DETROIT – We are about to close the books on 2023 and head into 2024 -- nearly a quarter of the way into the 21st Century.
It’s quite understandable if you look back at 2023 while singing “hit the road, Jack, and don’t you come back.” In a nutshell, there was too much bloodshed over the last 12 months. From Ukraine, to Israel, to mass shootings in America that we seem unable to quell.
Our political divisions have us in full-throated rancor and that’s before the first votes have been cast in the 2024 sweepstakes. On the other hand, there were quite a few very hopeful though quieter developments.
Some have suggested that we’re entering a new golden age of medicine. Promising new research into dementia. Promising new breakthrough treatments for sickle cell anemia. The World Health Organization has, for the first time, recommended a vaccine for malaria, one of the world’s deadliest diseases.
NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope keeps teaching us more and more about the origins of our very existence. Inflation is subsiding, Wall Street is at a record, and the U.S. economy is outperforming pretty much every other economy in the world right now.
On this edition of Flashpoint we’ll do our annual look back and we’ll look ahead. We’ll also talk with the futurist at Ford Motor Co. about their annual report on the trends that will define the new year.
You can watch the Dec. 31, 2023, episode of Flashpoint in the video player above.