SAN FRANCISCO, 2 January 2003 — If you’re a pessimist, the outlook for 2003 must be pretty encouraging. World War III, global terror and smallpox threaten in one corner. Economic depression, unbridled state surveillance, environmental catastrophe, social meltdown and bioengineering running amok lurk elsewhere. With the American war machine getting ready to roll, we probably won’t have long to wait to see how the current crisis will resolve itself. It could turn out like this: The invasion of Iraq is met by fierce resistance, including a scorched oil field policy by Baghdad, a coordinated global wave of terror and a non-conventional missile attack on Israel. Israel retaliates against Iraq, sending a wave of outrage throughout the Muslim world, where pro-Western governments, with their Western arms and, in Pakistan’s case, nuclear weapons, fall to Islamic revolutionaries. The world economy is devastated, democracy is sacrificed to the demands of the war on terror and global warming becomes the least of our worries. On the other hand, a swift and decisive US victory paves the way for an Israeli-Palestinian rapprochement, a drop in oil prices, a backlash against Islamic fundamentalism and a world economy that emerges invigorated from two years of recession. Perhaps because the picture is so murky, the mainstream American press is all but ignoring it in the many articles predicting the events of the coming year.
Thus, most of the forward-looking articles are largely confined to more important questions like who will win the Superbowl of American football, whether Jennifer Lopez will remarry and whether former vice president Al Gore will change his mind and come back to lead the Democrats in the 2004 elections against President George W. Bush.
In this air of uncertainty, the "psychics" are having a field day. Internet psychic Fred Fasset said he believes our troubles are just starting. He said the planet is in a state of tension and predicted a year of natural catastrophes to exacerbate the manmade ones. His examination of Iraqi President Saddam Hussein’s birth chart indicated that the Iraqi leader could be removed from the planet this year, possibly through a head or neck injury, but he warned that if wealth and power remained concentrated in the hands of the few, the planet will try to restore equilibrium.
"Civilizations have come and gone many times in the history of our planet," he warned. "Creation has to shake out the blanket and start afresh. Be comforted in knowing that the universe holds many worlds in which your consciousness and future selves will flourish." The normally upbeat columnist Joan Ryan admitted that 2002 was the year of cynicism but "the prospects for the coming year look even gloomier". She predicted: "War. Recession. Staggering state budget cuts. A government run by a secrecy-obsessed president. A Congress that will fulfil its ‘checks and balances’ role with important input such as, ‘Excellent idea, Mr. President! More coffee?’"
But she takes hope in the actions of individuals in 2002, like the whistleblowers named as the people of the year by Time Magazine; people who unexpectedly found themselves in the crosshairs of destiny, did the right thing and changed everything. "So how do we greet 2003? With hope instead of more cynicism?" she asked. "By reminding ourselves that no policy, leader, institution or tragedy is more powerful than we are."
Of the mainstream columnists who do attempt to peer into the future, many found gallows humour to be the appropriate style. According to humorist Dave Barry, 2002 was the year of being wary, and 2003 will see much of the same. Miami writer Ron Martin envisaged the end of the world as it might appear in newspaper headlines. "USA Today: We’re dead. The Wall Street Journal: Dow Jones plummets as world ends. PC World: World to join cyberspace. Life: The final year in pictures. Conde Nast Traveler: Best places in the whole wide world to enjoy the end."
But writing in The New York Times, self-admitted pessimist and strident presidential critic Paul Krugman found little to laugh about. "Are you enthused? I’m not," he confided. "I hope I’m wrong, but this doesn’t look like a happy New Year." Perhaps he would have cheered up if he had gone to one of the many New Year’s Eve parties in San Francisco. "Say Goodbye To 2002," said a local paper’s guide to the party scene. "And party like there’s no tomorrow." (DPA)