It's a Wonderful Life ... in 2030!!
A drone makes deliveries. Credit: AFP/Getty Images/HO/ Wing Aviation LLC
As Christmas 2030 draws near and the world enjoys the gift of unexpected solutions to our biggest problems, now’s the time to recap all we have to be grateful for.
The first kudo has to go to "Johnson & Johnson & Juul." When this extraordinary merged corporation first proposed its COVID "VAPEVAXX," a system that reformulates its recipe for the new variants surfacing daily and simply demands that users inhale delightful THC or nicotine-flavored vaccine boosters every 25-35 seconds, scientists, regulators, parents, children, and sentient pets were appalled.
And the names of its earliest flavors, "Coronaberry" and "Smokeaway," didn’t help.
But learning that vaped vaccines stop COVID in its tracks was game-changing. And finding out that VAPEVAXX also makes adults grow taller, lose weight, and remember what they went into the laundry room looking for, is awesome.
Mostly.
At some point, combining unstoppable height increases and weight loss ceases to be a good idea.
And it turns out that many families function better when members wander from room to room trying to remember what they're looking for, rather than spending time together.
But a decade later we finally are a COVID-free society, albeit a very tall, very skinny COVID-free society with a skyrocketing divorce rate.
And it’s not as if COVID is the only problem we’ve solved recently.
We fixed national politics!
After four years of President Joe Biden and four more for Donald Trump when he was reelected in 2024, polls showed 99% of Americans were unwilling to vote for either GOP front-runner Jeanine Pirro or the leading Democratic candidate, Rep. Ilhan Omar.
So who could forget that moment when, during an unprecedented prime-time Oprah Winfrey special, Tiffany Trump and Chelsea Clinton introduced their joint presidential ticket and game-changer slogan: "If You Think You Hate Our Parents, Imagine How We Feel!"
Neither 2028 next-generation candidate is loyal to any political dogma, but, unlike their politiparents, they admitted it. That paved the way for calm, moderate governance and inspiring national mottos like, "Wait, what were we even arguing about?"
And the willingness of the two women to alternate the roles of president and vice president every seven days promised both a new era of bipartisanship and, thanks to weekly inaugurations, a golden age of fashion.
Is our nation now perfect, as Christmas approaches? Of course not. The last "brick and mortar" retail store in the United States, a yarn shop in Skokie, Illinois, owned by 87-year-old Mildred Muggins, closed last month. The space was quickly filled by the hot new cocaine bar "Jawgrind." On the bright side, Muggins now works there as an "artisanal cocaine guru" and says she’s never been more alert.
Delivery drones buzz overhead endlessly, and have killed nearly all of the birds while dropping bottled water to thirsty recreational runners. Major League Baseball teams now bring in a new hurler for each pitch. Bitcoin replaced the dollar as the world's reserve currency, and then when the computers went down, invisible marshmallows replaced Bitcoin, and there was no real difference. And polls show most middle-aged Americans are simultaneously tending to aged parents, young children, numerous pets, and a set of internet passwords longer than the Rochester phone book.
But we’re COVID-free, as long as we keep vaping! We solved our political problems! And we just keep getting taller and thinner.
It’s like a dream, really.
Columnist Lane Filler's opinions are his own.
Lane Filler is a member of the Newsday editorial board.
