A 1997 Wired Article Predicting '10 Things That Could Go Wrong In The 21st Century'
I'd like to remain positive but ....
-----------
Link to tweet
-----------
– Tensions between China and the US escalate into a new Cold War — bordering on a hot one.
– New technologies turn out to be a bust. They simply don't bring the expected productivity increases or the big economic boosts,
– Russia devolves into a kleptocracy run by a mafia or retreats into quasi-communist nationalism that threatens Europe.
– Europe's integration process grinds to a halt. Eastern and Western Europe can't finesse a reunification, and even the European Unification process breaks down.
– Major ecological crisis causes a global climate change that, among other things, disrupts the food supply - causing big price increases everywhere and sporadic famines.
– Major rise in crime and terrorism forces the world to pull back in fear. People who constantly feel they could be blown up or ripped off are not in the mood to reach out and open up.
– The cumulative escalation in pollution causes a dramatic increase in cancer, which overwhelms the ill-prepared health system.
– Energy prices go through the roof. Convulsions in the Middle East disrupt the oil supply, and alternative energy sources fail to materialize.
– An uncontrollable plague - a modern-day influenza epidemic or its equivalent takes off like wildfire, killing upward of 200 million people.
– A social and cultural backlash stops progress dead in its tracks, human beings need to choose to move forward. They just may not...
= new reply since forum marked as read
We as a global community, not just the USA w/ drumpf, are allowing right win fascists to essentially be the cement shoes of our species, dragging everyone else to the bottom with it. drumpf, putin, brexit......... those are the major players but the problem is everywhere. the next to last thing on that list is a plague. covid hasn't been 200 million dead bad but the "social and cultural backlash" problem has made it so much worse than it had to be. we as a global community should thrilled that years of research and progress gave us the chance to make a vaccine for this thing in only a year. And here we are a year after that, and because of the "social and cultural backlash", we are still living with the virus every day because something like 1/3 of the globe refuses to take it.
Can you imagine that?
That is what i mean by cement shoes........ those of us, the vast majority that want to listen to experts and do the right thing are continually forced to live through the worst of everything because, to use the term from the USA, the "cement shoes" people want to own the libs.
For "social and cultural" reasons the cement shoes don't want a ban of assault weapons, even though the majority of us do.
The minority want to ban abortion, burn books, rig elections........ and oh yeah, SAVE the planet from climate change!
and it isn't happening............. because we just can't "move forward"
but it isn't all bad news. We still have the filibuster 
.
