My Predictions for 2007 on "Mugsy's Rap Sheet".

The close of 2006 saw the deaths of two Presidents, one with great reverence, the other disgrace. I speak of course about Gerald Ford and Saddam Hussein.

And to top things off, the 3,000th troop died on the last day of 2006.

That dichotomy sums up 2006 quite well. A mixed-bag politically, violence swelled to a crescendo in Iraq, which in turn helped drive both “Bush’s poll numbers into the toilet” and “voters to the polls” to turn control of BOTH the House AND Senate over to the Democrats. It’s a shame things in Iraq had to get SO incredibly bad before *just enough* people could bring themselves to not vote Republican for a change. The GOP has done a masterful PR job of turning “Democrat” and “Liberal” into slurs that… despite the Republican Party demonstrating the most mind-boggling incompetence AND A TOTAL LACK OF ADHERENCE TO THE VERY PRINCIPLES THEY CLAIM TO STAND FOR (”fiscal responsibility”, “smaller government”, “opposition to nation building”, etc)… many Americans still recoil with almost reflexive abhorrence to the very words “Democrat” and “Liberal”. So the political reversal this past November is no small feat indeed. But now it is time to look ahead to the coming new year and attempt to divine what it has in store for us.

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Prediction #1: The recent surge in violence towards our troops will not only continue, but escalate...

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Prediction #2: Bush’s cavalier saber-rattling with Iran will draw us into a short “accidental” conflict.

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Prediction #3: Afghanistan will continue to worsen. The Taliban will publicly declare it has re-seized control over most of the country.

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I know my predictions paint a bleak picture of 2007. But bright-spots include a Democratically controlled Congress that will finally serve as a check on Bush’s abuses of Presidential power. Public support for “alternative energy”/”energy independence”, and concern over global warming, will all grow. Clarity over the failures of Conservativism will become increasingly clear to the American public and help ensure that another disastrous “Neo-Conservative resurgence” never takes place again. Trials for detainees in Guantanamo are likely to start taking place under the new Congress, and investigations into the misuse and manipulation of intelligence to incite public support for the war in Iraq will finally be investigated. All good things.

Here’s to a WISER 2007 than we had in 2006!