In 1555, the French astrologer Nostradamus published a collection of poems that he held were predictions of future events. For 2022, as an example, he predicted a series of horrific events, including an asteroid strike, inflation, famine, and robots that would invade Earth. And while we only have a few more days left in the year for those robots to destroy mankind, the Lensa app is doing its level best to help out in the meantime.  

You might be hoping for a news cycle that skews slightly more positive in 2023. At this point, a few months of relative calm feel less like a nice change of pace and more like a f-ing emergency. My delicate little dopamine levels cannot handle another coup this year. Alas, according to Nostradamus we’re looking at seven months of the Great War, with a new world order emerging from the ashes of civilization.

Sounds relaxing. 

My own prediction: that Biden will not end up running for president. Stay with me now. It’s not that I don’t think he wants to, or can – I think he’s done a pretty spectacular job, especially given the tools he was given to start with: an opposition party riddled with straight lunatics, plague, the breakdown of faith in democracy stand as a few minor examples. 

No, I think that Biden will not run if – and only if – he realizes that there is someone better to take his place. Because I truly believe that what Biden wants is what is best for this country, and he won’t let his ego stand in the way. That’s why we elected him at the precise moment in time that we did. 

I think Biden – and a significant percentage of voters – can see, at this point, that there is something fundamentally broken about the American system. This isn’t to say that it’s time to rip up to the Constitution, despite Trump’s thoughtful suggestion – but rather to say that it’s time to go back to basics, get at the fundamentals of what our founders were trying to do, and reimagine those values through the cultural lens that has been so hard fought-for, and is growing larger every day.

It’s not that the Republican Party is bad, and the Democratic Party is good. It’s that the very system itself is a fatally wounded animal. The time is ripe for a brand-new type of leader to emerge, one who is unafraid to shake up long-standing systems and truly – I mean Bernie Sanders-style, not Clinton-style – acknowledge and work to uphold the values of the working class in America. Because the values, those are still there – despite a very vocal minority that captures a great deal of attention – at heart there’s still an America that we believe in. 

I think we want a new voice for America. I think we need one. And I think we all – Biden included – realize that now, in the lead to the 2024 elections, is the time. Nostradamus could be wrong about the new world order – he’s been wrong once or twice in the past – but what if his prediction comes right, only with changes that transform the world in previously unimaginable and glorious ways?