作者：JOSHUA E. KEATING 2012年12月21日美国《外交政策》
美国《外交政策》发表文章，列举了2012年十个最糟糕的预测。
1. 世界将于2012年终结——玛雅人
人们要把一件事搞清楚：古玛雅人并不认为世界将于2012年12月21日终结，目前甚至无法肯定这个日期对他们有什么重要意义。那么，“12月21日是世界末日”的说法是怎么来的呢？
最先使“玛雅人认为12月21日是世界末日”的说法流行开来的是作家迈克尔•科，其实他也不认为玛雅人的说法正确。但后来考古学家对他的解释提出了质疑，而且最近他们还发现了显示2012年以后数千年中特殊日子的历法。
2. 罗姆尼将获得压倒性胜利——迪克•莫里斯
福克斯新闻频道政治评论员、政治顾问迪克•莫里斯对投票行为的真知灼见曾对前总统比尔•克林顿的决策起到引导作用。他曾预言，罗姆尼将拿到325张选举人票，对其声誉造成的打击最严重的大概莫过于这一预言了。
莫里斯后来表示，他曾“错误地认为，黑人、拉美裔和年轻选民的投票率虽然在2008年出现高涨，但会在2012年回落到‘正常’水平”。
3. 只能当一任总统的人——贝拉克•奥巴马
“我有4年时间……从现在开始，我认为大家将会看到我们开始取得进展。但困难还是存在的。如果我无法在今后3年做到这一点，那么我将成为只能当一任总统的人。”——2009年2月1日
这番话是奥巴马对马特•劳尔的答复。当时，劳尔就奥巴马的经济计划对他进行了提问。现在来看，奥巴马的答复低估了美国选民的耐心或自己的政治能力。这番话也成为2012年总统竞选期间最受共和党候选人米特•罗姆尼欢迎的言论。
正如奥巴马自己所言，他的政府为帮助美国从大衰退中复苏所做的工作显然没有“完成”——刺激措施创造的工作岗位比其经济师预想的要少——但他现在无疑已成为连续两届担任总统的人。
4. 普京失势——玛莎•格森
3月4日，莫斯科克里姆林宫前，普京的支持者挥舞印有普京头像的旗帜。
“弗拉基米尔•普京总理不再是必然的领导人……我和许多俄罗斯人认为，政权将在明年3月份的选举前后倒台。”——2011年12月22日
“弗拉基米尔•普京总理不再是必然的领导人……我和许多俄罗斯人认为，政权将在明年3月份的选举前后倒台。”——2011年12月22日
玛莎•格森是一名驻俄罗斯记者，并且是今年备受推崇的《无脸人：弗拉基米尔•普京出人意料的崛起》一书作者。格森向来对俄罗斯政治观察入微，因此她对选举前的抗议活动所作的过于乐观的预测愈加显得出人意料。尽管有迹象表明反对派实力有所上升，但普京在3月份的选举中轻松当选，并已采取措施进一步对反对派的活动加以限制。
5. 阿萨德完蛋了——《经济学人》周刊
“叙利亚总统巴沙尔•阿萨德不大可能熬过今年。”——2011年11月17日
英国知名周刊《经济学人》在去年年底推出的“2012年的世界”预测一如既往地具有相当高的准确率，但他们错误地判断了今年的一个重大政治问题：叙利亚总统能撑多久？
英国知名周刊《经济学人》在去年年底推出的“2012年的世界”预测一如既往地具有相当高的准确率，但他们错误地判断了今年的一个重大政治问题：叙利亚总统能撑多久？
大多数观察人士要稍稍谨慎一点，不过，近来许多政要都在预言阿萨德即将垮台。有媒体报道称，美国中情局认为阿萨德将在短短几周内下台。我们拭目以待。
6.塔尼亚胡将在10月突袭——阿隆•本—戴维等人
“（本雅明•内塔尼亚胡）决心在美国大选前袭击伊朗……我怀疑奥巴马未必能说服内塔尼亚胡推迟有可能发动的袭击。”——2012年8月20日
今年，以色列新闻媒体纷纷猜测以色列将在美国大选前攻打伊朗。以色列电视台第十频道人脉广泛的军事记者阿隆•本—戴维根据他与军方高级将领们的交谈做出上述预言。
在美国，哈佛大学历史学家尼尔•弗格森在《新闻周刊》上发表文章预言，为了增加胜选连任的概率，奥巴马将对伊朗实施打击。紧张气氛依然浓厚，但美国大选举行了又结束了，特拉维夫——还有华盛顿——却没有丝毫动静。
7. 我们已经解决了希腊难题——安格拉•默克尔
“我们欧洲人证明了自己能够得出正确的结论。我们就完整的一揽子协议达成了一致意见。”——2011年10月27日
这是经过精心排练的套话。欧洲国家领导人开会讨论采取必要措施救助希腊和保护欧元区，宣布他们终于取得突破，然后几个月后再次讨论这个问题。尽管德国总理安格拉•默克尔在2011年秋天达成了关于削减希腊债务事宜的协议后宣称欧洲国家领导人终于渡过了难关，但这个大陆至今仍围绕向希腊提供多少援助的问题争执不下。
8. 诺贝尔和平奖得主将是——克里斯蒂安•贝格•哈普维肯
“哈普维肯看好的2012年获奖者是吉恩•夏普，他是非暴力行动的主要分析家和激励者……第五个有可能获奖的是缅甸总统吴登盛。”——奥斯陆国际和平研究所网站，2012年10月
年都会以其对诺贝尔和平奖的“猜测”引起媒体的关注。而这些猜测每年都是错的。只有一个被他列在名单最后的人——阿尔•戈尔，2007年——曾获得这个奖项。但哈普维肯坚持不懈。今年的获奖者欧盟，在哈普维肯列出的几十个潜在获奖者名单上提都没有提到。
9. 奥运会将是一场灾难——德国《明镜》周刊
8月4日，伦敦街头一位游客的帽子上别满了伦敦奥运的纪念徽章。
“伦敦和奥运会早已变得无法相容。游客需要下很大决心、最重要的是要有耐心才能到达比赛场馆。而对于当地人来说，问题在于奥运会不可以尽早结束。”——2012年7月17日
怀疑英国的经济困境、安全担忧、劳工骚乱以及差劲的基础设施会使伦敦奥运会开得“一塌糊涂”的并不只有德国《明镜》周刊。在奥运会开幕前夕，从小说家尼克•霍恩比，到《纽约时报》，到美国共和党总统候选人米特•罗姆尼，所有人都在怀疑伦敦有没有准备就绪。
当然，差不多按照所有的标准，伦敦奥运会都取得了了不起的成功。这是电视史上观众最多的一届奥运会，场馆设施经受了考验，安全担忧被证明言过其实，而且东道主获得了创纪录的奖牌。伦敦奥运继北京奥运和南非世界杯之后，成为又一个被广泛预料会成为灾难、但事实证明办得很出色的重大赛事。
10. 中国即将崩溃——章家敦
“不久之前，对于北京的官僚们来说一切还算运转正常。但现在没有什么是运转正常的。所以，是的，我的预言有过错误。但中国共产党将在2012年、而不是2011年垮台。我敢打赌。”——2011年12月29日
作家兼评论员章家敦在他2001年出版的《中国即将崩溃》一书中列出了清单。该书预言中国将在2011年垮台。章家敦承认自己的预言跳了票，但是在一篇发表在《外交政策》杂志上的文章中，他直接把自己的预言延后了一年。然而，尽管经过了权力过渡和充满不确定的一年，中国仍一切正常。
The 10 Worst Predictions for 2012
Who got it wrong this year?
BY JOSHUA E. KEATING | DECEMBER 21, 2012
The World Will End in 2012 --The Mayans (But Not Really)
Let's get one thing clear: The ancient Mayans did not believe the world was going to end on Dec. 21, 2012, and it's not even certain the date had any significance for them. Some archeologists believe that Dec. 21 will mark the end of the "Great Cycle" of 13 baktuns, the 1,872,000-day periods that are the largest unit of time on the ancient Mayan calendar, which is no longer in use among the Mayans' descendents. Others believe it will be Dec. 23 or a different day entirely. So where did the idea that Dec. 21 = the apocalypse come from? Author Michael Coe first popularized the theory that the Mayans believed this date is when the world would end -- for what it's worth, he didn't actually believe they were right -- but later archeologists disputed his interpretation and recently discovered calendars that show dates thousands of years past 2012.
None of that has stopped a cottage industry of doomsday prophetsfrom cashing in on the phenomenon, often connecting it to similarly crackpot ideas about solar flares, shifting global polarities, extraterrestrials, and the phantom planet Nibiru (and of course, that movie).
It's easy to laugh at the 2012ers, though the hysteria has hadoccasionally tragic consequences. An Ipsos poll conducted in 21 countries this year found that 8 percent of respondents wereexperiencing anxiety over the "prophesy." In Russia, there have been several documented cases of "collective mass hysteria" over the date, with worried citizens raiding stores to stock up for the apocalypse. In China, more than 1,000 members of a doomsday cult preparing for the apocalypse on Dec. 21 were arrested.
In any event, if you're reading this, it appears we made it.
The Romney Landslide --Dick Morris
"It will be the biggest surprise in recent American political history.… It will rekindle the whole question as to why the media played this race as a nail-biter where in fact I think Romney's going to win by quite a bit." --Nov. 4
Foreign Policy did a full list of bad election predictions here, but Dick Morris, the Fox News talking head and political consultant whose insights on voting behavior once guided President Bill Clinton's policy decisions, probably took the biggest hit to his reputation with his 325-electoral-votes-for-Romney call. Morris, who has since been put on probation at the conservative network, later said he had "mistakenly believed that the 2008 surge in black, Latino, and young voter turnout would recede in 2012 to 'normal' levels."
Of course, the famed polling guru could always have consulted some actual polls -- but that's not how you sell books.
One-Term Proposition --Barack Obama
"You know, I've got four years.… And, you know, a year from now I think people are going to see that we're starting to make some progress. But there's still going to be some pain out there. If I don't have this done in three years, then there's going to be a one-term proposition." --Feb. 1, 2009
U.S. President Barack Obama underestimated either the patience of American voters or his own political skill in this response to a question from Matt Lauer on his economic plans, including buying toxic assets from banks and increasing stimulus spending. The quote became a favorite applause line for Republican candidate Mitt Romney during the 2012 presidential campaign. As Obama himselfadmits, his administration's efforts to help the United States recover from the Great Recession are certainly not "done" -- and the stimulus did not create nearly as many jobs as his economists projected -- yet he is decidedly now a two-term proposition.
The Fall of Putin --Masha Gessen
"With Russians taking to the streets to protest the recent flawed parliamentary elections, Prime Minister Vladimir Putin has suddenly ceased to be an inevitable leader. He may think that this spring he will be elected president -- the job he held from 2000 to 2008 -- and serve up to 12 more years in that office. But I, like many Russians, think the regime will fall before the March election or soon after." --Dec. 22, 2011
Masha Gessen, a Moscow-based journalist and author of this year's highly acclaimed The Man Without a Face: The Unlikely Rise of Vladimir Putin, is normally an astute and clear-eyed observer of Russian politics, which made this overly rosy prediction about Russia's pre-election protests all the more surprising. Despite signs of growing opposition, Putin was easily reelected in March and has taken steps to even further limit the activities of government opponents. The unprecedentedly large street protests that greeted his reelection have now mostly fizzled, though in Russian politics, it's always wise to expect the unexpected.
Assad Is Cooked --The Economist
"Syria's President Bashar Assad is unlikely to last the year in office, as the Sunni majority, including senior military men and businessmen, decide that rule by the president's Alawite minority, which makes up about a tenth of the population, cannot be sustained." --Nov. 17, 2011
As usual, the venerable British weekly the Economist was more right than wrong in its "The World in 2012" projections written at the end of last year, but they misjudged one of the biggest political questions of the year: how long Syria's president could hang on. Most observers have been a bit more cautious, though in recent weeks, a number of prominent players, including Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu and NATO Secretary-General Anders Fogh Rasmussen have been predicting Assad's imminent fall. According to some media reports, the CIA believes Assad will fall in a matter of weeks. We'll see.
"[Benjamin Netanyahu] is determined to attack Iran before the U.S. elections.… I doubt Obama could say anything that would convince Netanyahu to delay a possible attack." --Aug. 20, 2012
This year, the Israeli media was rife with speculation that Israel would launch an attack on Iran before the U.S. elections. Alon Ben-David, the well-connected defense correspondent for Israel's Channel 10, made his prediction based on conversations with high-ranking military officers. Commentators Nahum Barnea and Simon Shiffer joined in, predicting in the paper Yedioth Ahronoth, "Insofar as it depends on Binyamin Netanyahu and Ehud Barak, an Israeli military strike on the nuclear facilities in Iran will take place in these coming autumn months, before the U.S. elections in November." An article in the newspaper Maariv said that Sept. 25 -- Yom Kippur eve -- was the crucial decision date. In the United States, Harvard University historian Niall Fergusonpredicted in a widely panned article for Newsweek that Obama would launch a U.S. strike on Iran in order to boost his reelection chances. Tensions are still high, but the election came and went without any moves from Tel Aviv -- or Washington.
We've Solved the Greece Problem --Angela Merkel
"We Europeans showed that we are able to reach the correct conclusions. We found agreement on a complete package." --Oct. 27, 2011
It's a well-rehearsed ritual at this point. European leaders meet to discuss measures needed to bail out Greece and preserve the eurozone, announce that they have finally reached a breakthrough, and then several months later are at it again. Despite German Chancellor Angela Merkel's assurances that European leaders had finally turned the page after reaching an agreement to reduce Greece's debt in the fall of 2011, the continent is still at odds over how much aid to extend to Greece. Germany was dragged into supporting a bailout for Greece and other aid-stricken countries by European Central Bank chief Mario Draghi this fall, but it's still very much touch-and-go. The chancellor recently griped, "In all my life I have never thought so much about Greece."
And the Nobel Will Go to … --Kristian Berg Harpviken
"Harpviken's favourite for 2012 is Gene Sharp, who has been a main analyst and inspirator on non-violent action, which has proven its strength in numerous uprisings over the past couple of years. The second favourite is Memorial, the Russian organization focusing on human rights, democracy, and reconciliation through historical documentation, alongside founding member Svetlana Gannushkina. Third on Harpviken's list is Echo of Moscow, an independent media house, and its editor, Aleksei Venediktov. A fourth possible outcome in 2013, suggests Harpviken, is a shared prize to Archbishop John Onaiyekan and Mohamed Sa'ad Abubakar, both of Nigeria, for their contribution to interreligious dialogue. A fifth possible winner, within the always controversial peacemakers category, is Myanmar's President Thein Sein" --Peace Research Institute Oslo's website, October 2012
Every year, Kristian Berg Harpviken, director of the Peace Research Institute Oslo, a Norwegian think tank, gets major media attention -- yes, from us too -- for his "speculations" about who will win the Nobel Peace Prize. And every year they are wrong. Only one of his shortlisters -- Al Gore in 2007 -- has ever taken home the prize. But Harpviken keeps soldiering on. This year's winner, the European Union, wasn't mentioned at all in Harpviken's list of dozens of potential winners. Interestingly, the Irish betting side Paddy Power did list it as a potential winner. Chalk one up for the wisdom of the crowd.
The Olympics Will Be a Disaster --Der Spiegel
"London and the Olympic Games are clearly not made for each other. Visitors will need determination and, most of all, patience to reach the venues at all. And, for the locals, it all can't end soon enough." --July 17, 2012
The German weekly Der Spiegel wasn't alone in suspecting that Britain's economic woes, security concerns, labor unrest, and poor infrastructure would turn the London Games into "one big, soggy mess." In the run-up to the Olympics, everyone from novelist Nick Hornby to the New York Times to Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney was questioning whether London was really up for it. Comedian Russell Brand summed up the feelings of many of his compatriots when hepredicted that, compared with the impressive Beijing Games, London 2012 would be a "right balls up."
Of course, by nearly any standards, the London Games were a smashing success. They were themost watched event in TV history, the facilities held up, security concerns proved overblown, and the home team took home a record number of medals.
London followed the Beijing Games and South Africa's World Cup as events that were widely expected to be disasters but turned out just fine. Maybe we can cut Brazil some slack this time?
The Coming Collapse of China (Redux) --Gordon Chang
"Not long ago, everything was going well for the mandarins in Beijing. Now, nothing is. So, yes, my prediction was wrong. Instead of 2011, the mighty Communist Party of China will fall in 2012. Bet on it." --Dec. 29, 2011
Author and commentator Gordon Chang made the list last year for his 2001 book, The Coming Collapse of China, which predicted that Communist Party rule would fall in 2011. Chang acknowledged that he had jumped the gun, but in an article for Foreign Policy, he simply moved his prediction forward one year. Nevertheless, despite a year of transition, scandal, and uncertainty, the mandarins in Beijing are still there.
