Republicans Breeding Their Way to Victory
One of the handful of bylines in political journalism that always presages a worthwhile read belongs to Joel Kotkin, Presidential Fellow at Chapman University, Contributing Editor to City Journal, and an unrivaled analyst of social, economic, and demographic trends.
In his most recent piece at the Daily Beast, Kotkin argues that Republican anxieties about appealing to Hispanic voters are overblown. His reasoning? "Hispanic population growth is likely to slow or even recede, and Republicans are likely to do better with the group (in part because it would be hard to do much worse), as assimilation increases and immigration becomes less volatile an issue."
The real demographic issue, according to Kotkin, is quite different:
More than race, family orientation may prove the real dividing line in American politics. Single, never-married women have emerged as one of the groups most devoted to the Democratic party, trailing only black voters, according to Gallup. Some 70 percent of single women voted Democratic in 2008, including 60 percent of white single women.
While the gender gap has been exaggerated, a chasm is emerging between traditional families, on the one hand, and singles and nontraditional families on the other. Married women, for example, still lean Republican. But Democrats dominate in places like Manhattan, where the majority of households are single, along with Washington, D.C., San Francisco, and Seattle.
In recent years Republican gains, according to Gallup, have taken place primarily among white families. Not surprisingly, Republicans generally do best where the traditional nuclear family is most common, such as in the largely suburban (and fairly affordable) expanses around Houston, Dallas, and Salt Lake City.
Ok, a difference to be sure, but not one that necessarily indicates a partisan advantage. After all, Kotkin is describing the world we already live in, one in which national politics are polarized and neither party has evinced anything like a capacity for an enduring majority in recent years. The difference, he explains, may come a little down the road, for a simple reason:
Varying birth rates also suggest that the Democrat-dominated future may be a pipe dream. Since progressives and secularists tend to have fewer children than more religiously oriented voters, who tend to vote Republican, the future America will see a greater share of people raised from fecund groups such as Mormons and Orthodox Jews. Needless to say, there won’t be as many offspring from the hip, urban singles crowd so critical to Democratic calculations.
How ironic. A Democratic Party that has spent the better part of the year defining itself as the party of contraception may eventually find its electoral prospects enervated by birth control.
- Comment (25)
- · Quote
- · UnfollowFollow (2)
- Pages:
- 1
- 2
Comments:
Oct '10
Re: Republicans Breeding Their Way to Victory
And that's on top of the millions of kids who would have been born into Democrat families and added to the Party rolls if they hadn't been aborted.
Dec '10
Re: Republicans Breeding Their Way to Victory
Good.
Jun '10
Re: Republicans Breeding Their Way to Victory
I always thought it foolish that liberal feminists were so eager to relinquish the greatest power that any woman has--the power to repopulate the Earth with half a dozen or more people absolutely loyal to her. That's power that doesn't go away.
Apr '11
Re: Republicans Breeding Their Way to Victory
You don't need to procreate when you can assimilate...
"Resistance is futile, Troy. You will be assimilated."
May '10
Re: Republicans Breeding Their Way to Victory
There's a marketing slogan in there for the GOP... All of them violate the C-O-C but would make the party very popular among young men of all races.
Sep '10
Re: Republicans Breeding Their Way to Victory
Some might say "its where the rubber hits the road", but not me, of course.
Sep '10
Re: Republicans Breeding Their Way to Victory
Mark Steyn in 2005:
May '10
Re: Republicans Breeding Their Way to Victory
That suggests that the 70s--the high-water mark of secular leftism--was an anomaly. It was the moment that left-wing indoctrination was cashing in at the ballot box, and not yet beginning to pay the price demographically.
I know I'm in danger of becoming Ricochet's house Pollyanna, but what Troy is writing here makes me more optimistic than ever.
Mar '11
Re: Republicans Breeding Their Way to Victory
The problem is that Democrats control the education and entertainment fields, and THAT'S how they "reproduce", not marriage and childbearing. They know they're not going to keep up by making their own babies. So they try to take ours. So simply relying on demographics here is foolish. Why have new Democrats in the delivery room when you can make them in the classrooms and concert halls? We're still at a disadvantage as long as our kids go to government schools and face the peer pressure of pop culture. Pop culture is exactly why resistance to homosexuality has been slipping. Dad and the preacher say one thing about morals, but Lady GaGa says another, and she has your kid's attention.
May '10
Re: Republicans Breeding Their Way to Victory
Dems get more abortions than Republicans. Children tend to vote as their parents did.
Just interesting facts.
Jul '10
Re: Republicans Breeding Their Way to Victory
Troy Senik, Ed.:
The difference, he explains, may come a little down the road, for a simple reason:
That there link is a twice buried lede.
Re: Republicans Breeding Their Way to Victory
Douglas, I think that's the single biggest criticism you can apply to Kotkin's reasoning. I'm probably not quite as pessimistic about it as you are (I think the cultural influence of the left can ameliorate their demographic erosion, but not fully compensate for it).
This underscores the importance of conservatives engaging in the broader culture. The trick is to do it without showing the seams. Too often, self-consciously conservative entertainment is so focused on the politics that it fails to actually entertain. It's the classic case of the adjective swallowing the noun (see "Christian rock"). The first priority is to make a good product. From there, the rest takes care of itself. The pill is easier to administer when it's ground up in the food.
Douglas
The problem is that Democrats control the education and entertainment fields, and THAT'S how they "reproduce", not marriage and childbearing. They know they're not going to keep up by making their own babies. So they try to take ours. So simply relying on demographics here is foolish. Why have new Democrats in the delivery room when you can make them in the classrooms and concert halls?
Oct '10
Re: Republicans Breeding Their Way to Victory
I used the think the Mormon drive for lots of children stupid (though my idea of "reasonable" was, and still is, four kids), until I learned about demographic decline.
Apr '12
Re: Republicans Breeding Their Way to Victory
Hmm... interesting!
Edited on April 18, 2012 at 5:20pmOct '11
Re: Republicans Breeding Their Way to Victory
Without universities, the ranks of libs would shrink even faster. That's the primary place where the brown shirts outfit and replenish their ranks. Is there any hope that liberals will see their stranglehold on higher ed weaken? Somebody give me a sign ...
Jun '10
Re: Republicans Breeding Their Way to Victory
I've done my part: five adult children, all conservatives. Bad news: they're all in Utah, where we have no shortage.
Feb '11
Re: Republicans Breeding Their Way to Victory
Six tadpoles and counting! You can thank Papa Toad and me later when they start voting ...
Oct '10
Re: Republicans Breeding Their Way to Victory
Douglas is right. Liberals approach having children the same way they approach having jobs. Why go through all the trouble for yourself when it's so easy to commandeer the efforts of others?
May '10
Re: Republicans Breeding Their Way to Victory
Bryan G. Stephens: Dems get more abortions than Republicans. Children tend to vote as their parents did.
Just interesting facts. · 1 hour ago
Saaaay, you're right! That explains voting tombstones in Chicago.
May '10
Re: Republicans Breeding Their Way to Victory
1) Peter has been doing his yeoman best for the cause. But Rob? Nope. Troy? I don't think so. Claire? Unh unh. James? One Gnat only. More proof positive that the Coastal Elites dominate Ricochet....
Troy Senik, Ed.: Douglas, I think that's the single biggest criticism you can apply to Kotkin's reasoning.......
This underscores the importance of conservatives engaging in the broader culture. The trick is to do it without showing the seams. Too often, self-consciously conservative entertainment is so focused on the politics that it fails to actually entertain. It's the classic case of the adjective swallowing the noun (see "Christian rock"). The first priority is to make a good product. From there, the rest takes care of itself. The pill is easier to administer when it's ground up in the food.
2) The media and academic dominance is going to go under as the legacy publishing and broadcasting paradigms die off, and as education becomes more privatized and competitive. Both trends are inevitable due to technology advances, market forces, and unsustainable costs of the current world (see "Wisconsin WEAC"). It will take some time, but the Titanic is slowly turning.