My New Year’s Predictions for 2023

Happy New Year to all of you!

With the beginning of a brand-new year, let me offer you my New Year’s predictions for 2023.

The war in Ukraine will come to an end not on the battlefield but instead at the negotiating table, which is where almost all wars are settled. There will be no absolute capitulation by either side. Russia will withdraw all its troops. Ukraine will agree to never joining NATO or permitting the west to station nuclear missiles on its soil. Crimea will remain part of Russia. Donetsk — one of four occupied areas of Ukraine which supposedly voted to join Russia in 2022 through highly questionable referendums — will be the sticking point. Clever and wise mediators will construct a compromise that is acceptable to both sides. France’s President, Emmanuel Macron, will play a very positive role in bringing about a settlement.

There will be no provincial election in BC. Premier David Eby will continue to do an outstanding job of developing more units of nonmarket housing than under any previous provincial government, including that of former Premier Dave Barret. Kevin Falcon, leader of the soon to be renamed BC United Party — currently the BC Liberal Party — will continue to have difficulty connecting with the BC electorate. There will be very few if any government scandals for him to sink his teeth into. The province’s budget will continue to be in the black. The BC NDP and the BC Greens will move closer under Premier Eby than they were under former Premier John Horgan. This can only be good news for our environment.

Vancouver’s splintered municipal Left will begin to coalesce around two parties – COPE and One City. Vision Vancouver will exist only as a display in the Vancouver Museum. Ditto former Mayor Kennedy Stewart’s Forward Together party. The Vancouver and District Labour Council will turn its mind to how best to bring about some form of unity between COPE and One City.

Donald Trump finally gets his comeuppance. His financial empire, built on a house of cards, will collapse. Civil lawsuits will move him ever closer to bankruptcy. Criminal charges will move him ever closer to prison. The Republican Party as a whole, or at the very least a section of it, will finally come to its senses and rid itself of the cult of Trump.

Cuba will continue to amaze the world by:

• reducing even further its infant mortality rate, which in 2022 was 4.188 deaths per 1000 live births – the lowest in Latin America, lower than that of the United States and on par with Canada; and
• increasing life expectancy – currently 79 years and rising, which is equal to that of the USA, ahead of Mexico, and not significantly lower than that of Canada.

Fusion energy will continue its journey towards mass commercialization. U.S. President Joe Biden will allocate large sums of money to accelerate this journey. This is very good news for humanity in its race against time with regard to the immanent climate collapse.

I give 75% odds that there will be no federal election in 2023. If there is one, it will produce another Liberal minority with a larger NDP contingent of MPs. The federal Conservative leader, Pierre Poilievre, will then resign. All of this will be good news for Canadians.

As you can see from the above, I predict that 2023 will be a positive year, a year of optimism, a year to look forward to.

 

 

Daily atmospheric CO₂ [Courtesy of CO2.Earth]

Latest daily total (Jan 9, 2023): 419.17ppm

One year ago (Jan 9, 2023): 417.81ppm