A new year... and boy did we barely get through the last... with all the earthquakes, nuclear melt downs, tsunamis, a dead Bin Laden, and a social confluence admonishing abuses of power, as seen in the revolutions of the middle east against cronyism, and as voiced through the human megaphones of Occupy protesters against greed... last year was one of tremendous change. Although the year began with most of us still beleaguered by the crash of 2008, 2011 marked a collective awakening from that cautious passivity to a vitriolic urgency. And now we start 2012, barely transitioned from all that defined 2011...
Still events from 2011 linger; unresolved. The most obvious is North Korea. The dear leader deprived us of his company just days before the new year, while his son, a 20 something year old kid, assumed command of a finicky, and schizophrenic military, armed with nuclear weapons (weak ones, but still able to reach their southern counterparts, or worse, Japan). Meanwhile, in the foreground of all that remains the North's deepening famine. All this is a recipe for one of two things happening: an act of war, or a meltdown of the State... or, the third rail, both... that is, a depraved and desperate act of a dying State that has nothing to lose from a nuclear response.
The other, and, as of this writing, more obvious wild card, is Iran. It has long been a hotbed from which tensions since the invading of Iraq has escalated. On that note, the pullout of an already worn and demoralized American armed forces from their contravening neighbor, a long time check to Iranian influence and power in that region, should play well into their hands--so much so, that Iran could be emboldened to act. The question is how, and to what extent, and, whether the rest of the free world has it in them to even respond.
Of course, another calamity is anticipated to unfold with the Greek economy. It has long been a lost cause, but has been saved for no other reason than the fear of what trouble could spawn from its collapse--of which a lot of people can only speculate as being so profound that its shock-waves will bring down Portugal, Ireland, and Spain along with it, before bringing wall street itself to its knees, much like Lehman Brothers did, but far worse.
Those are only likely, and foreseeable eventualities that can be surmised from what has already been set in motion from the events of the year prior. However, there remains unforeseeable possibilities like natural disasters (maybe the expected solar storm to hit earth?), supernatural events, like UFOs, or anything attributable to a Mayan calendar/History Channel narrative. Sounds incredible, but when I think back to how I could have never imaged 9/11/2001 on 9/10/2001, and how I never fathomed actually seeing a black U.S. President beyond Chris Rock's portrayal of one, I have to now consider that anything is possible... I just hope that this year's better than the last.
