Predictions for upcoming year

Published 1:59 pm Friday, January 23, 2009

I am a little late delivering my 2009 predictions to you, which must have put you in a dither.

Reorganizing my sock drawer took longer than I thought. But, even though we are a few weeks into the new year, I offer my same money-back-if-not-satisfied guarantee. First, you will have to send me some money.

As I look into my crystal ball, I will remind you that I am the expert who said Sonny Perdue couldn’t beat Roy Barnes, Tech couldn’t beat Georgia and when the Republicans took over control of state government, they couldn’t be as bad as the Democrats had been. So, I miss a few occasionally. Big deal.

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Let’s get right to work.

Prediction No. 1: The football coaches and student-athletes at the University of Georgia (the nation’s oldest state-chartered university, located in Athens, the Classic City of the South) will figure out Paul Johnson’s triple-option formation this year and return the football championship to its rightful owners. If by some extremely remote chance that does not happen (see Sonny Perdue vs. Roy Barnes et al.), I predict that UGA alumni will ask their Tech friends how many Rhodes Scholars they have had (I believe it is a whopping three) and then remind them of how many the University of Georgia has had (21—including two last year) and accuse them of supporting a “football factory.” I also predict that Tech fans are going to write me some very ugly notes when they read this.

I predict that Gov. Perdue will buy a mess of meat-eating piranhas and swim with them in Lake Oconee before he will ever again consider boogering around with the state’s retired teacher cost-of-living adjustment (COLA). As the governor has learned, piranhas are not as smart as retired teachers and nowhere near as mean.

I predict that the animosity between House Rules Chairman Earl Ehrhart, R-Powder Springs, and Lt. Gov. Casey Cagle will continue unabated in this session of the Legislature. However, Ehrhart’s advisers have cautioned him against calling Cagle “Eddie Haskell”—a character from the old “Leave It to Beaver” sitcom of the 1960s—because only 12 people in the state have ever heard of Eddie Haskell. Therefore, in the future Ehrhart will refer to Cagle as “Oprah Winfrey,” because we all know who Oprah Winfrey is.

I predict that one of my favorite legislators in all the world, Rep. Bobby Franklin, R-Marietta, will be unsuccessful this session in getting red clay declared Georgia’s Official Dirt (too controversial), but he will succeed in getting an anti-abortion amendment added to a piece of legislation regulating dog collars, something he was unable to do last year. I also predict that, in the confusion of the session, what actually gets passed will be a bill banning abortions for dogs and forcing Jane Fonda to wear a dog collar. Rep. Franklin may or may not know the difference.

I predict that the liberal weenies at The New York Times, The Washington Post and the television networks will be as tough on President Obama as they were on George W. Bush. I also predict the sun will rise in the west.

I predict that Vice President Joe Biden will do something extremely stupid before the year is out, like when he asked his friend in a wheelchair to “stand up and take a bow” during the campaign. But given the fact that he does this stuff all the time and that the liberal weenie media operate on a double standard, it won’t get reported.

I predict that former UGA quarterback Matthew Stafford will be the top pick in the upcoming National Football League draft and will make more money in half of one season than a schoolteacher, firefighter or police officer will make in an entire career. I don’t begrudge him getting the money, but I think it is a shame.

Finally, I predict that Sheila the Family Wonderdog will sleep 22 hours a day between now and the end of the legislative session and will still manage to be more productive than 180 representatives and 56 senators. For that, we can all be grateful.