Brandon Evans
“It will happen. There’s no IFS about it. And it’s gonna be ugly. It’s gonna be gut-wrenching.”
“It will be the end of America.”
“There will be economic, military and social collapse.”
“How many years will it take us to recover from this?”
The above quotes weren’t about an interpretation of an ancient Mayan calendar spelling doom on Dec. 21, 2012. Rather, they were made by political pundits about what would happen if President Barack Obama was re-elected in November. They were made by the likes of Chuck and Gena Norris, Rush Limbaugh and Ann Coulter.
But amazingly, we survived the election apocalypse just as easily as we did the Mayan scare. The year ends with two Armageddon-like predictions getting tossed out the window. Talk about anti-climactic! No ancient Mayan zombies or Obama KGB to be seen anywhere.
I survived two apocalypses (or is it apocalypsis) and I didn’t even get a lousy T-shirt for it. Come to think of it, if the apocalypse is the end of the world, how could there even be a plural version?
But what’s really amazing is how much time was wasted and negative energy generated focusing on such dark predictions. There’s enough tragedy in the world already. It’s not necessary to fabricate more.
Maybe in 2013, instead of spending our time preparing for the worst, we can invest our efforts into appreciating the beautiful world and wonderful people around us and try our best to make it a world we want to live in, rather than envisioning a planet doomed to collapse.
Brandon Evans is a Messenger reporter.
