Councilman Rick Caruso, Stephen Miller raises hair and many predictions for 2026

Among the many intellectuals we lost in 2025 was the singer Tom Lehrer, who scandalized America in the 1950s and 1960s with his scathing political songs, then left that profession in the early 1970s to teach math.

“Political satire became obsolete,” he sneered, “when Henry Kissinger was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.”

That thought came to mind as I pondered whether to continue with my annual Gustadramus columnwhere I give predictions for the coming year. How can I find joy after 2025 in Los Angeles that began with infernos, continues with the snow of the invasion of immigrants worthy of the White Walkers in “Game of Thrones” and ends with a record Christmas rain and a burst gas line that threatens to turn Castaic into a huge fire?

But hope and humor are what make life worth living, and President Trump makes Kissinger seem as unlikable as Bluey. So check out my 2026 prediction, which will come true, because my track record is more perfect than an order of taquitos at Cielito Lindo washed down with horchata.

*Rick Caruso decides not to run for California governor or mayor of Los Angeles when he realizes that JD Vance has a better chance of winning than him. Instead, the developer challenges LA City Councilmember Traci Park and easily defeats her by spending $538 million. He then shocks everyone with his progressive partisanship on the council, citing his Catholic faith and the fact that Jesus made the LA chapter of the Democratic Socialists of America appear to have woken up to, well, Park, a Democrat who is about as blue in political views as a fire truck. Caruso is using his wealth, deep connections and multi-billion dollar smile to solve homelessness, housing affordability and how to get from the Westside to the Eastside in 20 minutes during the Friday rush hour.

*Speaking of his will-or-not, Gov. Gavin Newsom decides not to run for president in 2028. He retreats to his predecessor Jerry Brown’s rural ranch in Northern California, shaves his head and announces that he is taking a vow of silence until the first leg of California’s high-speed rail project is completed. Newsom does not speak again.

*UCLA football is breaking its contract with the Rose Bowl and moving to an area closer to campus where it seems easier to fill the stands: Bad News Bear Field at the Westwood Recreation Center. The bleachers stay half full all season long as the Bruins finish with an undefeated record, because who wants to see UCLA play football?

*Stephen Miller, the chief architect of Trump’s scorched earth deportation policy, accidentally put Rogaine in his stomach and sprouted Edgar’s cut in seconds. It turns out that he is a modern-day Samson: his lack of hair was the reason he became a soulless ghost. He quickly warms up and urges the president to not only stop all deportations, but grant full amnesty and open the borders. Within a generation, Latinos named their firstborn sons Esteban in his honor.

*Throughout the hour, no political scandals hit the cities of Southeast LA County.

*The Angels are making the playoffs for the first time since 2014, ending the longest 11-year drought in Major League Baseball. They were swept faster than the city streets after the Dodgers World Series victory parade.

*NASA announces that a meteor is headed for Los Angeles, leading Mayor Karen Bass to effectively order everyone out of town except her. LA’s bad air quality shrinks the next meteorite to the size of a Chihuahua’s head as she sits on the steps of City Hall, takes the elevator to Bass’ office and proceeds to criticize him for taking that trip to Ghana while the Palisades were burning.

*Bill Essayli wants to prove to the world that he is legally astute, after a judge ruled that he was “not legally employed” as an acting US attorney in Los Angeles, his prosecutors called him nasty nicknames behind his back and federal public defenders regularly beat him in cases involving protesters at immigration rights rallies. He volunteers to prosecute a Hamburglar in a kindergarten prank case – and loses.

*Every gubernatorial candidate in California receives exactly the same number of votes in the June primary, which means they all advance to the general election. The same thing happened in November, leading to a run decided by a public game of rock, paper, scissors. The final two candidates are former LA mayor Antonio Villaraigosa and British-American political commentator Steve Hilton. Hilton concedes defeat when Villaraigosa offers to make him marquis of Huntington Beach.

*San Clemente buys all the sand from Saudi Arabia to replenish its rapidly receding coastline and builds a 500-foot-long sea wall to block waves from the beach. The city is still sinking into the sea because Mother Nature has not been defeated.

*Border Patrol Chief Gregory Bovino returns to MacArthur Park, which he attacked last summer, on the same day MS-13 holds its first international conference. He ignores the foreign cholos and commands his own migra to gang up on the mango lady, then he justifies his excessive force by saying that he is staring at her.

Modesto Nuts mascots Al the Almond and Wally the Walnut, along with special guest Woody from Disney’s Toy Story, chat with fans before a California League game against the Lake Elsinore Storm at John Thurman Field in 2018 in Modesto. Modesto beat Lake Elsinore 3-1.

(Zachary Lucy/Four Seam Images via Associated Press)

*La County Executive Fesia Davenport, currently on leave, is returning a $2-million paycheck the Board of Supervisors awarded her after voters passed a measure to make her position elected, which Davenport says hurt her. Her change of heart came after she discovered her disgraced Louis Vuitton bag left in the women’s room of the Kenneth Hahn Hall of Administration.

*More low-level tornadoes hit communities along Whittier Boulevard, where twisters hit Boyle Heights and Pico Rivera in 2025 and Montebello two years ago. Scientists conducted emergency studies before realizing the phenomenon only when former LA City Councilman Kevin de León spoke.

*AI is taking over Disney, proving that computers can only create slop by ordering the fifth “Toy Story,” a reboot of Marvel Studios’ Avengers franchise, the Baby Yoda movie, another classic Disney animated comedy. … Wait, is that Disney’s real slate for 2026? I told you that I am a prophet!