It seems to me that the Republican Party is destined to be the dominant political force outside the big cities and the northeast. A map similar to the one above for the 2008 election is quite similar in its distributions of the results by county.
The exceptions to the general position outside the big cities are easy to explain. African-Americans, American Indians, mining areas, Latinos along the Mexican border, retirees from the NE on the gold coast in Florida, these are the non big city populations that vote Democratic.
This would indicate to me that the chance of the GOP recovering control of the Executive Branch through a presidential victory is slim, and likely to remain that way ffor a long time.
The semi-rural base of the Republican Party does not wish to become the latest converts to "coastalism." Their representatives in the world pf professional politics want just that. They want to out-Democrat the Democrats. This makes them continuously vulnerable to primary challenges.
Try to imagine a Republican who could win the nomination in the primary process and then win the general election. I think Huntsman or Christie could win the general, but they are both very unlikely to win the nomination.
Nevertheless, the United States remains a federal republic. The GOP is very strong in many states. Most governors are Republicans. Most state legislatures are controlled by the GOP. The US House of Repersentatives has been re-districted by both parties in such a way as to "freeze" power in place.
Perhaps the GOP should accept a future in which it controls most of the states and the House of Representatives. Control of the US Senate may also be within reach from time to time. pl
Great map, thank you. do you have a legend that deines the greens and others?
MajW
The blue counties were won by the Democrats, the red ones by the Republicans. pl
I think this overlooks only the degree to which Democrats can become disillusioned and/or disgusted by their own leadership. As Democratic presidents continue to exercise executive power more and more ruthlessly Democratic voters begin to stay home on election day and open the door to possibility of Republican victory.
As the white population declines in the US so will the GOP. They have to reach out and find common ground with non white communities or they will forever be the “minority” party.
And Democrate voters are somehow confident that a Republican President would be LESS apt to exercise broadened executive powers? While they may be upset at Obama, they would be certain that if it were a Republican in office, it would still be the same, except for worse domestic policies.
abu sinan
I think you miss several points 1- The white population is not declining and will not decline. It is forming a smaller percentage of the whole but the numbers of white people are not declining. 2- the population is not evenly distributed. My map is an illustration of that. The federal structure of American government insures that the “country party” will have sufficient “clout” to tie in knots any Democratic “city party” that holds the WH. This kind of power will force the “coastals” into negotiations of the kind being seen now. To think that one must hold the WH to have power is untrue. 3- The immigrant population is likely to evolve over time. Hispanics, East Asians, etc. are culturally conservative… pl
For me the significant question is whether the map represents the division of Republican/Democrat, or rather conservative/liberal. The difference being if the division is political or philosophical/ideological. I tend towards the latter, which I think represents a trend beginning the late 20th century.
One thing you are forgetting. GOP austerity economics will be far worse for the inlanders than for the coastals so the GOP is doomed as lack of opportunity sends more and more inlanders (particularly their young) into the coastal cities. It is mathematically impossible for the economics of the GOP to work (which is why we had the recession in 2007-2008) and as the economy increasingly depends upon trade the inlanders will by necessity increasingly abandon the GOP unless the GOP changes. Of course, that then makes them coastals also. They really have no other choice.
GulfCoastPirate
Yet another economic determinist heard from. Your opinions are worth no more than mine. History will tell us. pl
If only acres could vote it would be a Republican world.
According to the unbiased folks that count stuff for the US government, in the year ended in June 2012 the number of non-Hispanic whites who died exceeded the number of non-Hispanic whites born by 12,000+. A first in American history. The white population is declining in both absolute and relative numbers.
Democracy appears to trump Federal Republic every time, at least since the horrid 17th amendment. ( Which if it hadn’t been passed, then your map would be important as a picture of senatorial power.)
According to Pew Polling ( their worth is for you to determine ) Hispanic Catholics in the USA who can vote; vote Liberal. The statement that Hispanics are socially conservative is not supported by any testable evidence.
What has been tested and is supported is that over time, Hispanics from Mexico do not assimilate into the USA, nor do they attain higher educational outcomes than their parents or previous iterations.
I don’t know what the hell the Republican Senators were thinking in passing the immigration treason, but all they’ve done is threaten to rupture the party by kicking it down to a House that has elections next year.
Rubio’s likely to get primaried, and Flake is at about 33% approval rating out here. That whore McCain can’t do a town hall without screaming at his constituents. Looks like populism might be back in style.
Best chance for a Presidential win would be Senator Ted Cruz, as opposed to yet another liberal in conservative drag from the Northeast who hits all the right buttons for the Beltway crowd but can’t appeal to the voters.
Of course, this is all assuming the country stays together. With every decision shoved down the throats of the rurales by effete coastal elites, the indignation builds. Our cities are a wreck, the border is still unlawful, and the State is currently going after a hispanic man for defending himself against a noble urban youf that tried to bash his skull in while Nidan Hassan STILL waits to be tried.
A house divided…
So many of the recent posts have struck a nerve in me — the one about knocking down the neglected areas of Detroit, the writeup by Richard Sale of his experiences at the 1968 convention, the possibility of a civil war in Egypt. They have made me think of many things I would prefer not to think about.
I am going to think more about this post and other ones and come back and say more.
But I will say for now that I think the 2012 election map as above will sort of hold for the next two presidential elections anyway.
However, I see many changes and uncertainties ahead.
I think the Republican Party’s days are numbered if it remains committed to very conservative, far right policies. Due to current demographic and economic changes and challenges, I do not think American will be able to sustain a major party committed to “small government conservatism” in the future — not even if the “small government” philosophy is frequently violated as it is today.
I say this because I expect middle class jobs and wages to continue to disappear. Poor people are needy people.
I can certainly envision the rise of new party in opposition to the Democrats who foolishly never seem to consider that the destructive immigration policies that they have pursued with such determination (along with many cheap labor lovers in the Republican Party) will come back to haunt them.
I think we may experience social unrest and economic problems that will shock us all and greatly affect all of our social institutions and make many people change their ways of thinking in the years ahead.
CK
“If only acres could vote it would be a Republican world.” Acres DO vote. That is called federalism. pl
You think the Republican Party is dedicated to ‘small government conservatism’ and is ‘far Right’?
That’s adorable. Meanwhile the far Left Democrats who are pushing for transsexual rights, more wars, more immigration from the third world and post-natal abortions are all totally reasonable.
I agree with you that the idea that Hispanics are ‘social conservatives’ is something Rove and the Beltway Cru came up with back in Shrub’s term to justify blowing up the housing bubble in order to turn Hispanics into Ohio Republicans.
However, it blew up in their faces and now they can’t live it down. More marriage out of wedlock, more usage of social services, more crime, more educational issues… Not hallmarks of ‘social conservatives’. They want their gimmedats.
tyler
IMO you are taking too short a view. pl
If assumptions are invalid, then the conclusion is worthless.
The recession of 2008-2009 was the bursting of the housing bubble which was caused primarily by insane lending with useless or no credit checks.
Then leading to the massive MBS trading, Credit Default Swaps and on and on as dominos.
Should Glass-Steagall have been repealed?
Of course not, but the Democrats and their media lapdogs conveniently forget that Clinton signed that repeal.
And I see a longer demographic trend here as coastal states (especially in the NE) become increasingly expensive and hostile to business, jobs (and people) will move.
There is already population flattening or loss happening in NY and most of the New England states.
This is true. It’s why the Democrats dominated the House for 4+ decades. They used to win many of those acres.
Both parties try to dilute the voting power of the other’s constituencies so we’ll see how that takes shape in the next few years. I would have preferred to see the VRA applied equally to all 50 states with full voting protections for all including from voter fraud and voter disenfranchisement.
Actually, I’m not but the math doesn’t lie. By voting with the GOP the non-coastals are voting against their own economic interests. Which of the two groups recovered from the recession quicker? Entirely predictable and the same thing will continue to happen each cycle. Math/science isn’t opinion. That’s why every time you turn your computer on you know exactly what is going to happen given no man-made defects. The equations that govern the electromagnetic waves that make your computing devices work are the same equations which govern economics. You can’t say the equations are correct in one area but incorrect in another. The equations are immutable and are correct throughout the universe.
Pat – I agree with you that time will tell but the trends are against rural conservatives holding on to the power they have today. I think everyone can agree cities are overwhelmingly Democratic, even in bright Red states. Urban areas continue to grow fairly dramatically compared with rural areas. According to one site I checked rural population declined by 2 full percentage points in just the last 10 years. While the correlation between urban and rural areas and liberal vs conservative political leanings is not perfect, there is no doubt in my mind that as urban areas continue to grow, Republican prospects will diminish.
Even in a Republic, as cities and their attached suburbs continue to grow, Republican dominance the House of Representatives will grow weaker. Republicans may continue to dominate State politics for a variety of reasons but even there power will accrue to politicians from Urban areas as time goes on.
It will be interesting to see how the 2014 Congressional races turn out. My bet is Democrats will make sizable gains in the House but not yet a majority. Living in an Urban area requires compromise to make it liveable and the more that Republicans appear to be against compromise will hurt them in Urban areas aside from their actual policies. Many Liberal Coasters are socially liberal but fiscal conservatives (I consider myself one) and Republican fights against abortion, Gay Rights, Immigration, universal healthcare etc will cause voters to reject them even though we agree with their fiscal policies.
jdledell
How do you propose to change the constitution in order to enable the growing numbers in the big cities? There are two possibilities 1- amendment. Do you think that will work? 2- a constitutional convention. Will that work for you and do you want to risk it. The first constitutional convention was called to amend the articles of confederation. Things got completely out of hand and a new form of government resulted. Or, perhaps you could just use the federal armed forces to overthrow the present constitutional order. pl
True about assumptions but I’m not making assumptions. Decreasing real income per person is a consequence of GOP economic theory. All the things you mention are a consequence of declining real income. If real incomes were rising you wouldn’t have had those problems with the items you mention although I agree that lax regulation of Wall Street contributed to the severity of the problem once it became apparent.
Personally, yes, I would reinstitute something close to Glass-Steagall. As for the Democrats math isn’t political. Many people looked at the math and made a fortune off the downturn and they didn’t have to worry about anything the government was or wasn’t going to do. They were going to make money either way. Some of those were Democrats and some of those were Republicans.
There was a reason Reagan and the Bush’s kept increasing government spending while preaching otherwise to the faithful. I believe Poppy referred to it originally as ‘voodoo’. A lot of people who lost out in 2007-2008 and who will lose out in the future should go back and listen to what he said at the time because it was, and is, ‘voodoo’.
“socially liberal but fiscal conservatives”. That combination doesn’t work. You can’t be “fically conservative” when you’re importing the Third World, paying for the ninth baby of Ofelia and Shitvaria, and gouging the middle class to keep the proles in EBT and SNAP cards.
This canard I keep seeing is a fig leaf for people who are screaming liberals and come up with this “err if Republicans were more liberal I’d vote for them!” nonsense when the reality is that people who identify as Conservative outnumber liberals AND independents for the first time.
[] “Diverse” Society
[] Prosperous Society
Pick one. You want to know what your “fiscally conservative but socially liberal” society looks like? Take a peek at the riots across Europe as “socially liberal” Northern Europe decided to invite the Third World to their “fiscally conservative” societies and now they get to deal with the joys of a diverse society, free of hate (race riots, cars on fire, anarcho-tyranny).
MajW,
The US does not have proportional representation. “Winner take all” election accounting almost prohibitively favors two-party political representation.
Pat, why is a change to the constitution necessary? The present status quo in the House is due to gerrymandering by whichever party controlled redistricting after the 2010 census.
2016 and 2020 could see big shifts in terms of who controls the majority of governorships and state legislatures. Thus we could see a new majority in the House after the 2020 census and the re-drawing of districts that will follow.
The whining over small states getting the same representation is just that. Irrelevant whining. All that’s needed is the next big wave election. If rural voters outvote the cities and suburbs then Republicans will benefit. If not, Democrats could take back the House. I don’t see that happening for another decade.
Sir,
I would otherwise agree with you, as I assume you’re thinking of the ‘sandblasting’ effect that American culture had on new immigrants would turn Hispanics into conservatives. The problem is that since the original 1965 Cellar Immigration ‘Reform’, we’ve continually turned down the intensity of our sandblaster. Instead of immigrants coming here and assimilating to our work ethic and ways of being, they’ve instead clustered in their enclaves and been kept fed by the hand of government.
It is why I am so opposed to the current immigration treason that the Senate just passed, as it will certainly result in the Balkanization of America within my lifetime, and maybe even yours.
Currently the top twenty countries we take immigrants from are in the Third World, with the first European country coming in at #22 (the UK). If we were taking them in a trickle, we could likely assimilate them, but we’re taking them in a flood. Towns in Maine and Minnesota are getting hammered with Somali refugees who bring the Third World with them.
The people running these refugee rackets are of the same mold as the neocons who got us into Iraq, as the neoliberals who want us in Syria: they believe that if you sprinkle some Democracy Pixie Dust on a Salafist or such they’ll magically turn into a Ohio Republican/Democrat with a love of Wal-Mart/Trader Joes.
We both know this isn’t the case, but what failed overseas in Iraq, Afghanistan, and the MENA sphere has been imported here for decades now. Perhaps if we shut off all immigration except for a trickle for a few generations, we might be able to assimilate the newcomers.
As it is though, the idea that America exists as a country, with beliefs and values and a culture of its own, is foreign to many of those currently pushing the amnesty treason. To them, America is a great pile of spoils for their particular ethnic heritage to loot, or a way to ensure that their bank account stays full.
Nonsense. The coastals ensconce themselves in whitopias away from the diversity they claim to love. The non-coastals get to deal with the diversity that the coastals keep on importing as they hunt for more authentic cuisine and cheaper domestic labor.
The coastals generally don’t have to compete with the Pedros and other immigrant labor of the world who will work for five dollars an hour. Tell me how many stock brokers, bankers, and other idiots repsonsible for the recession have to worry about being outsourced by an immigrant from Oaxaca?
You’re going to run to math and science? Let’s talk about the bell curve of IQ, who the majority of housing repos belonged to per capita, and who commits the most crimes. Or is that math and science just more HATEFACTS that you’d rather ignore?
Will Reks
Your comment is filled with wishful thinking. pl
Kirchhoff’s Current Laws govern economics? That’s funnier than the Laffer curve ever was. So all those young people will drop their Christian/pro-life/tree-hugging/you-name-it moral values they may hold the instant they show up in NYC (or elsewhere) to make a living? I’m sure they’ll make more than 30 pieces of silver, but I wouldn’t bet on them dropping their moral beliefs to make a buck. That line was over blown a decade ago, though it sure sold lots of books the the gullible. Lakoff made a bundle off his. The coastal enclaves are not 100% democratic, so it looks like math is having a hard time changing peoples souls.
Them there acres in Wyoming have 2 United States Senators. That’s two votes that count more than the millions of votes in Chicago.
Pat – I am not talking about any constitutional amendment, it is not necessary. With each 10 year census, the House districts have to be redrawn to reflect population changes. Since each district represents about 700,000 people as a states population shifts to urban areas there will be more urban districts and representatives.
For example North Carolina metro areas of Charlotte, Raleigh-Durham, Greensboro, Wilmington continue to add population relative to rural North Carolina, the state’s House delegation will turn bluer.
“Many Liberal Coasters are socially liberal but fiscal conservatives…” which cities are these mysterious liberals in and which members of congress have they elected? I sure can’t name any.
I predict Jeb Bush will be our next president. He will beat Hillary with 3 million contested votes in–Florida.
Many of the pre-2000 Hispanic immigrants are economically successful, conservative, ethnically Spanish and despise the newer, more indigenous immigrants, who are less intelligent and more prone to socialist thinking.
Our country is too big at 350 million people to accomplish any legislation to sustain, let alone advance, the maintenances and construction of an advanced civilization’s infrastructure. I would like to see us form smaller governmental regions, giving people more power to decide how to spend the tax dollars now taken at the federal level and accomplishing more than they can at the state level.
Strip away the social politics and there isn’t much of a difference between the parties. I’d be happy to see morality left out of politics. for the most part I don’t care who marries whatever.
With all due respect the ‘coastals’ (and I am speaking as one) are far more diverse than the inner portions of the country. I travel through both. Flying as a bird I am directly across the lake from the Johnson Space Center and my ‘whitopia’ isn’t solely white at all. I’m surrounded by everything from Asians to South Americans with a few Russians and other Europeans thrown in. It’s a completely different environment than what is in the inner portions of the country.
We don’t compete with immigrant labor because we have embraced it (down here even Perry is for it). I know plenty of immigrants who are running their own businesses, buying homes/property and so on. Some of these are very intelligent people who had the misfortune of being born poor in the wrong country. They no more want to be your “Pedros’ than I want to be. In fact, truth be known, you disgust them. If you give them a chance by allowing them into the above ground economy they would flourish in the same way that every other immigrant group before them has flourished.
Yes, I will run to math and science. When the red staters saw their 401k/portfolios crumble, mine doubled. When they all sold at 8000 some of us bought and now we’re at 15,000. Time to sell while all the red staters are buying. You complain about Democrats, stock brokers, bankers and others but when the Tea Party of the red staters was coming along and Boehner/McConnell were up on Wall Street begging for donations and agreeing to sell you out by promising to filibuster any reform who were you complaining about – Obama? LOL!
The one person who was more responsible for the latest recession than any other was Ronald Reagan. He sweet talked you into believing that 1 + 1 = 3 and you believed him. Don’t blame your lack of math skills on coastals, Democrats, bankers, stock brokers, immigrants or anyone else. It’s a game that the inner portions of the country can never win as long as they continue with the GOP. They have no one to blame but themselves.
Pat, you never answered the question.
“How do you propose to change the constitution in order to enable the growing numbers in the big cities?”
Why is this necessary and who is demanding this change? No one but the elites in the media we all despise.
The big factor in the disillusionment of the Democratic Party base is the fact that, at the federal level, the party no longer advocates for the economic interests of the middle class (except for a very thin veneer at the very top thereof), not to mention the working class. More and more of these folks thus vote with their butts, by sitting on them on election day. That’s why the Dems lost the House and their supposedly filibuster-proof majority in the Senate in 2010, and why they’ll lose even more seats in both houses in 2014. Dem activists are believe that the high percentage of loons in the GOP gives them an advantage but they fail to see that they’re not going to get the turn-outs they need when they try to paper over their sell-out to the big money interests with appeals to identity segments.
Cruz? LOL. He won’t even get re-elected in Texas. You folks were all saying the same thing about Perry in 2012. How well did he do? Maybe Cruz can remember three departments instead of Perry’s two.
The country isn’t going to stay together? Where are you folks going to go? You’re landlocked? Are you going to pull out your popguns and take on the federal government or will you be confining your wrath to the coastal elites? Should I start building my rockets and lasers now or can I make it through the summer?
If the Hispanic man had been minding his own business he wouldn’t be in this fix now would he? Maybe he should have gone to the store and bought his own Skittles.
Your Republican senators are now treasonous? Do you seriously believe that 10 or 11 million people who went through what they went through to get here are going to up and leave because you say so? Will you be going after them with your popguns also?
Have you ever thought about emigrating? There must be a planet somewhere that isn’t fully developed where you would feel right at home.
Assuming you are responding to my comment above, I did not say they would vote Republican, nor mean to imply that they would prefer one in the White House. I merely suggest that as enthusiasm wanes they might not vote at all, or might vote third party.
I think all of this tends to overlook two factors which join forces to skew what should be logical. First is that both parties govern not according to any overriding set of principles, but strictly in the interest of their own preservation of power. The second is that voters tend to change who they want to be in control not because they think the other party is any better, but simply because they are so thoroughly disgusted with the one presently in power. Maybe I’m just cynical, but I’ve been witnessing this nonsense for fifty years, and most changes of power have not actually made any sense.
you will come to see, very very soon, if not already…defining “white”, both officially and unofficially, will become a damn tricky thing…’and a close run’ thing.
I would suggest GCP…this is, dramatically, less about “GOP economic theory” than it is about Neoliberal Theory. And practice.
And there are no bigger supporters of that then the present Dems.
They were thinking, “I’m gonna be president”, or a slight variation, ‘my republican colleague is going to be President and give me, and members of my family a good job, and a bigger place in history than I have now’.
with all due respect JJ, I think you have it wrong. If the GOP stays with “very conservative”, they have a good chance of electing a President. If they swing, or stay, on ‘the far Right’ as you say, then yes, I think they are doomed to lose elections.
Bill H
I live in the 8th District of Virginia. That means Jim Moran. The Dem. Party here controls the nomination one way or another. The district is heavily Democratic. Moran has lots of seniority and brings home the bacon. There have been many attempts to dethrone him. Not even the Zionist element in the Dem Party has succeeded. Nobody likes him but he will be a congressman until he quits. That has nothing to do with disgust. pl
jonst, abu sinan et al
I agree with jonst that “white” is a sometimes thing and will get more that way. I know quite a few African-American rednecks. pl
jdledell
I think that it is incorrect to think that population shifts will deny the GOP power. The states are redistricted by the states and they have proven ingenious at constructing illogical districts that nonetheless serve their purposes and “pass muster” with the federal courts. I think that will continue. So long as the states control re-redistricting, power will be divided in the House as the states see fit. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_American
BTW this wiki contains a chart that show that according the the US Census the white population continues to grow in absolute numbers. pl
GCP
“are far more diverse than the inner portions of the country.” Yes, but that is irrelevant. Louisiana is diverse but unlikely to become a blue state. pl
fred et al
Yes. Wyoming, Idaho, etc. all have two senators. I want to see how the coastals are going to change the Great Compromise. pl
You mean those millions of Mexicans have zero desire to see Mexico rid of men who abuse her and her people; men from the drug gangs, corrupt politicians and greedy oligarchs like Carlos Slim? Those folks really, really just want mom, apple pie and to be citizens of the United States? I think if anyone ever tried to put a campaign together to free Mexico I think he’d find millions of willing recruits.
jdledell
“Even in a Republic” No. This is a federal republic. France is a republic but an integrated unitary state. We are not. pl
Thank you. Was wondering about what was refelcred in upper northwest of country.
There is some truth to this statement.
In some areas yes. Other areas – not so much. If the GOP is eventually forced to retrench to the old confederate states (minus Virginia, NC and Texas where there are or shortly will have problems) plus a few small western states then they are in big, big trouble. That isn’t enough of an economic base for them to challenge the cities and the coasts. They’ll be forced to change.
The young are already changing whether you, I or anyone else likes it or not.
I wasn’t speaking of Kirchhoff. It’s really a very simple concept. Electromagnetic waves move through space and are modeled as sine waves. Economies move over time in a series of recessions and expansions also modeled as sine waves. The basic complex equations used for wave theory can then be used for both (or anything else that moves as a wave). The variables change but the underlying math stays the same.
Ask yourself why Wall Street and big banks have hired all those physicists over the years? Do you think the CEO’s were interested in astrophysics?
I agree with this and have been making this argument for a long time.
@GCP: “The equations that govern the electromagnetic waves that make your computing devices work are the same equations which govern economics.”
1. equations don’t govern, they describe;
2. economics is not physics;
Isn’t this the same argument we heard from Rove around 2000 and particularly by the time of the 2004 election? Something about a permanent GOP majority based on redistricting? Then by 2006 the House was back in the hands of Democrats. Populations shift and move about. 10 years is a long time. Districts that look safe at the beginning of a decade may not be so safe 6 or 8 years later.
GCP
That works both ways in re redistricting. IMO the GOP will hold both houses of congress after 2014. pl
Sure, certain legislators have secured seats for their lifetime. I recall one Senator was elected even after he was dead and there was some chicanery to let his wife serve his term. In San Diego county we have Duncan Hunter and I will guarantee that a large portion of voters thought they were voting for his father, since he did not use “Jr” on his campaign signs.
I was referring to the White House and the majority in Congressional houses.
GCP
Virginia now has Republican leadership in all three major state offices and Rep. control both houses of the legislature. the Republicans have committed suicide in the coming election because of Cucinelli’s ethical problems and the absurdity of the Lt. Gov. candidate. These choices virtually insure McAuliffe’s election. Without that he would have been defeated for the third time in a state wide election. We have two former governors as US senators. they both were careful to govern from the center when they were in Richmond. Virginians vote for sensible, careful people. Party does not mean much here on a state wide basis. In NC the Republicans control the state legislature. Texas seems pretty obviously red. I think you just like to argue, something I do not appreciate. You claim not to be an economic determinist but your arguments are all based on economics. pl
You missed the joke and responded with something even funnier. What the does a co-located supercomputer do for economic value other than for the managers of the firms micro-trading stocks? How did all those phd’s help BP, Transocean and their insurers? That complex sine wave equation math must have told them just how many lawyers and lobbyists to hire to get Obama to bail on his responsibilities to the Republic. Then there was that great sine wave modeling at MF Global, surely Corzine figured out how much to pocket to stay out of jail, or not. That and a hundred others add value to the ‘economy’? Certainly if the money is going into ones pocket and one has no responsibility to other members of society.
Those young people – they aren’t changing – they are reaching adulthood with different life experiences and frames of reference than the society I came of age in. You are mistaken if they think all the math above is making them rigid liberals who will vote Democratic forever.
Neither of the parties is dedicated to any principle, ideology etc. They just talk that way and the people who don’t look or think too much about the details (i.e. 99.9% of the people) don’t know it…and quite frankly they don’t care.
What they do specialize in is to make themselves to be friends/ally of certain groups and enemies of others. On this dimension, they are “sincere” but only in the relative sense–because one party is so clearly making themselves an enemy of a certain group, the other party can endear itself to them by making token, symbolic concessions, or simply by saying a few nice words (or even by merely not being an enemy.) No, nobody is being “sincere” by going out of their way to support one group or another.
In other words, we are saddled with politicians who talk a lot, do next to nothing, and are skilled only at posing. Yet, we delude ourselves into thinking that “our side” is the savior because “the other side” is the devil–whichever side we happen to be on, based on very flimsy evidence. We think so much of the talk because most of us (the public) see so much of it (thanks to the internets) and we don’t know the “real” stuff because most of us wouldn’t know what to make of it even if we see it (not that we do…again, thanks to the internets–this would take real experience and knowledge, not a 5 minute search for random junk).
Madison made the point (at the Virginia ratifying convention) that a successful republic, in the end, rests on no set of clever institutions, but the wisdom of the people to ultimately sort out charlatans. This wisdom is increasingly becoming precious….
Really? That seems to contradict your reply to Tyler above.
“We don’t compete with immigrant labor because we have embraced it ”
What’s going to happen to labor rates in Texas when these immigrants return to liberate Mexico? Well if you bring in a few million people born poor elsewhere nothing. Which has essentially been Tyler’s point for a couple of years running.
What are the tangible differences between the “country” GOP and the “coastal” Democratic party when it comes to financial & economic policy, foreign policy, federalism and the rule of law in tune with the spirit and intent of our founding ethos?
IMO, what we have seen under both GOP & Democrat Presidents and Congresses is the growing scope and scale of the federal government; interventions in lands they can barely pronounce let alone understand the nuances; continued erosion of the rule of law as the favored classes get a pass.
Federal government “stimulus” as reflected in their debt has grown non-stop for decades. Ominous words such as “sequestration” are bandied about when even the growth rate of this debt accumulation is reduced. Why bother living within their means when the governments debt can be monetized endlessly. Well connected private sector losses become public. Officials routinely lie to Congress and no one cares. The government becomes ever more secretive and now there are good & bad “leaks” with good being what the political establishment wants us to know. Both parties try to outdo each other on who can eviscerate the spirit of the Constitution to keep the ever fearful American people safe from the threat du jour.
The only difference between the parties that I see are on issues that I believe government should not even be involved and those are the litmus test issues of personal choice – Guns, God and Gays. And yes, the unions too!
That’s the important question. I think there will be an explosion of one kind or another. Which makes the NSA tracking and the Massachusetts/Boston abandonment of the 4th Amendment even more troubling. I can only imagine which civil servants are already spying on members of Congress, their staffs and likely political opponents in an effort to impose their own political opinions, which superficially at least, appears to be the case with the IRS scandal.
Let me narrow this down because brevity is the soul of wit.
Paragraph 1: “I am surrounded by Europeans and high IQ Asians, not Treyvarious and Juan.”
Paragraph 2: “Because some RINO thinks illegal immigration is okay, its automatically okay. Also unproven “coming out of the shadows” bullshit magical thinking.”
Paragraph 3: “I’m going to ignore the Democrats who are owned by Wall Street and the CC companies pushing through TARP just as hard as everyone I mentioned, because that is an unconvenient fact that I hate.”
Paragrpah 4: “The magical negro messiah can do no wrong. Our fundamentals are sound even though once Bernanke threatened to turn off the free money tap, the financial industry about shit the bed.”
Keep on pretending, buddy. I don’t know if you’re serious or just messing with me by being such a clueless fool.
Based off of what? More of your “math and science” that you hug to your tits like a security blanket? Cruz is doing fine in Texas, you dope.
How is Dixie “landlocked” when its got that thing called the Gulf of Mexico, you fool. Tell me more about how ‘popguns’ are currently busy stopping the US military in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Your entire persona is that of someone who is a big statist sheep, so its no surprise that you’d sympathize with young thug Saint Trayvon of the Skittles as opposed to someone watching out for his neighbors.
We don’t enforce the immigration laws, so of course they’re not going to leave. If you started enforcing them, it’d be a different story. You and your idiot liberal friends handwave the difficulties in ‘banning’ assault rifles, but going into the cities and ripping out illegal aliens is too hard? Yeah, okay champ.
Have YOU ever thought of emigrating? I’m sure Europe with its diverse society free of hate and neoliberal policies would be a haven for you.
I disagree respectfully Optimax. I think the tolerance for immigration wavering, like has characterized Judas McCain his entire career, is going to be done after this. I think its very clear that Jeb Bush is another RINO a la Romney, and the constituents are tired of the Beltway feeding us neoliberal RINOs.
You, your friends and neighbors are clearly doing much better than the average American.
Based on what you said, it looks like you think that you’ll be able to keep floating above the apparently permanent disaster zone that many Americans now find themselves living in due to high unemployment, increased job competition, low job creation and increased costs while wages remain stagnant or decrese.
I think if you asked long term Americans making $10 or less in Texas — of which there are many, as I recall Texas and another state are tied in last place for the highest number of workers making minimum wage — what they think about immigrants already there and the prospect of having a greatly increased number of new immigrants coming in, they would not “embrace” that idea.
I have long thought that our politicians have been living in a fantasy land since Reagan, but that applies to both parties. Each one clings to a vision of the world that does not match reality. We are stuck with the results of a neverending cascade of bad decisions that feed upon themselves, intertwine and are now in the process of pulling this country down and apart.
Well of course. That’s all we heard during last year’s Republican primaries, you know that. But come fall Romney didn’t campaign as if he were the dedicated, long time very conservative, almost anti-government candidate because he know he wouldn’t get enough voters. Any of the other people in the primaries would have run back to the center like he did, if they wanted to win.
I think the far left is pretty powerless. The things you don’t like may have started out as far left issues but they won’t go far unless they go far closer to the center. Also remember that the elites always think the rest of the country is with them, or well be. Same with the people on the far left and right. They are out there with the fervent few but boy are they convinced that they secretly have a lot of company or that they will, someday.
Where do you see the votes coming from?
More than half the country is liberal or moderate. How can a very conservative candidate have a natural appeal to these folks who are not even conservative?
Also, as we continue to add to the ranks of the needy, even people who may not like the idea of social safety net will be using it.
Given current economic conditions, how many desperate users of government aid are in a position to vote for candidates that will that assistance away or reduce it?
A while ago, you and I exchanged opinions re. H1-B visas.
But, you’re not wrong all the time.
This comment here is dead on.
America is being balkanized and cynical scum like Schumer with the connivance of dopes (like Rubio, Graham and the Democrat McCain) are doing their best to push it further.
We need to look at the electoral college map for this discussion.
Pat – If you wanted controversy on your site, you sure got it with this topic. I’d like to make a couple of additional points.
When I say I’m socially liberal and fiscally conservative I mean I have a libertarian streak in me. Frankly, if Gays want to get married it’s none of my business and should not be the government’s business either. If women want an abortion within a reasonable time period or want morning after pills and access to contraceptives it’s no ones business except for the affected woman.
When I say fiscal conservative I mean revenue and expenses should be more in balance. Our national tax base as a percentage of GNP is the lowest since the 1950’s yet we can’t live anymore within 1950’s needs. Our population is too old and the cost of everything to run this country is too great. I’d like to see Federal revenue and expenses balanced out at about 23% of GNP. My Federal, State and Local R.E taxes last year ran 48.68% of gross income. Would my standard of living be hurt if taxes were a few percent more? Absolutely not.
A legitimate question is whether the government is the best vehicle for distributing income. Having sat on the Boards of several charities, I can tell you they are not so great at the distribution game either. As far as Estate Taxes go, I have every dime tied up in trusts for distribution to various charities. I have no intention of spoiling my children’s lives by passing on a pot of money when they are all living well established successful lives.
It’s obvious that immigration is a hot button with many people here. Because I’m Jewish, I am biased on this issue. I am the keeper of our family history which goes from 1570 in Romania, to Hungary, Slovakia, Croatia, and eventually in Aix en Provence, France. All this wandering was to find a place where they could finally feel wanted and thrive.
From the 1920’s on my family members started coming to the U.S. illegally. They would board cargo ships in Marseille and when the ship docked in America after a little wait they merely walked down the gangway into this country. By 1943, my entire family aunts, uncles etc were here the same way.
I have a lot of empathy for people who want to find a place where they can thrive in life. You have at least 11 million immigrants in this country without papers. It is not practical to kick them all out. Lets get them above ground into the tax paying economy and on to a path to citizenship. It’s no different from my wife’s family who had been coming to America from Norway since the early 1800’s. They all went to Canada and then walked into Minnesota to meet up with others and nary a proper piece of paper among any of them. They were all rural Norweigians with hardly any education yet they thrived here and contributed to this country.
I think supporting the Senate Bill on immigration makes me more conservative than liberal. Back on topic, rural vs urban political leanings there is plenty of speculation here but Pat put it best – time will tell.
Pat – forgive me for taking one last shot at an issue raised here – socialized medicine or Obamacare. First Obamacare is NOT socialized medicine since it’s all delivered via private industry. However, military and VA medical care is socialized medicine because it is arranged and delivered by government. Does anyone here advocate turning those two medical systems to private hospitals, doctors and Insurance companies? Can you imagine a soldier injured during action having to deal with an insurance company about what will and will not be paid for in his/her care?
I personally benefited from socialized medicine practiced in this country during the 1940’s and 50’s. Along with hundreds of thousands of others, I contracted polio as a 2 year old in 1946. My father was a bus driver and my mother was a homemaker. They did not have two nickels to rub together much less pay for the enormous medical costs I was going to require. No many people had health insurance in those days.
The State built hospitals(in my case Gillette State Hospital for Crippled Children) hired doctors (in my case Dr. John Moe)nurses etc to staff these hospitals. From the Iron Lung through 26 major operations to correct for the ravages of polio and almost 14 years of hospital time I received extraordinary care that in today’s world would have cost millions. Most of the innovations in polio care came out of these state hospitals. In 1951 the state paid Dr. Moe a princely sum of $5,500/year. I know because my uncle, an accountant, did his taxes. The other doctors were paid even less because he was head of the Ortho department. All of my medical care for those 14 years cost my parents zero. Do I think the private medical industry would have done better – no way. I cannot imagine all the fighting my parents would have had to do with an insurance company over the ins and outs of what should or should not be covered.
I know I am taking a personal example beyond where it should be but it is why I am not afraid of universal healthcare like most first world nations have.
jdledell
I presume you are talking to me. i have not advocating any of those things, i.e., throwing people out, repealing the ACA, etc. My post had to do with what I think the differing cultural characters of our regions means in the context of a FEDERAL REPUBLIC. pl
egl
“We need to look at the electoral college…” No we don’t my post did not deal with presidential elections. pl
Look at Racheal Jeantel, the state’s star witness in the show trial of George Zimmerman, if you want to see the ‘wisdom’ of the average American on display.
I agree with you that neither of the parties is dedicated as much as they make up an ‘umbrella’ of sorts for like minded individuals to cluster under. I certainly don’t think the Republicans are my ‘savior’, but they at least have the least amount of malice for me compared to the Democrats.
Romney would have gotten plenty of voters if he had gone to the mat for more than just “tax cuts for my buddies”. Every single conservative issue Romney tried to triangulate and pissed off his base. I was there when Romney’s son came to Arizona and told us Ron Paul fans that if his daddy lost the election it was our fault.
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: Romney was a northeast liberal who passed an AWB, paid for abortions with state money, and refused to enforce immigration laws. He could have won 70% of the LAH TEE NO vote and still lost. The problem was he didn’t appeal to the whites who were his base, instead listening to Beltway ‘consultants’ who told him he needed to be MORE liberal, and welp look where we are.
The far left doesn’t have a lot of power? Homosexual marriage is now a thing, they’ve got five year olds declaring themselves transsexuals and suing to use the girl’s bathroom, and the immigration treason is now at the doorstep with the House. Your handwaving aside, the far Left has plenty of power. This would have been madness as little as ten years ago. Nowadays Paula Deen drops a racial slur and they’re about ready to burn her at the stake. “The far left doesn’t have a lot of power”. Holy hell.
I’ve been listening to this talk about magical centrists rising up for years now, but much like unicorns they never seem to manifest. We’re heading for a hedonist dystopia, but you keep believing these ‘centrists’ are going to keep everything in line.
A jew in favor of more immigration because “is it good for the jews?” Let me tell you how shocked I am that the jews think of themselves first and their host country last.
I already explained above how you can’t be a social liberal and fiscal conservative, but I see you ignored that in order to pretend that adding 20 million Somalis and Indio peasants is somehow going to make the country better, ignoring every study that doesn’t use magical thinking (IE: pretending every illegal alien is a high skilled immigrant)showing that we’re going to be spending trillions on social services for them.
jdledell
I never said anything about throwing people out of the country. If they are useful economic migrants who are not otherwise criminal or habitually indigent, let them stay. I have no problem with the senate’s bill
On the other hand I find your lecturing about “the huddled masses yearning to breath free” to be insulting and your reference to your religion to be even worse. You think you have some special position because you are Jewish?
My family is made up of immigrants also. We started coming to what is now this country in 1620 and finished our migration in 1850. All these people were “undocumented.” They were such because there were no immigration documents or procedures until the 1870s. Does your more recent immigrant status give you a special position?
My family, my friend, has bled on just about all the fields of European strife on this continent or abroad that involved the United States or it \s colonial predecessors. I, personally, fought in half a dozen campaigns, some of which were in places you never heard of. What have you or your family done for this country? Did you serve in the armed forces?
Your family had a place to “refugee” to because my people bled to make sure there would be such a place.
Don’t presume to strike a haughty pose about what the obligations of the United States are toward immigrants. Don’t presume to tell me that the US has no right to exclude people it does not want. We do and we will.
I hope that you are not the lying bugger who wrote here that the number of people classified by the census as white is declining in absolute numbers. In the last census period the white population grew by 13 million.
You may think of this country as a giant refugee camp but a lot of us do not. pl
Pat – I most definitely did not mean you. Specifically, it was responding to Tyler. I should have been clearer but we should all be more specific when we encounter these long threads.
Pat – I am not being haughty or trying to lecture. I was merely using a personal example to illustrate a point. I mentioned Jewish only because we are an example of not being greeted with open arms in numerous countries. As I said, I wanted people to understand my bias on this issue.
I am giving an opinion just as you and others are giving an opinion. I am not demanding anything – the issue will ultimately be decided in the voting booth. No I did not serve – the military decided in my case that they did not need a soldier who had to use crutches and a wheelchair because of polio.
Last but not least, I made no reference to whites in any of my postings so I’m not the one who lied.
If you feel like you need a label that is OK. I do think economics tends to be marginalized in these types of discussions by those who want to keep the topic centered on subjective rather than objective data.
Argumentative? – Perhaps but I thought it was an interesting topic. I’ll go back to lurking.
Have a nice day.
Here in N.England poor people getting handouts often vote for folks who want to repeal handouts. It’s a matter of pride not logic. That’s what’s turning my neighborhood republican.
“I will gladly give you border security down the road for 20 million new Democrats today.”
No wonder they call the Republicans the stupid party.
The other day I heard some congressman submitted a bill that would give refugee status to those from the parts of the world affected by climate change==that is basically the whole world.
JCJ./….. I understand where you are coming from…but there is the anger so deep and visceral towards the coastal elites, faux Left and Right…I think this anger will trump even economic self interest….if the crazy Right can be contained.
Nowhere for all us hundreds of millions of long term American citizens out here getting crushed between the new arrivals (mostly on the bottom) that we have to keep splitting the American pie smaller and smaller for and the sellouts at the top who get to grab profits for themselves and shift costs to the rest of us.
Now these newcomers can always go back home and the really rich can wave their money around and get some kind of investors’ visa in a lot of places.
The number of real choices for Americans is rapidly shrinking, while our worries, frustrations and financial problems (both personal finances and problems connected with too little government help for those who need it and too much government money spent that shouldn’t be) are rapidly increasing.
It’s pretty clear to me we can’t keep going on like we are. Major change will come because it has to. The young people coming up will refuse to accept the mess that we are handing them.
JCJ
The young people coming up will refuse to accept the mess that we are handing them” Sanctimonius BS. pl
GCP
A label? you are what you are. pl
jdledell
i am sorry to learn of your affliction. In such a circumstance I suppose I would have been some sort of historian of obscure subjects. pl
“However, military and VA medical care is socialized medicine because it is arranged and delivered by government.”
Military and VA health care are only provided as a result of service in the armed forces of the United States. What service to the Republic do you need to provide to receive Obamacare? How about showing up at the ER? Yeah, nothing.
I hope you’re right, Tyler, I don’t want another Bush is high office. I did see him pandering to the Hispanics saying we needed their high fertility rate to take care of us old farts. No organic system can maintain continual expansion without collapse.
“Unlimited growth is the philosophy of a cancer”, I believe the saying goes.
Pat – This is a cheap shot and you’re better than that. I worked hard in life and was Senior VP and one of the top five executives of one of the world’s largest financial companies.
On this subject we have a difference of opinion. When I write about all the things that Israel is doing wrong you not only agree with me but ask me if I want to be a Guest Author.
I come here and support this site because it offers a unique perspective on the world not found anywhere else on the web. Sometimes I write something and you and/or commentators point out where they disagree. I reflect on that and sometimes it causes me to change my thinking. Hopefully, that will remain this site’s primary purpose.
jdledell
“i am sorry to learn of your affliction. In such a circumstance I suppose I would have been some sort of historian of obscure subjects. pl” If this is what you are referring to it is not “a cheap shot.” I was thinking of William H. Prescott, the historian who wrote “The Conquest of Mexico” and “The Conquest of Peru” while virtually blind. His books were a great influence on me as a boy and I admired him for his genius. So, I am not “better than that.” pl
Regarding the exercise of ruthless executive power, when a republican is elected, he/she will pick-up from where Obama left off after he picked up from where Bush left off.
Wash. Rinse. Repeat.
I am minded that Arizona has two senators and one of them is a McCain, and that Rhode Island also has two. I am also minded that Wyoming has but one representative. So all those acres don’t really amount to much power. I am familiar with the great compromise and that compromise was destroyed by the 17th amendment. The states no longer appoint their Senators so the federalism is moot.
There is no need to change the great compromise, the new imported populations will not be like the older residents of the empty states.
Acres used to vote, prior to the 17th amendment, since then it is direct democracy.
I am the one you refer to as a “Lying Bugger.”
Here is the link to the 2012 data about the absolute decline in the number of whites in the USA.
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/13/us/census-benchmark-for-white-americans-more-deaths-than-births.html?_r=1&
http://www.census.gov/newsroom/releases/archives/population/cb13-112.html
Your data via Wikipedia is from the 2010 census.
Actually the “lying bugger” would have to be an arm of the US government … but that is not news.
CK
“Race/Ethnic Group 2020 2030 2040 2050 2060
White 76.5% 74.7% 72.7% 70.8% 68.9%
Black 13.4% 13.7% 14.1% 14.4% 14.7%
American Indian, Eskimo, and Aleut 1.3% 1.4% 1.4% 1.5% 1.5%
Asian and Pacific Islander 5.9% 6.6% 7.4% 8.0% 8.5%
Two or more races 2.9% 3.6% 4.4% 5.4% 6.4%
Hispanic (of any race) 19.1% 21.9% 25.0% 27.9% 30.6%
Non-Hispanic White 59.7% 55.5% 51.0% 46.6% 42.6%”
From the wiki on Race and demography in the US.
IMO the distinction between hispanic whites and other whites is artificial and will disappear. I believe that is what jonst was saying.
http://news.yahoo.com/census-hispanics-fuel-us-white-population-growth-173449405.html
pl
Federalism is moot? Each state still has equal representation in the Senate: Two each regardless of population. The 17th amendment allowed residents of the various states vote directly for the Senators rather than elected legislators. The replacement of Senators removed or died in office and the power of a particular state’s governor to name a replacement is the major factor in the power shift of 17th amendment currently being debated. There is nothing requiring a primary election or restricting how a particular state may set such requirements. If a state legislator wanted to pass a bill stating that replacements could only be made from sitting members of that state’s legislature there’s nothing stopping them but perhaps their own state constitution.
The one Representative from Wyoming is in the House of Representatives, that is not the Senate. Similarly the proportion of Representatives in the House is determined by the population of persons, not citizens, in each state. Thus an illegal immigrant counts the same as a US Citizen. That lack of representative power in the House was debated by Lincoln-Douglass over a hundred years ago. How many extra congressman does California, New York or Texas gain from this? Who’s losing – states in the mid-West, New England and the South.
Don’t like McCain, you can always move to Arizona and run against him.
I’m glad we can find some common ground, in that case.
Philospers think, and may often opine dangerously close to the gibbet or bowl of hemlock but until that point afte free to have at it and each other like a pool of tenure track egomaniacs.
With ideologues its their psychosis and the dialectic in which the the black-and-white opposite/object must be destroyed. That brooks NO apostasy from an immutable given from the other, but offers a complete pass on fleshy deviance of the utile true believers, until the odd one hits a banana peel/cell phone and is sacrificed with unseemly hypocrisy and universal relish.
It is the voodoo of attacking government then expanding it to use as poltical resource/capital syphon – corporate, well it hardly compares to welfare, lets call it funding our fellow travelers.
Whilst telling the rest of us to diminish expectations, (bright shiny 2.0, 4G credit trinkets aside!) from the government, look to yourself, state and and your church while we line up the big scam. Ask that think tank over there what’s what. Or those other 50.
Presto! 30 year later you got Citizens United. The sunk capital of which has been long ago amortized, depreciated, deducted. Then funneled back to whomever the spells of the original voodoo were in fact legislated to benefit, a customer named, it now appears, unfettered global capital.
Teach a man to fish. . .but then decimate, concentrate, monopolize and privatize the few left a few generations hence.
Sell remaining fish, collect dividend, invest in luxury goods and war, and the soma black market.
Repeat.
Would that human sentience was as rational and adherent to the prescribed laws of creation as the wire Mr. Ohm discovered resistance in, now dutifully doing your computing.
Don’t be so sure, there is no end of what can be outsourced to India, In Canada Banks are firing computing divisions after Indians are brought in to be trained in the work before it is shipped off for good. Canadian government abets and gives incentives expressly for it.
The university grads staffing our Stabucks and bookstores are now being displaced by low wage temporary work permit imports; the banks are no different, and at least can plead, “It’s complicated”
Your last paragraph disregards historical context whatever statistical truths may underlie it.
If we’d all been born in a barren landlocked bumfuckville with no slaves, or been slaves and despised by better armed natives, eating that good old lead paint in our slums instead of that peeling latex out in the suburbs as a child, abandoned to our jobless addictions, why the local math and science, as it percolated through divinely created human beings, the math might add up a little different.
Or reveal you to be one of the more temporally, if not morally or spiritually, fortunate cohort of your birth year’s global expression of sperm. One of few amongst millions, fated to fetch up with your mom’s egg, delivering you the unorthodox upbringing you have lauded here previously, bitter as you are.
The lot of the poor, the marginalized and maligned, the few real evil shits aside, are a universal function of the system designed and run by capital apparently abetted by free will and the crapshoot of birth. You were or are part of the armed protection of the existing order, presented with people in crisis at their worst, and a few real shits. maybe some evil .They ARE bitter facts; surely not hateful. They are petty, admittedly insidious crimes, but the mass murderers, the black market allowers, the economic wreckers worthy of your bitter hate are in charge.
But they are in their turn as disposable as Mrs. Dean – until such time as they are physically need to man the bastions – by which time everyone’s goose will be cooked.
I read your blog when you invited us to – the first article “Bitter”. Your last paragraph called to my mind that and TTG’s recent honorable offering here.
It is not a fantasy and worse yet the politicians who set it up are almost guaranteed entry into the 1%, a status completely transmissible hereditable except for any but the most blatantly unsophisticated.
Interesting map! World events will make a mish mash of this by 2028 Presidential election when even Republicans and DEMS will probably be confined to the trashcan of history. Why?
First $700 Trillion in untaxed unregulated derivatives stalk the developed world’s economic picture. When and where they will strike is unknown.
Second, by that date 50% of all residential Higher Ed students will be foreign nationals. 50% of Grad students in Science, Math, and Engineering are already.
Third, 75% of all college grads in the USA will be women.
Fourth, President Obama is secretly in love with secrecy and his ability to evade Congressional oversight and public criticism through secrecy.
Five! Single family residential housing will largely be available only to the top 25% by wealth in the USA which means much more foreign ownership of US housing including resident aliens.
Six! Something like the Marian Reforms of the 1st Century BCE will be needed to staff the US military. Even now non-citizens exceed over 5% of the Armed Forces.
Seven! The EU and Eurozone will have collapsed except as a destination resort for the top 5% of wealth holders world wide. The people of that area will be almost totally a service economy for those visitors and foreign residents.
Eight! Most of Siberia will be owned or occupied outright by the Germans or Chinese.
Nine! The Chinese condominium will be locked tight against the rest of the world even without military power. It will consist of the Koreas, Japan, Taiwan, Burma, Malaya, Indonesia, Australia, Phillipens, and Singapore.
Ten! The Chinese lobby will have opened the USA largely through technical changes in the US immigration law to almost wide open Chinese immigration for both education and permanent residency.
Eleven! The states will have been analyzed in detail by the MSM and academica and those with best {highest?} living standards will be the destination for the rest. Largely exploited the bottom 10-20 states will begin to look largely like the third world. Commodity production the main chore of these states including agricultural commodities.
Twelve! Those identified as culturally black in the USA will have been firmly relegated to the bottom of the heap since all efforts at affirmative action will have been eliminated by the growing Hispanic and Asian minorities.
Could be wrong as always.
Can you summarize this and make it tangential to the matter at hand? If you’re going for elegant it veered off into pomposity at about two and half paragraphs in. It seems like you were arguing blank slate theory for a bit, but I’m not sure where you were going with this.
Hope you’re enjoying the blog – always good to get feedback from a reader.
And yet your “state” is stealing your democracy with hundreds of millions watching without acting while a disproportionate % of your poor are shipped abroad to defend it for your oligarchs.
Charles I
“while a disproportionate % of your poor are shipped abroad to defend it for your oligarchs.” Absolute BS. http://giftoffreedom.wordpress.com/2011/08/02/demographics-of-the-united-states-armed-forces/
The poor are under-represented in today’s armed forces. The people in the ranks are very middle class. I thought you had gotten over the 60s lefty BS. pl
Ah okay, you were responding to my initial offering, now that makes more sense. But I’m still not sure exactly what you’re getting at, and it seems like you’re off in Blank Slate Theory land.
How does my last paragraph disregard historical context? The Jews, the Chinese, the Irish, the Italians – all arrived here in a state of shock and disrepair, by and large but they’ve made it by any estimation.
The rest of your ‘essay’ (I’ll be generous here) reads like a giant appeal to emotion. ‘WHAT IF YOU WERE BORN IN SENEGAL HUH?!’ Well no kidding, I’d probably want to leave. On the other hand, I’m not born in Senegal, and what ifs like that are better suited for 2am dorm room discussions, not matters of national policy. Your attitude is some sort of bizzaro world version of “White Man’s Burden” through the lefty guilt filter.
As it is, I was not born in Senegal, or Mexico, but here, in the United States where my nominal loyalty lies. I assure you that while you may assume that I was part of the ‘armed protection of the existing order’, my reasons were more the same of young men throughout history. Your attempt to slur the Army is noted though.
I still stick to my original estimation that this goes for the high note but falls flat on its face quickly. While you might have the time and the comfort to pose these existential questions about ‘the poor dears’, many of us do not. This false piety while you wring your hands is nothing more than status seeking among those looking to be ‘more pious than thou’.
Let’s look at where we are now: the same forces that seek to turn America into a series of shattered states by flooding it with the Third World are also busy trying to bomb more Christians and their protectors in the Middle East on behalf of Muslim and Jewish states and enslaving us under a mountain of debt.
These interests are also involved in a protracted class war where anyone who deviates from the cult of equality/cultural marxist party line is quickly attacked on all fronts in short order. They enforce their deluded religion with a fervor not seen since Torquemada, yet constantly wrap themselves in the flag of the victim while insisting “one rule for me, another for thee”.
This is the time to be bitter. This is the time to spit on your hands, raise a black flag, and begin to slit throats if I may quote Mencken. Making spurious claims to some sort of ‘internet honor’? Well that’s precious, but some of us have a future to change.
All
I found time to look at the white demographic data some more. White non-Hispanic (a largely meaningless term)deaths exceeded births by 10 or 15 thousand in the last year. This resulted from an aging population and a lower birth rate than other groups. Nonetheless, the white population grew as a result of immigration. pl
“The lot of the poor, the marginalized and maligned, the few real evil shits aside, are a universal function of the system designed and run by capital ….”
THe lot of the poor and marginalized has been crappy everywhere on Earth in every economic system designed by mankind. Too bad. That does not entail an obligation on the people and government of the United States to impoverish our own people.
If you don’t like what the Canadian government is doing to your country and your people then change your government, don’t bitch about mine.
Pat – As time goes on it will be harder and harder to classify who is “white”. The mixing of white, hispanic, asian and middle eastern blood seem to be accelerating. World travel has contributed to this but the world economic integration is an even bigger accelerator. In my own family none of my children married a caucasian. This is a result of my working and living in 7 different countries while they were growing up.
In my own expensive New Jersey suburb, while still overwhelming white, 8% are from India, another 6% are chinese, 4% hispanic etc. I was stunned to see this years Prom pictures and large number (compared to the past) of mixed race couples.
jdledell
My post was about politics and culture, not race. Others insisted that this was all about the decline of white people. pl
Out here in the Country, seems its’s time to revive States Rights….
Given the “Court”/Coastals….with their Imperial Presidency inside the Beltway. Lot of red space there in the graphic….
What? Don’t tell me you have given up on Trump!
“Best chance for a Presidential win would be Senator Ted Cruz, as opposed to yet another liberal in conservative drag from the Northeast who hits all the right buttons for the Beltway crowd but can’t appeal to the voters.”
Reading through its funny how many of my predictions came true, minus the part about Cruz winning the nom, what with Trump coming out of nowhere. He did adopt the same populist policy I said a Republican would have to run on to win.
This is somewhat off topic, but I was wondering the opinion of the SSTers on the article (and the topic) in light of recent discussions about “political correctness” and multiculturalism.
http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2016/10/maajid-nawaz-splc-anti-muslim-extremist/505685/
I don’t know too much about Maajid Nawaz, but to the extent that I know of his work, I thought his ideas, broadly speaking, have a strong merit, as a defense of a different version of “multiculturalism” that does not bow to either nativism or PC, something that recognizes that “minority cultures” need to adapt, assimilate to, and respect the mainstream, but that the mainstream needs to respect, understand, and recognize certain key aspects of minority cultures as well. If you will, a two way path of understanding requiring working with all sides, rather than “one side is right and the other side is wrong” attitude that seems to prevail among too many people, whether one agrees with the specifics of what he believes and does. I knew that he drew criticism from both sides, but this seems astonishing that he should be declared a “bigot” by an organization like SLPC.
@GulfCoastPirate,
“The one person who was more responsible for the latest recession than any other was Ronald Reagan.”
DEAD WRONG.
Clinton caused it when he signed the Balanced Budget Act of 1996 or 1997 and the federal govt ran federal government surpluses for the *first* time since the 1920-1930, thinking he would have the same success he had in Arkansas when he instituted the same thing as Governor. Federal government surpluses throughout US history have immediately preceded every depression. But that yahoo didn’t know—and still doesn’t—know it.
See Table 1.1—Summary of Receipts, Outlays, and Surpluses or Deficits (-): 1789–2021 on https://www.whitehouse.gov/omb/budget/Historicals. These are the facts, GCP. These numbers don’t lie.
There have been seven of depressions in US history, if you include the 2008 Great Recession, delayed by the dotcom and housing bubbles until 2008 and ‘saved by the bell’ of automatic stabilizers kicking in. Those automatic stabilizers were instituted after the Great Depression. It would have been 10X worse than the Great Depression without them.
Look at the deficits during Reagan’s time. Ballooned. In 1985, David Stockman was interviewed after he left the Reagan admin and said that Reagan increased the deficits to prove to the Democrats that increased federal government “buying” (erroneously called “spending”) would destroy the economy. It had the opposite effect.
“History tells the tale. The federal government has achieved fiscal balance (even surpluses) in just seven periods since 1776, bringing in enough revenue to cover all of its spending during 1817-21, 1823-36, 1852-57, 1867-73, 1880-93, 1920-30 and 1998-2001.
We also experienced six depressions up till 1929. They began in 1819, 1837, 1857, 1873, 1893 and 1929.
The one exception to this pattern, the seventh depression, occurred in the late 1990s and early 2000s, when the dot-com and housing bubbles fueled a consumption binge that delayed the harmful effects of the Clinton surpluses until the Great Recession of 2007-09.”
Just look at the Historical Tables. Read the facts.
This is why I am terrified of Hillary winning and putting Bill in charge of the economic direction. They are both hayseeds from Arkansas who don’t know the difference between state and federally run economies, and obviously don’t think they have to learn it. None of the 50 states has the power to issue the USD. Only the US federal government does. Globally. Worldwide. 100% monopoly on creating the US dollar. It’s counterfeiting. There ain’t no factory in downtown china manufacturing USD that we borrow. If you believe that, I have a bridge to sell you.
No, as the joke goes, *dual* loyalty is an improvement.
@Tyler, darlin’,
“They want their gimmedats.”
Enough with the gimmedat sneers. Beneath you.
It is the federal government’s JOB to provide for the “general welfare” of the people. Read the fucken preamble to the Constitution. It’s right there in black & white; provide for the general welfare of the people.
The federal government does that by *buying* goods and services from the private sector, **creating jobs**. It doesn’t “spend,” it BUYS stuff from the private sector to provision itself. It does it through the aegis and power of Congress—again, a power reserved only to Congress through the Constitution—something Congress has neglected to do for the past 30 years, leaving it to the Federal Reserve to attempt to accomplish it thru monetary policy (its mandate) instead of using fiscal policy (Congress’ JOB).
Businesses do NOT create jobs. Businesses are sitting on $2 trillion of cash waiting for Households to get their income back to increase sales. Households account for 70% of all spending in this country. Businesses? Only 12-14%. If these households don’t have the income to buy plane tickets, hire gardeners, buy construction materials, hire tutors, employ architects, buy cars, feed their kids, buy gas, get a new frig or tv, whatever—what is called “goods and services’ in the dry language of accounting—then businesses are not going to invest in hiring more people. Why should they?
No businessman in his right mind would hire people for the sole purpose of providing jobs. Period. Ain’t gonna’ happen, Tyler. No restaurant owner hires busboys to help the economy. They hire waiters and busboys because customers are streaming into their establishments, over-extending their capacity to serve their customers who have money to spend.
You need to rearrange your idea of unemployment. And what causes it. Drop the small-mindedness. It’s beneath you, because you’re a sharp guy who can think logically most of the time.
If you put a 100 dogs in a room with 95 bones, a minimum of 5 comes out without bones. (Some dogs might find two or more bones.)
No amount of education, re-training, peddling your rich family name, your inside relationship with your local congressman, or your exalted class, is going to change that outcome. Only 95 dogs max can come out with bones.
This isn’t rocket science. Unemployment is a matter of dogs and bones.
And only the federal government can provide those jobs in a downturn, per its constitutional charter, per its power to issue the currency (taxes don’t pay for this shit, you think $2.5 trillion annually in federal taxes pays for anything?), and per its JOB to take care of the society for the benefit of everyone. Public fucking Purpose.
CORRECTION!!!
Should read: ” There ain’t no factory in downtown china manufacturing USD that we borrow. It’s counterfeiting. If you believe that, I have a bridge to sell you.”
Charles,
“In Canada Banks are firing computing divisions after Indians are brought in to be trained in the work before it is shipped off for good. Canadian government abets and gives incentives expressly for it.”
They’re doing that now? Any possibility you have a link?
MRW, excellent MMT (Modern Monetary Theory) analysis. You are so correct, with a fiat currency at the Fed level, any real attempt to balance the budget would be catastrophic. That debt is more about the money supply. And it can always be paid back in dollars which the Fed can take care of with a few computer key strokes…just as they are doing with QE.
Clinton may be a hick from Arkansas, but according to Warren Mosler, he does understand MMT and the difference between state and federal economies. He told Mosler that MMT could not be accepted politically. Cynical grifter.
Hell, Nixon understood it, I think when he finally took us off the gold standard. Cheney “deficits don’t matter” understands it as he was in the Nixon administration at the time.
The conservative mantra of “balance the budget” has been distractive nonsense to promote right wing social agenda, at least since 1971 when Nixon dropped the gold standard.
@GulfCoastPirate,
“The equations that govern the electromagnetic waves that make your computing devices work are the same equations which govern economics.”
Maybe so. But they sure as hell don’t govern double-entry accounting. And ALL FEDERAL GOVERNMENT TRANSACTIONS–operationally–are recorded in double-entry accounting. (Actually it’s quadruple-entry, but I ain’t ‘splaining that.)
Do you know that understanding accounting, taking a real accounting course, is not a requirement for a PhD in Economics at MIT, Harvard, Yale, the Univ of Chicago, and Stanford? Furthermore, advanced accounting students at the graduate level have a hard time wrapping their heads around how the federal government quadruple-accounting system really works.
Let me give you an example of this stupidity.
Everyone quotes the NYC Debt Clock. The $20 trillion. Where the hell is the Asset Clock that represents the other half of the ledger? Double-entry accounting DEMANDS both sides of the ledger. And where are those assets parked?
Wanna’ know? They are in the people’s pension funds, university trusts, grandma’s Savings Bonds, corporate savings accounts, and individual savings accounts, not to mention foreign govts, banks, and investors. Because the federal government hired the private sector during the course of provisioning itself.
There’s just so much of the country where there is no economy. All those places voted sanders in the DNC primaries and seem to vote republican overall. People just want to be able to work decent jobs and live decent lives. That’s a bridge too far for the parasitic financial looting class.
America shouldn’t have to be like Nigeria, where everyone has to crowd around the big cities in hopes of getting any employment. There’s no reason for things to be so bad for so many.
@Tyler
People not affected by diversity have the luxury of voting for things like, well, the most vexing problems of their libtopias, such as: global warming, racist cops in Ferguson, MO, Christian bakers not making gay wedding cakes in Gresham, OR, etc.
Ante
What you say is true concerning the lack of income in the red counties, but there is also a lot of pure anti-blue cultural feeling even in places where income is pretty good. pl
MRW
In the context of the time of its adoption the framers had in mind to create a more efficient government than that of the Confederation under the Articles. “Provide for the welfare of the people” had nothing to do with improving their economic lot in life. pl
Col. Lang
This is the error that all the economic determinists as well as the keynesian cargo cult, the socialists and the big government types always lean back on. In their minds “promote the general Welfare” means that the federal government is RESPONSIBLE for the economic well being of each citizen. In my reading of the federalist papers the framers believed that was the responsibility of each citizen.
MRW keeps at this canard that government spending is the ONLY means for economic prosperity in these United States. Note his comment to Tyler – “Businesses do NOT create jobs.” Ludicrous on the face of it!
In an earlier thread (IBD/TIPP Presidential Tracking Poll) he had the thesis that he claims as gospel truth with the same cut and paste that he always places on threads here at SST, which is that whenever the federal government runs a budget surplus or balances the budget the US has an economic depression. In looking at a simple chart of federal government debt which is the best data series as it takes into account the net deficit after all accounting gimmicks, it is clear to even a high schooler who has taken statistics, that there is no correlation, let alone causation, between federal government budget surplus/deficit and economic growth or median household income. There are periods of varying length of time when the federal government debt has remained steady or declined or increased. During these periods we’ve had both growth as well as declines and no mathematical relationships can be derived.
We find many instances of recessions when the federal government runs deficits and periods of great growth when the federal government runs balanced or surplus budgets.
The chart of federal government debt since 1945 is self explanatory.
https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/FGDSLAQ027S
This is the net deficit that the federal government has run since 1945. As is clear the government debt was flat from the 50s through the 60s. Yet we had really good growth in GDP and household incomes. However, since the mid-80s, federal debt has exploded and has even gone parabolic since the 2008 financial meltdown. Yet, we see several recessions and the weakest post-war economic recovery after the 2008 recession.
To quote billionaire money manager Paul Singer, just making observations of data:
“Between 1870 and 1913, the real GDP of the United States rose from $20 billion to $131 billion (1958$). That gain of 4.3% per annum compounded over 43 years is the highest real GDP growth on record for a continuous equivalent period of time.
But here’s the wonder of it. During that golden age of growth and prosperity, the US had no central bank and not even one episode of fiscal stimulus!
If you allow for population growth from 39 million in 1870 to 97 million by 1913 …real GDP rose from $480 to $1,350 per capita or at a 2.5% annual rate. That, too, was never again exceeded over a continuous four decade interval.
During the most recent 43-year period, for instance, the growth rate of real per capita GDP was only 1.6%; and since the eve of the financial crisis in Q4 2007, it has dropped to just 0.3% per annum….
Compared to the last 9 years when we have had a tsunami of stimulus, both fiscal and monetary, how did we get 8X more per capita growth in real GDP during the 43-year period ending in 1913? After all, the almighty Fed did not even open its doors for business until the fall of 1914?”
MRW and others like him are cultists, who call anyone that don’t agree with their clear nuttiness that infinite government spending is the only means to prosperity as idiots. Just read some of his posts on this topic and what he calls people who call him on his BS. Look at him sneer at Tyler with all that superiority on this thread. Yet, he can’t point to any mathematical relationship between federal government deficits and GDP growth rates and median household incomes!
MRW,
I live, I deserve, where’s my check? That’s a new one. You left out the “secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity,”
Illegal immigrants are not our posterity. The learned helplessness of yet another generation knowing nothing other than life on welfare is not a “blessing of liberty”.
Abu Sinan,
The question is: is White a Race? Or is White a Way? A Way of Being?
The US Democratic Party is the oldest political party one Earth. To what do you attribute its longevity?
Both sides need to figure out a way to bridge the divide. Can some adults somewhere step up? Broader gulfs have been negotiated.