Hello, beloved humans, and welcome to the seventh annual edition of Rex Huppke’s Guaranteed-Accurate-Never-Wrong-Grade-A-New Year’s Predictions, an annual event cherished by tens of people.
As regular readers know, I once walked through a mysterious mist in a field outside an Indiana hog farm and emerged smelling terrible but also possessing the remarkable power of precognition. I explain everything in my wildly popular, yet-to-be-written motivational book, “Always Pause to Inhale the Hog Fumes.”
In last year’s edition, I accurately predicted the following:
Donald Trump will become president of a Florida enclave known as “Scamsylvania.” Check, that definitely happened.
Pants will be outlawed. They were not technically outlawed, but as people continued working from home due to the pandemic, nobody in their right mind wore pants. So I was right. Check.
Going into Week 15 of the NFL season, the Chicago Bears will be 4-9 and head coach Matt Nagy will be on the outs. OK, I didn’t actually predict that one, but I could have because I’m always right. Check.
That’s all the evidence you need to proceed with 100% confidence in my prognostication skills.
So here are things you can count on happening in 2022:
The unvaccinated will form a powerful afterlife super PAC.
As America continues to struggle with the coronavirus pandemic, and as the willfully unvaccinated continue to allow new variants to develop, those most staunchly opposed to COVID-19 vaccines and other prevention measures will join together and form the first afterlife-based political action committee.
Though not of this earthly plane, the Super PAC will still be able to place factually incorrect anti-vaccine and anti-mask scare ads on Facebook, because Facebook policy does not prohibit misinformation spread by “inhabitants of the afterlife or anyone who pays us money.”
I will get rich selling NFTs of my calves.
The collision of my staggeringly gorgeous, carefully sculpted man-calves and the burgeoning NFT (nonfungible token) market was inevitable.
For those who don’t know, NFTs are, according to Investopedia, “cryptographic assets on a blockchain with unique identification codes and metadata that distinguish them from each other.” Nobody actually knows what any of those words mean, which is fine because nobody really knows whether NFTs exist and, if they do, they are usually purchased with cryptocurrency, which is technically not real.
Make sense? Of course not. If it did, I wouldn’t be able to charge as much for unique digital images of my calves.
I will be so wealthy by the end of 2022 that I will fly into space in my own rocket, which will be shaped like one of my calves.
American democracy will end.
Let’s be honest. Democracy in this country has had a nice run, but there are a bunch of extremely loud people with guns who don’t much care for it anymore. So it’s probably best we just let it slide and try out a bit of light fascism.
Republicans across the country spent a good bit of 2021 promoting the false narrative that the 2020 presidential election was rigged and finding clever ways to make sure only the white people … excuse me … RIGHT people are allowed to vote next time around. They’ve elevated people who likely think ducks are spying on them to key election posts across the country, with the sole purpose of overturning any election results that aren’t in their party’s favor.
As children, we called this “cheating,” but for grown-up Republicans it’s called “patriotism.” Because they love “American democracy.” As long as they alone are in charge.
Republicans will win big in the midterm elections.
(See previous prediction.)
Climate change will continue to not care if you believe in it.
If 2021 featured fire, flooding and December tornadoes in Minnesota, just imagine what 2022 has in store!
At a recent meeting of the American Geophysical Union, scientists said a glacier the size of Florida — the Thwaites Eastern Ice Shelf — is eroding faster than anticipated, increasing the chances that homeowners in Schaumburg will eventually have oceanfront views.
While politicians cry out that climate change is a hoax and ceremonially rub crude oil on their bodies, careful to avoid the corporate cash stuffed in their pockets, the planet’s warming oceans and rising temperatures will continue to gleefully remind humans they are expendable.
In 2021, Republican Sen. Ron Johnson of Wisconsin said climate change is “bull(bad word).” In 2022, his unoccupied lake house could be destroyed by what will be called a “firecane floodnado.”
And he will still think climate change is bull(bad word).
I will be outlandishly grateful to all readers, cruel or kind.
I can already confirm this prediction is accurate.
As I sit down each day in my Obama-autographed beanbag and begin typing whatever blather travels from my brain to my fingers, I realize how fortunate I am to have you all, the readers of said blather.
Whether you agree with what I write or think I should be keelhauled and delivered to a dank cell at Guantanamo Bay, I appreciate you. Truly. Thank you for letting me into your lives and sharing your thoughts.
I wish all of you, each and every one, nothing but good health and happiness in 2022.
From my family to yours, most sincerely: Happy New Year!
There’s still time to donate to the fourth annual Insult-A-Columnist Holiday Food Drive benefiting the Greater Chicago Food Depository. Vote under RexRocks (myfooddrives.org/RexRocks) or RexStinks (myfooddrives.org/RexStinks).
Rex Huppke is a columnist for the Chicago Tribune and a noted hypocrisy enthusiast. You can email him at rhuppke@tribune.com or follow him on Twitter at @RexHuppke.