Tick Tock, Tick Tock…

The Doomsday clock is counting down!

The Doomsday Clock is a design that warns the public about how close we are to destroying our world with dangerous technologies of our own making. It is a metaphor, a reminder of the perils we must address if we are to survive on the planet.

Each year, the Clock is set by the Bulletin’s Science and Security Board, a group of internationally recognized experts on nuclear risk, climate change, disruptive technologies, and biosecurity.

Right now, the Clock is the closest it has ever been at 90 seconds to midnight.

What will they set the Clock at this year? Join us on January 23rd at 10 am ET to find out.

But the clock is not the only negative predictions this year, the Eurasia Group's annual forecast of the political risks is not pretty.

2024. Politically it's the Voldemort of years. The annus horribilis. The year that must not be named.

Three wars will dominate world affairs: Russia vs. Ukraine, now in its third year; Israel vs. Hamas, now in its third month; and the United States vs. itself, ready to kick off at any moment.

Russia-Ukraine … is getting worse. Ukraine now stands to lose significant international interest and support. For the United States in particular, it's become a distant second (and increasingly third or lower) policy priority. Despite hundreds of thousands of casualties, millions of displaced people, and a murderous hatred for the Russian regime shared by nearly every Ukrainian that will define the national identity of tens of millions for decades. Which is leading to more desperation on the part of the Ukrainian government, while Vladimir Putin's Russia remains fully isolated from the West. The conflict is more likely to escalate, and Ukraine is on a path to being partitioned.

Israel-Hamas … is getting worse. There's no obvious way to end the fighting, and whatever the military outcome, a dramatic increase in radicalization is guaranteed. Of Israeli Jews, feeling themselves globally isolated and even hated after facing the worst violence against them since the Holocaust. Of Palestinians, facing what they consider a genocide, with no opportunities for peace and no prospects of escape. Deep political divisions over the conflict run throughout the Middle East and across over one billion people in the broader Muslim world, not to mention in the United States and Europe.

And then there's the biggest challenge in 2024 … the United States versus itself. Fully one-third of the global population will go to the polls this year, but an unprecedentedly dysfunctional US election will be by far the most consequential for the world's security, stability, and economic outlook. The outcome will affect the fate of 8 billion people, and only 160 million Americans will have a say in it, with the winner to be decided by just tens of thousands of voters in a handful of swing states. The losing side—whether Democrats or Republicans—will consider the outcome illegitimate and be unprepared to accept it. The world's most powerful country faces critical challenges to its core political institutions: free and fair elections, the peaceful transfer of power, and the checks and balances provided by the separation of powers. The political state of the union … is troubled indeed.

I think they are right! There is no end in site to the wars, all the sides on the warring countries are so far apart I just don’t see how they will end peacefully.

Risk 1: The United States vs. itself
While America's military and economy remain exceptionally strong, its political system is more dysfunctional than that of any other advanced industrial democracy … and in 2024 faces further weakening. The US presidential election will worsen the country's political division, testing American democracy to a degree the nation hasn't experienced in 150 years and undermining US credibility on the global stage.
Eurasia Group's 2024 Top Risks Report
8 January 2024
By: Ian Bremmer,  Cliff Kupchan

The US political system is remarkably divided, and its legitimacy and functionality have eroded accordingly. Public trust in core institutions—such as Congress, the judiciary, and the media—is at historic lows; polarization and partisanship are at historic highs. Add algorithmically amplified disinformation to the mix, and Americans no longer believe in a common set of settled facts about the nation and the world.

The two major parties' likely presidential candidates are uniquely unfit for office. Former President Donald Trump faces dozens of felony criminal charges, many directly related to actions taken during his term in office, most critically including his efforts to overturn the results of a free and fair election. In any stable, well-functioning democracy, the 2024 contest would be principally about those. The United States is presently far from that. On the other side of the aisle, President Joe Biden would be 86 years old at the end of his second term. The vast majority of Americans want neither to lead the nation.

As I said I see these predictions “right on,” yesterday I painted a negative future and I don’t any bright spots.