Skip to main content

2009 Prognostication: Post 1 of 14


The press release from Freedom House has come out. Sadly, freedom retreated in 2008. There were 90 "free" countries in last year's report, but that dipped to 89 in this year's report. That means the answer to Question 1 of the 2009 Prognostication Quiz is B.

What was the country that declined? It was Senegal, on the west coast of Africa. Senegal's democracy has had two smooth transfers of power in recent history, allowing it to move from "partly free" up to "free" in the 2003 report. President Abdoulaye Wade (pictured above) was reelected in 2007, but came under some criticism last year with a series of scandals (corruption in his cabinet, nepotism on behalf of his son, and needlessly divisive confrontations with the opposition). That, presumably, plunged Senegal from "free" back to "partly free."

Twelve people picked B. Here they are, listed in order of predicted score for the remainder of the quiz:

1. Leanne
2. Ted
3. Jeremiah
4. Stephanie
5. Peter M.
6. Tina
7. Adrian
8. Heather
9. Rachel F.
10. Valerie
11. Grant
12. Ryan

The twelve who chose B (minus one) made it the most popular answer, followed by the eleven who picked D (plus one). Interestingly, only 8 picked C (no change). It seems that people were inclined either to be optimistic or pessimistic, with very few feeling that things were about the same.

We've also had the first round of the NFL playoffs, affecting question 3. There were quite a few upsets, making losers out of the 30 people who picked answers A-C. Remaining are the 13 who picked one of the remaining teams: D. Pittsburgh Steelers (Gloria, Pamela, Leanne, Zoe and Tina), E. Philadelphia Eagles or Arizona Cardinals (Pete C.), and F. Baltimore Ravens (Cameron, Marcus, Janet, Valerie, Peter M., Jan, and Ben). Two days of football remain: the two conference championship games this Sunday and the Super Bowl on February 1.

Next up is the Miss America Pageant on January 24. One person picked Miss Kansas to win. (Her talent is singing whilst accompanying herself on the piano.) Will she win?

Comments

  1. MT9:12 AM

    Damn! Couldn't just *one* more country be less free this year??!

    ReplyDelete
  2. MT2:56 PM

    by the way, I think it is highly unlikely that Miss Kansas will win. Her hair is about an inch long! http://www.missamerica.org/competition-info/national-contestants.aspx?state=Kansas&year=2009&GO=GO%21

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Can You Cross Your Toes?

Katie and I had a heated discussion the night before last. We were sitting on the couch watching Jon Stewart when she noticed a large, apparently cancerous growth sticking out of the bottom of my foot. She asked what the big lump in my sock was. "That's my toe," I responded, nonplussed. I had crossed my first and second toes, causing a lump to protrude from the bottom of my sock. Katie was quite alarmed. "You can cross your toes?" "Sure, can't you? Everyone can cross their toes!" "Of course I can't cross my toes. Who can cross their toes?" And I confirmed that Katie could not, in fact, cross her toes. Even manipulating her toes with my fingers, I could not get her toes to stay crossed. She just has very short toes. That led, of course, into a discussion of who was the freak. Were my long, crossable toes abnormal, or were her stubby, uncrossable phalanges the outliers? In case you're confused, here are some pictures. First, of my v
35 comments
Read more

Leagalize drugs!

The Economist has a wonderful editorial this week about legalizing drugs. I wholeheartedly agree that the world will be better off by far if the United States legalized, taxed, and regulated illicit drugs such as cannabis, cocaine, and heroin. The goods that will come from legalization: 1. We will save the $40 billion the US spends trying to eliminate the supply of drugs. 2. We will save the costs involved in incarcerating so many drug offenders (as well as gain their productivity in society). 3. We will gain money through taxation on the legal drug trade. 4. Legalized drugs will be regulated, and thus purer and safer to take. 5. With all these savings, we will have lots of money to spend on treating drug addiction as a public health issue rather than as a law and order issue. We will have lots of money to fund treatment programs for addicts that are ensnared by the easier availability of drugs. 6. We will prevent tens of thousands of killings in countries that produce drugs when proc
10 comments
Read more

2017 Prognostication Quiz FINAL POST: Questions 10 and 11, Stocks and Quakes

In the last post , I pointed out that Matthew D. and I were in a two-way tie at the top of the leaderboard with me holding the edge over him in the tiebreaker. For Matthew D. to have a chance to come from behind and grab the win, some significant December movement would be needed in one of three areas: the stock market, world earthquakes, or a convenient death. Here's what happened: 10. Stocks (December 29) How will stocks do in this first year of Trumponomics? Will the Dow Jones Industrial Average be up or down compared to the final close of 2016? Which way will the Dow go? a. Up b. Down The Dow Jones continued to rise throughout the month. I maintained my advantage in the tie-breaker. 11. Earthquake (December 31) How many big earthquakes (magnitude 8.0 or larger on the Richter scale) will there be this year? (Big earthquake counts from this millennium are indicated in parentheses.) How many big earthquakes will there be this year? a. None (2) b. One (7) c. Two (4) d. Th
Post a Comment
Read more