Reviewing those 2010 Predictions

I didn't get 2011 predictions posted this year, but I should recap my 2010 predictions, especially since I didn't do too bad. Here we go:

10. Sometime in the first half of the year, the stock market will outrun the current irrational exuberance and sharply tumble back below 10,000.

It wasn't as sharp as I was thinking, but in late spring/early summer, the Dow plummeted from 11,200 to below 9,800.

9. At the end of the year, unemployment will remain above 9%.

Got it, but this was almost a gimme.

8. At least one nation will default or nearly default on its debt.

We had a couple of close calls, but no actual default. Ireland, Greece, and Iceland, amongst others, still hang on by their fingernails.

7. A promising Green Bay Packer season will be derailed by injuries.

Last year was too healthy for the injury bug not to catch up with them, and it did.

6. Democrats will avoid provoking controversy via legislation just enough to lose fewer seats than anticipated in the off-year election.

That's what I get for overestimating the political instincts of the current class of Democrats. Wrong.

5. The newspaper industry will continue to disintegrate as at least two more papers halt their print editions.

I don't recall any doing so, so wrong again.

4. Al Gore will pontificate about global warming during an unseasonable cold snap/blizzard (this should be a gimme).

Not gimme. Ol' Al went on the DL to a certain extent. Had he shown up in Cancun, though, this one would have been a winner.

3. Tiger Woods will return from hiatus before the majors begin.

There was no way he'd stay away from the majors. Got it.

2. There will be a significant terrorist attack on American interests.

Wrong, and thankful for that. Never would have predicted TSA Gone Wild, though. I guess all that rhetoric about the Bush Administration being the Nazi's was just talk, huh? Unless the Obama & company are the Politburo.

1. President Obama's approval rating will end the year marginally higher than they begin the year. Marginally.

Wrong. Slightly lower. But I didn't think he'd ram Obamacare through, and I though congressional Dems were smarter politicritters than they were.

I'm giving myself 4.5 out of 10 on this (a half for the near national defaults). Not great, but if this were hitting a baseball, you'd all be talking about me cryogenically freezing myself right now.