May 14, 2012

Trende's Trends: Sailer on "The Lost Majority"

I review Sean Trende's new book on whether 2012 will be a realigning election in VDARE. Read the whole thing there.

By Steve Sailer on 5/14/2012 Labels: ,

39 comments:

Anonymous said...

I agree with you On Whittier, and take Irvine the fastest growing city in OC is a swing city. Becoming more asian has led it more so recently, granted old Larry Agran Dem even got moderate Repblicans who voted for him in the past, Irvine last year grew 5,300 and Anaheim and Santa Ana the cities of the hispanic majorties about 2,800 and 2,300 apiece and both cities have a based about 100,000 above Irivine. I think that asians while having less kids since they are older than hispanics and usually have less kids are still going to grow about 1 to 2 percent in LA and probably about 1.5 to 3.0 percent in Orange County in this decade which means that OC with the exceptions of some beach towns like Dana Point or San Clemente or San Juan Capistranto is going to be about 20 percent asian and going to have less of the old Gop politics. Hispanics along are not the only factors even in Ca.

5/14/12, 8:22 AM
WMarkW said...

There is no reason to think that either party will win a realignment forever. Since the Twenty-Second Amendment (limiting Presidents to two terms) took effect in time for the 1952 election, the two parties have traded the White House every eight years right on schedule except for one four/twelve split in the 1980s. Things like recessions still defeat the party in power; and they've become skilled at re-making themselves in response to events.

5/14/12, 8:23 AM
WMarkW said...

There is no reason to think that either party will win a realignment forever. Since the Twenty-Second Amendment (limiting Presidents to two terms) took effect in time for the 1952 election, the two parties have traded the White House every eight years right on schedule except for one four/twelve split in the 1980s. Things like recessions still defeat the party in power; and they've become skilled at re-making themselves in response to events.

5/14/12, 8:23 AM
Anonymous said...

Also, most of the white cities of La, Orange and San Diego are growing slowed, La white cities like Rendono Beach are growing around .4 and Mission Viejo is growing only .7 about the same as Santa Ana but Anaheim at .8 percent. Interesting San Diego City which is more white than La, Long Beach, Anaheim and Santa Ana among large cities in So Calif is growing around .8 to .9 percent versus only. 5 percentage for LA. So, minority shift mainly hispanic and asian until asians started to die off since they are older than hispanics will shift in this decade. and probably even less for the Republicans but maybe the Dems might become more moderate since the hispanic growth is in inland counties.

5/14/12, 8:28 AM
Mr. Anon said...

Steve, here is another recent "crops rotting in the fields" story:

http://www.waff.com/story/18372860/some-ala-farmers-cut-back-crops-citing-crackdown

A few anonymous farmers said they will not plant as much this year lest their crop go unpicked. At least that is the ostensible background of the story. Notice that they never mention any names or numbers. What are the names of these farmers? How many of them are there?

5/14/12, 8:32 AM
Anonymous said...

Obama's Julia is as fictitious as Lillian Helmann's.

5/14/12, 9:24 AM
Whiskey said...

Steve, Game Theory implies that when economic growth becomes stunted for decades at around 2% or so, the only way to "win" at coalition politics is to kick out of the country the opposition coalition, so the spoils become bigger and payoffs to the other side become smaller.

In France, this is seen with proposals likely to be enacted of 75-100% taxation on income/wealth over say, 1 million euros. Melenchon wants it on wealth, Hollande on income. Objective: drive the middle class Whites out of France, leave nothing but single White women, Africans, and North African Muslims in France. The Left Wing Dream.

In the US, it is likely the reverse. The game that Elizabeth Warren played, heap-big-fake Indian, is over. The only way for the Warrens to win is to kick out the competitors, i.e. Hispanics (and also Blacks) so THEY and not say, Cornel West are Harvard Professors.

That's the kicker on realignment: things change radically when growth stops/slows for long periods, and lifeboat ethics take hold. I suspect the realignment talk is more akin to looking at deeper/wider social changes in America. The way FDR heralded the end of ruralism in America and the new Urbanism.

5/14/12, 9:50 AM
SFG said...

You know, when you kept saying 'Scots-Irish' in that article, I thought you meant something else...

5/14/12, 10:19 AM
DaveinHackensack said...

"For example, the addition of left-leaning foreigners and their children to American elections could simply move the whole political spectrum to the left, with the Republicans taking up the policies of current Democrats and the Democrats acting like a social democratic party."

What we've seen recently has been more like an orthogonal move by both parties in a globalist/Davos economic direction on issues such as immigration and trade. Similarly, there has been an orthogonal move toward greater hawkishness in foreign policy, and a one-way ratchet up in the security/surveillance state.

5/14/12, 10:37 AM
Bill said...

In Trende’s model, the party that benefited from what seemed like a permanent realignment will find itself hard-pressed to keep all the over-expectant elements of its inflated, unwieldy coalition happy.

Yes, that's the problem with the permanent victory model. Democrats literally can't afford to accommodate everyone. Lots more white males would vote dem if they had anything to offer, but giving anything to them would mean they wouldn't have enough left over for the other parts of the coalition.

If the Democrats achieved a large majority, they would have to consume themselves, and it would all fall apart in short order.

5/14/12, 10:58 AM
Anonymous said...

I think the Frankfurt School might be pushing the envelope just a little too hard with their overaching agenda of mainstreaming orientalistic sodomy & pederasty - misoverestimating their ability to move events quite as quickly as they would have preferred.

Even if you were to throw out the economy and the looming Trayvon race riots, my guess is that a general sense of public disgust [with e.g. the Travolta mess or the billionaire mayor of NYC lecturing North Carolinians on intolerance or the most recent News-Weak magazine cover] could very well be the straw that breaks the camel's back for the DEMs this year.

Maybe the Frankfurt School hasn't yet realized that - in the long run - any increase in homosexuality is [tautologically] at odds with a resurgence of patriarchy.

5/14/12, 11:05 AM
Anonymous said...

I'm not too sure about this Steve.
Basically, in a word, politics is all about tribalism.
Political allegiances are tribally based in that groups, self-identifying groups, support parties whom they think will look out for them and theirs - always has been this way, always will since party politics first evolved in 17th century England.
These days, basically, the Democrats are run by a black/Jewish alliance in which the Jews provide the cash and organisational back-bone, and blacks are the outward face. The point is that this set-up has been very succesful for both parties, blacks have got huge privelege and entitlement, Jews have been able to usurp the WASP establishment.
As I've pontificated before the Democrats have basically become 'the anti-white man alliance', a spoils system in which booty is taken from white men and distributed to white women, latinos, blacks and other non-white immigrant groups. All these groups know this and that the the Democrats truly have them at heart, thusly they will vote Democrat for evermore. 'Hispandering' is a hiding to nothing for the Republicans, a cynical move the beneficiaries know is cynical.
The Republicans are not 'the party of whites' as some might have you - and they never will be. They are purely and simply the party of big business, the globalists and the 1%, working class whites stuoid enough to vote for them are chewed up and shat out just like hyaena droppings, useful for nourshing fat cat profits and fertilizing fat cat fields as nitrates, blood and bone meal, but no other use to Republican big-wigs at all I'm afraid.
Pedro, has taken that job, he is low waged, brown faced, smiling and willing to work for cents on the dollar.

5/14/12, 11:34 AM
Beccher Asbury said...

The main target of Trende’s book: the bread-and-butter concept of typical big picture psephological tomes: partisan realignment.

Psephological: I have never heard of that word before. Thanks for the education.

5/14/12, 11:35 AM
Florida resident said...

Dear Mr. Sailer !
Can you make a synopsis of your VDARE article ?
As of now, it is 3,306 words long (according to MS Word.)
Can you kindly deliver an abstract of the length, say, 400 words ?
I can pretend, that it is difficult not for me --- to read 3,300 word essay, but, e.g., for my wife. And I would like her to read Sailer.

Your truly, Florida resident.

5/14/12, 12:07 PM
rob said...

"Ironically, in Trende’s view the most likely “permanent realignment” signaled by 2008: the Democrats have decisively lost the Scots-Irish of the greater Appalachian zone..."

Oh, when you say Scots-Irish, you mean Scots-Irish!

5/14/12, 12:43 PM
non-Irish Scots said...

I think in Haggard's case it was brought out more due to being surrounded by a lot of Bakersfield Dutchmen

5/14/12, 12:56 PM
Nova Scotia Irish said...

Maybe young white people who are just starting to get interested in politics want to do what cool white people do.

Does W. Virginia show any signs of some day getting with the program? Because I was early I took an extra day going up I-64 on a cross-country drive. It was like entering a time warp (not the charming Brooklyn kind). Mind you I am totally pro-diversity.

5/14/12, 1:14 PM
Luke Lea said...

You left me confused, Steve.

5/14/12, 1:17 PM
monomaniacal alt-right professional analyst said...

Colorado has also in the past exhibited a different relationship as to Rockefellers vs. coal miners.

5/14/12, 1:22 PM
Conatus said...

This is the middle class white man's problem in a nutshell from Thomas Frank, What's the Matter with Kansas, p. 7.
"Grandstanding leaders never deliver, their fury mounts and mounts, and nevertheless they turn out every two years to return their right-wing heroes to office for a second, a third, a twentieth try. The trick never ages; the illusion never wears off. Vote to stop abortion; receive a rollback in capital gains taxes. Vote to make our country strong again; receive deindustrialization. Vote to screw those politically correct college professors; receive electricity deregulation. Vote to get government off our backs; receive conglomeration and monopoly everywhere from media to meatpacking. Vote to stand tall against terrorists; receive Social Security privatization. Vote to strike a blow against elitism; receive a social order in which wealth is more concentrated then ever before in our lifetimes, in which workers have been stripped of power and CEOs are rewarded in a manner beyond imagining."
During every election the Republicans dangle cultural change in front of the white middle class but only deliver real change for big, organized, politically contributing business. But where else can you go, not to the Dems who hate whites. You are stuck voting for the Goppers because at least they leave you alone.

5/14/12, 1:32 PM
Joe Sox-Pack said...

"What we've seen recently has been more like an orthogonal move by both parties in a globalist/Davos economic direction on issues such as immigration and trade. Similarly, there has been an orthogonal move toward greater hawkishness in foreign policy, and a one-way ratchet up in the security/surveillance state."

This is also my view.

5/14/12, 1:37 PM
Jack said...

As an upper middle class educated white Republican, the Colorado-West Virginia situation is the one I most identify with. Young white "cool" people mostly vote Democrat, and people want to be "cool". The Democrat percentage at top colleges in 2008 was like 80%. As a law student, I was surrounded by Jews voting for a half Muslim president and women who are in love with gay marriage. Why? Because it was the "cool" thing to do.

For their future, Republicans will need to sway some of the elite, and by elite I mean upper middle class to upper class white people. It is not a huge number of votes, but will pay off bigtime in money and status. I believe many of this group of whites are persuadable this year. Especially if Romney nominates a good VP - Thune and Paul Ryan are good options.

5/14/12, 2:36 PM
Anonymous said...

But where else can you go, not to the Dems who hate whites. You are stuck voting for the Goppers because at least they leave you alone.

Leave you alone, indeed.

Republican "small government" means government by witch-burning, pitchfork-wielding clean-cut mobs who see life as one big high school beauty contest. Only libertarians truly stand for small government - but we already know they are crazy autistic bastards with nothing to sell to the average man.

5/14/12, 2:46 PM
Anonymous said...

Whiskey: ...lifeboat ethics...

Gotta love those 12th Century Scots-Irish philosophers.

5/14/12, 2:56 PM
jody said...

i still think the last time a republican can win the election for president of the united states will be 2020.

after watching the significant leftward movement of most of the television news channels over the last 5 years, i'm not even so sure of that. 2016 might be the last time a republican can be president, with the way most television news producers skew the national news so extremely far in favor of the democrat politicians.

notice how they control the rules of the national discussion now, where the republicans are in danger of allowing their political enemies to dictate what is even acceptable to talk about. "That's a losing issue for you" is now their mantra any time the republicans move away from economics and want to attack democrats on some other issue. "Don't go there, that's a loser for you." over and over, this is the response today. obama caught in a scandal? don't go there. loser issue for conservatives.

i see people on the web picking up this talking point and bringing it up first whenever the dramatically corrupt obama cabinet has been caught in yet another situation which is unbecoming of their office. "Don't talk about (scandal number 7), that's a losing issue for you. Only wingnuts care about this. Best to drop it, and focus on 2016, seeing as how we've now educated the public on how unelectable all your candidates are."

notice for instance, how the media spends a lot of their time trying to make every single republican candidate look like a buffoon. meanwhile, a communist, racist, anti-american liar and failure who is wrecking the US is supposed to be the sensible, intelligent choice, by way of total omission. they never talk about how preposterously bad obama is, and harp incessantly on minor things about the republicans which they want burned into your mind. "This is why they aren't qualified, and why it's a joke any republican is even running for office. Every one of them is completely unelectable" is the repeated message. if trende and steve don't think this has a COLOSSAL effect, they're wrong.

5/14/12, 2:59 PM
jody said...

one thing missing in this analysis is how california is now permanently and forever going to vote democrat in every election from now until the end of the united states.

as pat buchanan correctly points out, once one of the other big states permanently flips to always voting democrat for the rest of time, a republican can never win an election for president of the united states ever again.

california, illinois, and new york are permanently blue. this means once pennsylvania, texas, or florida goes permanently blue, it's all over. again, buchanan correctly points out, texas is slowly moving towards blue. with demographic trends, it's inevitable texas will turn blue. it' just a matter of time.

for me, the one thing i wonder, is why do republicans in california even bother to vote? it's a waste of time now.

and why do republican candidates for president even bother to campaign in california? for that matter, why would a democrat? it's going blue, 100% for sure, and all those 55 of those electoral college votes go directly into the democrat's pocket, every time, all the time, forever. both the republican and democrat would be wise to spend zero percent of their time in california and instead spend all their california time instead in battleground states.

perhaps they must keep up appearances for fundraising purposes, but there's no point at all, none, to campaigning in california now, for either party.

5/14/12, 3:08 PM
Anonymous said...

While it's true that Congress was ruled by Democrats, keep in mind that many Democrats were actually Southern conservatives, closet-Republicans.

5/14/12, 3:17 PM
Anonymous said...

many Democrats were actually Southern conservatives, closet-Republicans.

Right. Reagan was successful in getting his agenda passed because of the strong support he enjoyed from conservative Southern Democrats and blue collar Reagan Democrats.

5/14/12, 3:35 PM
anony-mouse said...

A long article about future political demographics without any mention of who's having babies and who's not?

5/14/12, 4:28 PM
Anonymous said...

Well, actually the Republicans did do good with the elite in Orange County Ca, Dallas Tx, and Houston Tx. In most southern states the Republicans do better with upper middle class and wealthy whites. Heavily support is among whites that are religous but make at least 75,000 a year, lowest support is among whites below 30,000 in most states. So the opposed is true.

5/14/12, 8:20 PM
Anonymous said...

"
and why do republican candidates for president even bother to campaign in california? for that matter, why would a democrat? it's going blue, 100% for sure, and all those 55 of those electoral college votes go directly into the democrat's pocket, every time, all the time, forever. both the republican and democrat would be wise to spend zero percent of their time in california and instead spend all their california time instead in battleground states."

Anybody out there up to defending the Electoral College?

5/14/12, 8:52 PM
Anonymous said...

GOP will tack hard left in order to compete in CA TX etc. They are already the Liberal Party at the top.

GWB was a liberal. McCain was a progressive. Romney is a full blown moderate Democrat ie a lefty.

GOP establishment can't wait to nominate non whites for POTUS. Rush Limbaugh's short list for 2012 was Herman Cain, Cornell West, and Marc Rubio.

5/14/12, 9:47 PM
Anonymous said...

Meant to say Colonel West (Alan).

The point is that the GOP is flexible! Got an entire state filled with assorted non-whites? No problemo! GOP will increase the pigment of their candidates to whatever extent is necessary to buy off 50.1% of the votes. Just ask Karl Rove.

Bobby Jindal 2016!!!

5/14/12, 10:31 PM
Anonymous said...

Thomas Frank, What's the Matter with Kansas

Some might say the broad white middle class would rather vote for the GOP illusion than face reality: they are unrepresented in the American political system.

5/15/12, 6:07 AM
Anonymous said...

Well, the Whitter mexicans seem to be growing, I saw a picture of Angel fans and the Mexicans were more of a white family. I see Mexicans moving more into the Inland Empire and becmong more middle class. Hopefully, the Pew Hispanic poll is right that immirgation from Mexico will slow and day laboreres by 2020 will dropped off more.

5/15/12, 6:39 AM
Dr. Φ said...

"Latinos consistently gave Democratic presidential candidates between 66 and 76 percent of the vote…They did so whether the GOP candidate was running in the immediate aftermath of Proposition 187 or as the heir to an administration that had just signed an “amnesty” bill, as George H.W. Bush did in 1988."

George H.W. Bush didn't take office until 1989.

5/15/12, 6:59 PM
Anonymous said...

Steve, I take your point about 'end-is-nighness' being mostly wrong. But I believe it is possible to be over-confident of equilibrium, and thus venture into what I call the End-of-History fallacy.

Disequilibriums happen. The actors don't always recognise them in real time. And historians can smooth everything out with the benefit of hindsight and long timelines. (Hence ongoing debates about whether the Dark Ages was dark vis a vis the Classical period, etc.)

An impending disequilibrium is the hardest thing to call - not only because you can look like a crank; but because equilibrium is a powerful force. But predicting disequilibrium is also THE most critical survival skill.

Here's a simple example: Rhodesia. The end of the world really was nigh. But many poor souls hung on too long waiting for a snapped pendulum.

Gilbert Pinfold.

5/15/12, 10:29 PM
Anonymous said...

Hopefully Romney will pick ROn Porlund, he is good because he is not from one of the heavily immirgant states. The Republican Party pick too much in heavily immirgant states like Ca, Tx, Az, but maybe not this time. The midwest is good since its a swing area and is less interested in the hispanic question.

5/16/12, 8:58 AM
guest007 said...

If Steve was correct, then there would be a model that would explain how Califonria will revert back to a Republican Majority.

However since Steve knows that the Democrats have a lock on California and there is nothing that the Republican can do to change that, then it should be easy to understand how the U.S. can function with one relevant political party.

Politics in the future will take place in the Democratic Primary (or open primary in California) and will be about different groups fighting over who gets the most of the white guys money.

5/17/12, 4:04 AM

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