We should have realized we were in trouble when the decade began by not beginning, after linguistic and mathematical purists noted that millennia, centuries, and decades begin in the year 1 and not the year 0. Having already breached the laws of both language and mathematics, the rest was inevitable.
Nobel laureate Paul Krugman called the decade the Aughts, and that seems appropriate. Because this was The Decade That Wasn't.
More below the fold....
The Decade That Wasn't
2000 - It all started with the worldwide collapse of commerce, communications, pornography, and anything else that runs on computers, all caused by the infamous Y2K bug. That collapse went largely unnoticed as the news media were focused on the unfolding apocalypse - plagues, earthquakes, zombies, and the return of gods and/or aliens - all exactly as predicted by millennialists. Only the nine justices of the U.S. Supreme Court survived to vote in the presidential election, and thus George W. Bush was chosen.
2001 - One catastrophe was averted as millions of American teenagers did not hop on their parents' computers after school to surf for porn, all because Attorney General John Ashcroft covered the breast of Lady Justice. Tragically, the collapse of internet pornography left enough bandwidth that billions of Muslims could unite behind Saudi ex-patriot Osama Bin Laden, who ordered 19 hijackers - almost all Saudis living in Europe - to launch a series of offensives that conquered vast tracts of the U.S. Or so it was predicted. Recognizing that we were in grave danger of being overrun by hijackers from Saudi Arabia living in Europe, President Bush ordered the military to begin preparations to invade Iraq. Showing his now legendary foresight, President Bush also ordered U.S. forces to offer millions of dollars to Afghan warlords, predicting "We will get Osama Bin Laden, dead or alive, if they happen to see him and have time and it's not too much bother." President Bush also ordered the NSA to review every email, internet chat, text message, and telephone call made anywhere in the world, predicting that any message sent by anyone to anyone might include terrorist plots. (This solved the problem of the collapsed porn industry, at least for NSA employees.)
2002 - Based on predictions that Iraq had or would soon have weapons capable of turning Americans into mushrooms, the U.S. Congress debated whether to invade Iraq or to invade Iraq, Iran, Venezuela, "and anywhere else there's oil in need of democracy." Congressional Democrats joined with Republicans in voting to authorize the president to invade "anywhere on earth, or even other planets if they have oil in need of democracy." Just as predicted by Democratic strategists, this produced landslide wins in almost four House races.
2003 - After Secretary of State Colin Powell held up a vial of powdered sugar and predicted "substances like this may already be in your coffee," the U.N. Security Council voted to not vote, thus clearing the way for the U.S. invasion of Iraq. Just as predicted, U.S. troops were greeted as liberators and Iraqi exile Ahmed Chalabi set up a government that became the model of Jeffersonian democracy. President Bush, wearing a flight suit and codpiece, announced "Mission Accomplished," noting that gasoline prices would soon plummet as grateful Iraqis turned over their oil to Exxon and Texaco, thus ushering in a century of prosperity. Months later, Vice President Cheney predicted that the Iraqi insurgency was "in its last throes," and New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman predicted we would turn the corner of a flat world in six months.
2004 - Based on negative media reactions to the popular campaign style of Howard Dean, Democratic strategists predicted the somnolent John Kerry would sweep to victory because he, unlike President Codpiece Bush, was a legitimate war hero. Meanwhile, blogger Markos Moulitsas predicted that women on his site would enjoy the image of scantily clad actresses smearing whipped cream over each other. This, plus the need for a mathematical symbol of reasoned dissent, an internet prank, and a site upgrade resulted in Kos' announcement that Pi equaled DKos(v)3.0. And Thomas Friedman twice more predicted we would turn that flat corner in Iraq in six months.
2005 - Based on his diagnosis that given proper treatment she would be back on her feet and voting for the GOP within weeks, Senator Bill Frist sprearheaded the Republican effort to save Terri Schiavo put government in charge of health care. Later, FEMA director Mike "I'm an Arabian Stallion" Brown declared that New Orleans levees were more than adequate to withstand Hurricane Katrina and even if they weren't, FEMA would be able to get food, water, and other emergency supplies into the city within weeks if not decades. Buoyed by these successes and Thomas Friedman's prediction that the U.S. would turn the corner in Iraq in six months, pundits offered detailed analyses of how the inevitable permanent Republican majority would change American politics.
2006 - Analysts predicted the failure of DNC Chairman Howard Dean's 50-state strategy, noting that soon Democrats won't even be able to win in Massachusetts. Their dazzling domestic policy successes, plus finally turning that corner in Iraq and predictions that Americans would die if Democrats took control of Congress, swept Republicans to victories in almost four House districts in the midterm elections.
2007 - Just as predicted, with new Democratic majorities in both the House and Senate, Americans died by the thousands from illnesses, car accidents, lightning strikes, snakebites, shark attacks, bee stings, and other signs of divine retribution. And just as predicted, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid passed legislation to change the stars on the U.S. flag to hammers and sickles alternating with crescents, outlawed all religions except Islam, raised the income tax rate to 110%, and led a revolt that jailed hundreds of Republicans for dissent. U.S. Attorneys who refused to join in this partisan purge were ruthlessly forced out by Democrats in Congress.
2008 - Fortunately, salvation arrived in the form of old GOP warhorse John McCain. After Democrats foolishly chose a young African American who spent his boyhood palling around with Chicago terrorists in Indonesia between trips to Nigeria to hide his birth certificate, it was only a matter of whether Senator McCain would pick Carrie Prejean or Sarah Palin to win over women who had supported Democratic rival Hillary Clinton. When informed that Ms. Prejean was too young to become president under the Constitution, Senator McCain said "Let's take the other former beauty pageant winner." Strategists noted that a man named Barack Hussein Obama could never win a U.S. election, between the famous Bradley Effect and his belonging to a mosque black revolutionary church, unless he began to show more fire and personally attacked his opponent. This, combined with Sen. McCain's prediction that the U.S. economy would rebound if he put his campaign on hold for a few days, led Sen. McCain to a landslide totaling almost 1/3rd of the Electoral College.
2009 - And thus The Decade That Wasn't drew to an end with President Obama confiscating every gun in the U.S., requiring everyone to kneel toward Mecca, nationalizing banks, nationalizing auto plants, nationalizing health insurance, raising income taxes to 110%, shutting down Fox News and conservative talk radio, locking up millions of Republicans in secret FEMA concentration camps, and building a tunnel from Mexico to Lou Dobbs' back yard. To top it all off, President Obama also sent CIA agents to Nigeria to destroy his birth certificate. Just ask Orly Taitz.
Not bad for only a year in office. We predict next year he'll return to Krypton, to organize the alien takeover slated for 2012. Which is sure to happen unless the internet porn industry collapses again.
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Happy Wednesday!