This is my third year making predictions. What I have learned from previous years is that the future is difficult to predict. I try to be as specific as possible, and hopefully entertaining.
I will re-use some predictions that were ahead of their time.
I called 2011 the "Year of the Hollow Victory". It just looked to me that so many public figures were waging battle that they may be missing the war. The microscope the media places on everything takes some getting use to seeing. The fact of the matter is that some media reports are informational, some news, and some simply wrong. Not every report deserves a full measure of rebuke.
2012 will be the year of people looking back at 2011 and 2012 becoming the Year of Buyer's Remorse
Here we go:
Obama wins re-election.
The Republican splinter is a fissure. A Republican will run as an "Independent". When the circus music stops, and some selfish book whore has sunk his (or her) party's hopes, it will leave some of the far Right on an every shrinking island.
Seattle Mayor Mike McGinn will lose the 2013 election in 2012.
I know it looks like it is already over, but he still has parts of a fragile coelition that he has yet to break apart. He's got a basketball Jones, but doing the right thing for the right reasons isn't good enough for the rabid sports haters that have pooled up as one of McGinn's groups of support.
Initiative 502 will pass, legalizing marijuana at the state level.
Smoking in public places of medicinal marijuana will ironically be against the law.
A rerun from 2011: 1.b. Congressional Democrats will champion state's rights [for marijuana use].
Another rerun from 2011: 5. The state will grant counties the power and authority to raise taxes to pay for transit by popular vote, adding an increase to the Motor Vehicle Excise Tax limit, and property tax limit, counties and cities could use.
The Sacramento Kings will make plans to relocate to Washington State (no insider info here, just a straight prediction), prompting another team to beat hem to the market.
A third option, not Key Arena, will emerge as another multi-purpose arena location (again, no insider info here, just a prediction). This is a real estate problem.
Rob McKenna will be elected Governor of the State of Washington, and will instantly disappoint the Republican Party with his first proposed budget.
Bob Ferguson will win the race to be Washington State's Attourney General.
People living in Medina, Washington, will refer to the people living in Bellevue, Washington's 9th Congressional District as living in "District 9".
Dow Constantine will be the front runner to replace Rob McKenna as 2012 comes to a close.
Suzan DelBene will be elected to congress in the 1st Congressional District.
The color for 2012 will be a very dark green, almost black.
And now a little music, The Walkmen, In the New Year