this one: see the big about Nikki Hayley above.
Plantagenet
- “A general strike in the UK leads to the fall of Sunaks Tory government and an election.” Alas, alas.
- “Increasingly tiresome man-child Trump announces he will not run in 2024.” The second clause does not follow from the first.
Robin
- “The dollar will come under co-ordinated international attack this year on a scale not seen before. There will be wild gyrations of the dollar against other currencies…” This is a partial hit, but as yet no undue turmoil.
- “The only option now is war. War to extend the survival of the dollar and war to drive even more power in their direction.” They do keep trying, don’t they.
Yarrow
- “Hairy chests on men come back into fashion.” Damn right.
- “2023 will see an explosion of interest in gardening and household-scale meat production.” It didn’t happen—yet. But don’t abandon this prediction.
Jim H
- “Franciscus II is elected pope.” Frightening prospect.
- “Elon (Musk) announces run for presidency.” As long as they can turn up his birth certificate in Hawaii, he has a shot.
Robert E
- “Putin will either die (naturally, or suspiciously) and be replaced by another hardliner.” He’s still there and smiling.
- “One of the Clinton’s will die before Biden, who will die in office.” Again, I am proud because I have so many optimists are readers.
Yawrate
- “Russia wins the eastern Ukraine with a DMZ and a land route to Crimea.” Something like that.
GamecockJerry
- “Slick Willie kicks the bucket.” Maybe he has a steady supply of adrenochrome.
spudjr60
- “Putin will either die (naturally, or suspiciously) and be replaced by another hardliner.” He’s still there and smiling.
- “SCOTUS will rule against Harvard and UNC admissions policy. The shocker will be that they also overturn Griggs vs Duke Power and in the majority ruling the crumble the entire ‘Disparate Impact’ structure.” Nailed the first part, but missed the second. They merely found new ways of pandering.
Hagfish Bagpipe
- “The head of the secret criminal cabal controlling the world is arrested in Teaneck, New Jersey.” I’m not allowed to say whether this happened, or whether it didn’t. But watch outside your door, Hagfish.
Hun
- “The scientist-politicians in Brussels will find a solution to the EU energy crisis after the Gates of Hell open in the basement of the European Parliament.” Half right. The Gates opened, but the creatures that emerged were all subsumed into the EU bureaucracy.
- “Israel will repatriate all their citizens and citizenship eligible individuals.” This is the only prediction that mentioned this tiny country that looms so large.
Pouncer
- “A ‘near miss’ asteroid strike will only be detected (or disclosed to the public) as the rock is departing our vicinity.” They did, and do, announce these. No hits yet. But wait.
- “Pete Bootycheck will step down from Sec of Transportation and will blame homophobia.” I like it, but it didn’t happen.
Johnno
- “In the year 2023, Greta Thunberg mysteriously conceives by the power of some unholy Earth spirit.” Well, the Antichrist has to come from somewhere.
- “China continues to sink economically and internally as aging population grows exponentially…” In a way, yes, but they are looking to expand to make up for it.
Aaron
- “Soros says so long to the Earthlings.” He’s drinking from the same well Bill Clinton is.
- “The Euthanasia craze accelerates (3% per year in the North now).” It did, becomming programmatic in many lands, like Canada. I might be wrong, but I think they do home delivery now.
- “Apostasy is no longer closeted in Catholicism”. Boy, howdy, is this right.
HiFast
- “An electric vehicle parked in an underground garage below a high-rise in San Francisco will catch fire and spread to at least 5 other vehicles.” No, but there were various incidents, all long forgotten.
SUBSTACK
The Substack mirror was brand new when these predictions were made, so there are far fewer of them. I predict a reversal of number of entries this year.
Flippin’ Jersey
- “We will begin to see the first ‘If you received a Pfizer or Moderna MRNA vaccination, you may be entitled to compensation’ ads.” Surprisingly no. The immunity vax manufacturers have likely precludes much of this.
- “Daffy Uncle Joe will serve out his term (being hopped up on goofballs always helps) and be nominated for a second term.” So far, but wait.
Dashing Dimwit
- “Vice President Harris resigns.” Again with the wild optimism.
- “China invades Taiwan.” Try again next year.
John Henry Holliday, DDS
- “A Normal American, pushed to his limits by anti-whiteness and an increasingly obvious 2-tiered society, makes an assassination attempt on some democrat politician.” They didn’t even try to fake such a thing. But try this one again for next year.
- “A tactical nuke will be used in Ukraine or SE Poland.” Thank God you were wrong.
Captain Morgan
- “The energy crisis in Europe gets worse as governments do nothing.” They’re studying the problem, Cap’n, studying.
- “German car manufactures shut down at least one production facility in Germany, and moves to China.” This didn’t happen.
good_eldian
- “Ukraine retakes the south, and comes within striking distance of retaking Crimea.” It happened in the press, but not in real life.
- “Several EU countries announce a shift to nuclear as the main focus of their energy policy.” Second person to guess this.
The Antipole
- “The world continues falling into a major depression as various economic bubbles pop.” It does seem like the elite sort of want this, doesn’t it.
- “Saudi Arabia joins BRICS.” Near hit: they were invited, but haven’t moved yet.
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2024 Prediction: The price of a barrel of oil will exceed $140 as Experts continue to flounder while they pad the pockets of their Wall Street and Silicon Valley brethren in the search of the renewable grail.
Well, at least, it was an opportunity for humility. Surely, Briggs will provide another.
Prediction: The world will continue to slide into rule by authoritarian groups. In other words, 2024 will be a continuation of the downwards trend witnessed in recent years.
Why, because the necessary elements of a flourishing society for all are rapidly disappearing and there is no indication the trend can be reversed. These are personal freedom and internal restraints provided by Christianity.
If Trump wins, he will delay this trend but not reverse it. The main element that is disappearing for a flourishing society is an internal monitor on voters/rulers to choose moral solutions which Christianity provided. What has replaced Christianity is a focus on the near term success of the self.
This prediction is a general one and not specific such as the price of a commodity or a winner of an election. But in general there will be more instability. Does anyone doubt that if Trump wins, there will be rioting? Does anyone doubt that if Trump loses, there will be rioting? Just by different groups.
Aside: I am well aware of the shortcomings of many Christians throughout history but in general it has provided a limit on what could be acceptable. Also, Trump is consumed with the aggrandizement of himself but recognizes what has led to the past greatness of the US so will temporarily provide these. Another difference is between those who will be rioting next November, one group absolutely abhors the thought they could be injured or killed while the other not looking forward to either outcome will be more willing to incur them. Can anyone imagine a liberal college professor incurring injury for his beliefs let alone dying for them?
In 2024, Gavin Newsom will be “elected” president of the U.S., to begin pulling the entire country into the black hole of woke horror already occupied by the ruined state of California.
““A few countries recognize that nuclear power is important for having national economic security.” This one also didn’t happen, which is surprising.”
Actually, it is happening.
“Poland’s Council of Ministers formally approved a resolution selecting Westinghouse to be the technology supplier for the Polish government’s six to nine GWe nuclear program. This program will start with three reactors at the Lubiatowo-Kopalino site in northern Poland.” [….]
“In addition to two AP1000 units being completed at the Vogtle site in the United States, four AP1000 units are currently setting operational performance records in China with four additional units under construction. Westinghouse AP1000 technology also has been selected for two additional units in China, nine units in Ukraine, and is under consideration at multiple other sites in Central and Eastern Europe, the United Kingdom, and in the United States.”
https://info.westinghousenuclear.com/news/poland-selects-wec-ap1000
Central Bank Digital Currency and the 15 Minute Cities things will kick into over-drive in 2024. I suspect this will involve a second plandemic with pretty much the same rigamarole as last time. I don’t see how they can let it lie having put so much into the first plandemic. It will be interesting to see whether genpop has any mind to push back this time but I expect normies to double down compared to last time to justify to themselves giving in the last time, “this time it’s for real.” The death toll, real or imagined, will need to be higher than the first plandemic. They may give it a year or two more so people can forget how nonsensical the first plandemic was. Genpop have the attention span of goldfish either way.
The increasing ridiculousness of electric vehicles, for instance the extreme fire hazard, will lead to an orgy of tax-payer funded capitalism in an attempt to find something more profitable than the internal combustion engine that is at least slightly less absurd than electric vehicles.
Wokeistas will be amazing us with their enthusiasm for an mRNA vaccine to counter the obesity epidemic afflicting the poor, whilst celebrating morbid obesity as a brave life-style choice.
At some point the globalist plutocrats going to have to give up on this whole, “the West is dying because everyone is too old” BS and come out into the open about their plans for population reduction as a societal and moral good.
The UFO nonsense is still there desperately attempting to break into public consciousness but clearly it will take something spectacular and entirely out of nowhere. I suspect if the globalist plutocrats feel they’ve lost control they’ll go full Project Bluebeam because then anything, however outrageous, is on the table. That may be nearer their 2030 marker rather than 2024, there’s still plenty of mileage in the current nostrums.
Israel – “tiny country that looms so large”
That is a very mild way of expressing who rules the Global American Empire. 🙂
My prediction for 2024: The BUYER of a used car will want to KNOW the TRUTH about the used car. The SELLER will want to HIDE the truth.
>“‘Died suddenly’ will become the leading cause of death.” We moved on to bigger better fears.
Excess deaths in UK and US are higher than WW2 deaths. “Nobody” cares.
When do you expect Putin to follow your Barbarian Bible predictions and start nuking his way to Lisbon via Mumbai and Beijing?
These missed predictions are similar to every other year. The only prediction I have ever made that was even partially wrong (I’ve only made two in my life)
was in 2020 when I predicted, after a few beers, that the US would be invaded by aliens. We were invaded by aliens from Mexico and Central America. But I was only half right. I had predicted an invasion of aliens from the planet Uranus.
There is an important lesson to be learned here that I learned as a child: Don’t make predictions nd don;t believe predictions
I was taught this lesson because an older relative was always predicting doom in spite of the fact that he owned a small business and was rich. Could cause a child to have nightmares. My parents taught me to ignore predictions because they are almost always wrong
That lesson helped me a lot in 1997, after I began sy studying climate science as a hobby. After one hour I concluded the future climate would get warmer unless it got colder, a prediction I have make every year, starting in 1997.
I also predict the stock market will go up in 2024,
unless it goes down.
My point is that climate change is nothing more than a wild guess data-free prediction of global waring doom in 100 years, that started in 1979 and has been wrong ever since. There are no CAGW data, so there is no science, behind CAGW predictions.
Every year we get a lesson on how unreliable predictions are, yet people still make predictions and love to hear predictions.
I have a free, no ads, no begging for donations, climate science and energy blog with a daily reading list of good articles by conservative authors. I ban predictions unless they are for the next month or two, which have some chance of accuracy.
https://honestclimatescience.blogspot.com/
1 – the #1 observation on most of the failed, but serious, predictions is that the authors under-estimated how long things would take. Most could be repeated for 2024 with a better chance of being considered hits.
2 – in my own case.. I said I’d be wrong. And I was.. so 100% right?
In all seriousness, and I’ll cite myself to illustrate this, many of the predictions could be seen as right to some degree – and wrong mostly on timing and/or extent.
For example, I said that 60% of Americans would think democrats cheated in 2020 and 2022. Some polls say that’s about right – and predicted american attitudes toward the Ukraine war would change as more and more Americans start to see that the US has been supporting the wrong side – and that’s happening now.
Here’s a suggestion: if you are going to do predictions again this year – and I hope you do – then maybe have your readers vote on how accurate (e.g. percentage true?) each one was. If you want to do it, but think it pain I can help: let me know and and I’ll put them into a phpsurveyor form on my website and collect the votes for you.
Putin will never nuke anybody, since “they” (citizen) are and/or are becoming “his” customers. Someone had perhaps read western literature about socialism and / or communism (and about Egyptology, for sure), that’s true, but not the nuking (which has never happend from the “Putin” & BRICS side and can not be evidence for anything).
P.S. this says an Obermaat (Staff Sergeant) who served in the “western” data center of Naval North intelligence service …
Briggs, you fool! The mainstream media isn’t just going to stay silent about the vexxine injuries! They are going to CONTROL THE NARRATIVE! Observe! Expurts are already getting ahead of us! Here’s their prediction in anticipation of the predictions we were all going to make!
‘Experts’ Say New COVID Strain Will Cause Global “Heart Failure Pandemic”
https://www.zerohedge.com/covid-19/experts-say-new-covid-strain-will-cause-global-heart-failure-pandemic
They are putting us all on notice that any claims the vexxines are causing the heart attacks are FAKE NEWS! That these heart attacks overwhelmingly occur only in the vexxinated young is simply a BIG FAT COINCIDENCE!
Mr. Murphy claimed this was a good predicion of his
“and (I) predicted american attitudes toward the Ukraine war would change as more and more Americans start to see that the US has been supporting the wrong side ”
The only thing worse than making predictions and believing predictions, is evaluating your own predictions and claiming they were correct when that claim is total BS. I read a lot of news every day of the year. I do not recall any Americans stating we supported the wrong side in Ukraine, other than correct complaints that we should have not engineered a 2014 coup there to toss out a pro-Russian president about to sign a huge, beneficial trade deal with Russia.
There are some Americans, including me, who wanted us to stay out of a proxy war with Russia. I have never heard any American say or write we should have joined or supported Russia. That is your fantasy.
Johnno starts with
“Briggs, you fool!”
He gets the readers laughing and then presents an excellent analysis of how leftists behave. They lie, cheat and steal to gain power and control. Truth is not a leftist value.
Of course the three years of leftist lying about safe and effective Covid shots will continue. They even call Omicron “covid” when it has the infection fatality rate of a common cold (1/100th of the actual Covid19 infection fatality rate).
I wonder if “Covid” WILL RETURN NEXT FALL before the 2024 election to get absentee ballots mailed out to fake people / fake addresses on election rolls of registered voters, as done in 2020?
We had two couples over for dinner Yesterday. All vaccinated. All had Omicron after vaccines. Some twice. The wife and I, NOT vaccinated, had no colds, no influenza, no Omicron and no Covid 19 over the past four years. We were told we got lucky.
One leftist woman guest began talking about masks. I stated that in early 2020 after Fauci said (at first) that masks don’t work, I selected five mask studies on line at random. Read all of them. All said N95 masks can not stop the spread of viral aerosols.
I warned our guest not to believe masks would make one safe. As a leftist, she rejected all contrary information by claiming I had confirmation bias (her favorite tactic to cut off debate).
She then came up with her bassackwards theory that she wore a mask not to protect herself but to protect others. She falsely claimed her mask did not protect her when breathing in but did protect others when she was breathing out. A total dingbat theory.
She also thinks all conservatives are climate deniers.
This is a rich woman who runs a small business, has tens of millions of dollars and a large home. Yet she knows nothing about most subjects other than her opinion is always right, the government is always right, and YOU have confirmation if you disagree.
To increase the chances of winning a coveted major prediction award, perhaps categories should be added, with a prize for each category? Possible categories: Forecasting, hindcasting, wishcasting, fearcasting, sarcasting, broadcasting, flycasting, blamecasting, firststonecasting, awaycasting, couchcasting, callcasting, aluminumcasting, wormcasting, centralcasting, typecasting, implicittypecasting, explicittypecasting, votecasting, and cautiontothewindcasting. Other categories may exist.
Masks don’t do a damn thing? As far as reducing the spread of infectious diseases, I don’t doubt that is true. But someone wearing a mask is unlikely to sneeze in your face, so there’s that. I was at an outdoor gathering several weeks ago, and the atmospheric conditions must have been just right, along with my positioning relative to the sun, because everyone talking, without exception, was spewing expansive clouds of spittle droplets of all sizes with every utterance. I have respiratory issues, and wearing a mask for even a very few minutes makes breathing a problematic experience. I need a chest-mounted mask dispenser that can hold, say, a hundred fresh masks neatly folded and ready for action. One of the cheaper manually-operated models would suffice, but an automatic model would be the cat’s meow.
The automatic fresh mask dispenser works in a manner similar to this device:
https://brillseat.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/06/027-21.jpg
It has a manual override button for emergencies.
Dear Matt Briggs, Uncle Mike, John B (), Dav and friends:
Happy New Year.
https://youtu.be/e94yc4zE0yQ?si=pfqVa0p4WndkUmMn