Column: An Oscar-winning L.A. council member? Gov. Danny Trejo? Gustavo’s 2025 predictions
The good news: None of the predictions I made in last year’s annual Gustradamus column came true. If any did, it would have been a sign that the apocalypse is nigh.
The bad news: The apocalypse is here.
Donald Trump is about to become president and is licking his ketchup-specked lips at the prospect of punishing California for not rolling over for him like, say, Jeff Bezos did. Democrats are in the political wilderness now that Latinos seem to be over them. The city of Los Angeles faces a $130-million budget deficit. USC’s football team is playing in something called the SRS Distribution Las Vegas Bowl, while UCLA’s squad is staying home and probably doing steps up and down Young Research Library.
What’s next: Rick Caruso buys his suits at the Paramount Swap Meet? USC wins a national football championship? I’m calling those, as well as the following — and if any come true, be afraid.
With so much doom and gloom, I wish I could predict good things for 2025. But my Magic 8 Ball sees little to look forward to except a lot of laughs — because we’ll need to crack up at the cruelty and tomfoolery coming from the White House to keep from crying, you know?
This is some of what I see happening in the next 12 months:
*USC, desperate for football glory again, ditches the Big Ten Conference after just a year for something a bit more manageable: The high school-level Trinity League. They finish in last place after perennial prep powerhouse Mater Dei recruits all of their players, leaving the Trojans with a squad made up of the school’s marching band, outgoing President Carol Folt and journalism majors. The last group has never seen a football game — not even Madden.
*In one of his final acts as president, Joe Biden declares the Graffiti Towers — the long-abandoned trio of downtown skyscrapers that turned into L.A.’s biggest tagging canvas — a national monument. The City Council votes to charge an admission fee so people can tag and base jump to their heart’s content. The resulting crush of tourists rescues L.A. from fiscal insolvency.
*Speaking of City Hall, L.A. Councilmember Monica Rodriguez is invited to appear in the live-action version of “The Incredibles” as her animated doppelganger: voluble, brilliant, bespectacled, fashion-forward Edna Mode. The San Fernando Valley politician wins a best supporting actress Oscar by doing nothing more than playing herself.
*After Donald Trump’s share of the Latino vote increased in every presidential election since 2016 — despite a barrage of insults that included bragging about the taco salad at Trump Tower — he shocks the world by granting amnesty to all illegal immigrants, including double amnesty to Venezuelans and Central Americans so they can vote twice. The move guarantees that Latinos will go Republican for the next generation. It also leads Gavin Newsom and Nancy Pelosi to personally construct a 100-foot wall at the U.S.-Mexico border, brick by brick. Kamala Harris volunteers to stand guard in Calexico with a giant inflatable mallet, because she has nothing better to do.
*LeBron James announces he’s going to play until his 60s so he can become the first NBA player to lose alongside his grandson.
*Danny Trejo — whom I suggested back in 2020 should have been appointed California’s U.S. senator — declares he’s entering the 2026 gubernatorial race. All other candidates immediately drop out, because who wants to debate Machete? Trump immediately softens his anti-California stance, lest Trejo crush his short-fingered hands the first time they meet.
L.A. Times columnist Gustavo Arellano has an uncanny ability to not be able to predict the future. But last year, two of his 2022 predictions came true — both of them bad news. Will 2023 be better?
*Out of jobs, with no political future but a lot of time on their hands, former L.A. County Sheriff Alex Villanueva and ex-L.A. Councilmember Kevin de León start a podcast. It lasts all of one episode after both pass out from all the whine.
*Labor leaders deem the incoming senior class president at Baldwin Park High School anti-union because of a project praising hometown chain In-N-Out, whose workers have never formed a union yet enjoy some of the highest wages in fast food. They successfully recall the student after a $1.2-million campaign.
*The Times debuts its bias meter with my columna. The AI-powered doohickey self-immolates upon coming across my first use of Spanglish. Times owner Dr. Patrick Soon-Shiong stops the project and focuses instead on trying to cure something easier than modern-day journalism: cancer.
*Someone finds a purpose for jacaranda trees that’s actually beneficial to mankind.
*After a year of fighting online and via diss tracks, rappers Drake and Kendrick Lamar announce they will decide their beef once and for all with a wrestling match in the parking lot of the Tam’s Burgers off Rosecrans and Central avenues in Compton. Since Lamar has the home field advantage, he offers Drake the first kick, punch, body slam, suplex, piledriver, Stone Cold stunner and wedgie. Lamar still easily wins. Drake returns to Canada and takes Justin Bieber with him.
* Elon Musk — who’s suing the California Coastal Commission for not allowing him to launch more SpaceX missions from Vandenberg Space Force Base — decides to move his operations to Mt. Whitney. Newsom — a longtime friend and benefactor of tech bros — tells Musk that’s cool, as long as all those rockets don’t harm the environment. Musk responds by training the bears up there to drive his Cybertrucks so he can start a new Uber rival. Newsom praises Musk’s move as environmentally friendly. The mega-billionaire then turns Mt. Whitney into his lair, calling it Mt. Mar-a-Lago.
*I take a long, relaxing vacation — eh, who am I kidding! Consider it a miracle if I take a two-hour break — and it certainly won’t be at In-N-Out, which will continue to be overrated.
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