2020

I started posting this a fortnight ago.

Let's play a game: fast forward to 2020 and try to guess what kind of state the world will be in.

Unless there's a man with a rifle on a grassy knoll, Donald Trump will still be president. He'll be coming to the end of his first term and no doubt the world will be wondering if he'll get a second term. Most presidents get a second term: you can be demented (Reagan), sick unto death (Roosevelt) or totally unsuited to the job (guess who) but if the party and the public are behind you - and the public are behind Trump right now and probably still will be in 2020 - you'll get the nomination for your party. Will the Republicans in Congress forgive Trump for giving the best jobs, not to politicians like them but to his buddies from the world of big business? Will they overlook the fact that he has sacked anyone with the slightest idea what they're doing, appointed family members as White House aides, and produced 'Executive Orders' so riddled with loopholes that the Supreme Court will be tied up for years trying to sort it all out? More money for the lawyers and they all get to blame the courts - yay! You know the Executive Orders I mean: you have a green card, so you can get (back) into the USA. Oh no, wait: Border Patrol has sent you back to Iraq, even though you haven't lived there for 7 years and only went for a week (the wrong week, it turns out) to see your dying grandfather. You've been refused permission to fly through New York, despite the fact you don't want to stay there but to go back to Europe where you have a good job and a happy family waiting for you. Tough.

Maybe the invasion of Iran will be underway. Iran is being lined up right now as the big problem as far as middle east security goes. Pakistan, riddled with terrorists, is a friend of the USA. So are Turkey, Egypt and Israel. The USA and UK sell them billions worth of arms. Nobody seems to know if Iran has nuclear weapons (remember Iraq's weapons 'of massive destruction' that we never found?) but the Iranians hate the USA (and for good reason since the CIA fomented the downfall of the Shah but then tried to undermine the Ayatollah) and show every sign of being possible leaders in the Persian Gulf, so that kinda guarantees the tanks will be rolling in quite soon.

By 2020, the EU will still exist but it'll be shaky. Trump and his business buddies don't like the EU. They call it a 'a cartel' as if it was some Colombian drugs gang. Trump and co want unfettered free trade, with no protection for the small states of Europe  - except, of course, they are not going to allow just anyone and everyone to trade with the USA. Angela Merkel has not been forgiven for reminding Trump of his duty of care for refugees on day 2 of his presidency, and he says ominously she's on her way out. The EU has played right into the hands of Trump with its inability to curb the waste in the Commission. Tusk and co look nervous and there is no natural successor to Merkel among the EU leaders. And the Marine woman in France is very scary this time around, especially faced with Fillon and Macron (joke names if ever we heard them). Only favoured friends can trade with the USA, but the UK should be all right in the short term as long as the un-elected Theresa May stays in power. All opposition voices (Ken Clark, David Davies, Boris Johnson - not opposition really but some are possible rivals for the job of PM) - will be silenced and replaced by Tory boys with suspicious backgrounds. Will there be one whose dad ran away to join a circus?

And what of Scotland? Tbh - to be honest - as some of my Facebook friends would put it - that's really all I care about. I can't understand that there are people in my homeland who still think it's better to stick with the morons in the union that calls itself the UK. People who think leaving the EU is a good idea, when those of us who have worked with the EU know the value of EU solidarity, not to mention EU funding. I'm talking about people who adhere to an ideal of socialist solidarity despite the fact that the Labour Party doesn't have so much as an idea, never mind an ideal, to bless itself with. People who go on and on about their connections with relatives south of the border, as if the border had never existed or would be a problem in the future.

That will be the real test in 2020. If we can win these people over.