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Tuesday, November 13, 2012

The Numbers Game

There's only so many ways to skin a cat or win an election. Like gambling, you don't just take the easy money, you look for the big score. The Republicans have always taken the easy money, setting up their own dime store New Deal after losing to FDR and Truman, setting up affirmative action and HMOs after JFK and LBJ; scoring short term political victories and long term defeats.

As we speak, a small horde of consultants and would-be consultants is urging the Republican Party to take the easy money of amnesty, tax hikes and anything else that will make them an inoffensive version of last election's Democratic Party. And if any of that is followed by a victory, then the consultants order an expensive bottle of wine and the left goes on planning another big score.

The key to winning the game is in the numbers. Demographics.

The weakness of the kind of state that Western liberals love to set up, the one with 4-day workweeks where everyone is either in a university or a union, where no one goes to church or synagogue, where having more than 2 kids is frowned on and retirement can be had before your hair goes white, is that it demographically trends conservative. Not necessarily what most conservatives think of as being conservative, but nevertheless those retired 60-year olds who have one daughter named Inga and take four vacations a year, don't much like change. They don't like America, Israel, banks, war, monarchy and a lot of the things that the left expects them not to like; but they also form societies that lack the left's radical appetite for change.

Older societies trend conservative. And a low birth rate means that the society will be old and the growth in children will come from more traditional households. Those children can be broken down in the mandatory public education system and influenced through cultural dementia, but the long run prospects don't look good for the left. Eventually you end up with a society where everyone expects to retire at 55, even though there aren't enough younger workers to take their place, and half of those potential younger workers are getting useless advanced degrees or dreaming of moving to America, while the other half are joining some revivalist religious movement. And that's a bad deal either way.

The left's utopias are not only economically unsustainable (what else is new) but also politically and demographically unsustainable. The economics can't be fixed, but the politics and demographics can. As with all of the left's solutions, they involve finding ways of making things much, much worse. And their answer to the demographic and political problem is immigration. Bring in young people from elsewhere who will have lots of kids and vote the straight slanted ticket. Preferably the kind who won't get along with the locals and will be taught to constantly complain about racism, even though back where they're from, racism was as accepted as daylight drug deals and beheadings.

Bring them in, run their kids through the same system, add a few holidays to the calendar, enjoy the new ethnic foods and hopefully teach their kids to stop having so many kids if they want to retire at 55 and fill their house with knickknacks from their vacations in Greece and Brazil. And then fill the new gap with more immigrants. It's a plan that makes as much economic sense as the European Union and is twice as sustainable. After all lots of people in the world want free health care and a passport from a country that won't collapse into a murderous civil war when the price of bread goes through the minaret.

And if the assimilation program doesn't work, well then you only have to bring in half as many immigrants next time around, because all those countries you brought those immigrants from are now in your own country. Saves on jet fuel and coast guards. Not to mention language lessons, though it usually turns out that you need them anyway because your excellent schools no longer seem to be doing such a good job of teaching your own language and what used to be your language is now an argot composed of the languages of your immigrants and bits of your own language processed into the fake street slang of rap stars. And before you know it, you're using it too.

It's a dead end. It's Rome with the barbarians sorting through the loot. It's China when the wall fell. It's Byzantium when the Bedouin raiders poured through and began the centuries long process of tearing apart Middle Eastern Christianity, that Islam wrapped up. It's the long fall of civilization into night with a bloody pension and a hell of a retirement plan lost somewhere in the middle of a pile of broken marble columns.

But it keeps the left alive. Without diversity, the left is a bunch of corpulent unions protecting their pensions while the young people look at brochures of London and Los Angeles and finish their fourth degree. Without it, the left eventually dries up, blows away in the wind and dies after running a few protests against austerity and then has to implement it anyway.

Diversity isn't a moral principle. It's oxygen for a dead movement. It's the only way that the left can stay alive long enough to fulfill the accidental mission of every parasite by killing its host. It's the numbers game and as long as the left can cobble together these coalitions built on the backs of immigrants and tied together with community associations and piles of free stuff, then it can go on squatting on a society, dipping its proboscis in the sweet nectar of wealth and power, and then when the nectar runs out, switching to sipping its blood.

The left needs immigration to run its numbers game. It needs immigration to survive. It needs immigration to force further change on societies that would be static if left to their own devices. It needs immigration to provide it with a permanently disadvantaged working class from an infinite supply of billions. It needs to make its own failed society fail in new ways by injecting other failed societies into it.

Play the diversity of numbers and the kids stop dreaming of London and LA and start hanging out at clubs where diversity seems to make life more exciting. The declining native upper class and the immigrant working class shake hands over the bodies of the native working class and the whole broken train rumbles forward into the night.

But this numbers game depends on no opposition party emerging to represent the people left out of this arrangement. And there are two kinds of opposition parties. The cheerfully capitalist party whose leaders have gone to all the right schools and are obscenely enthusiastic about bringing some fresh blood into the country. And the other kind. The ones who aren't interested in fresh blood.

The opposition party and its composition doesn't matter that much until the crunch kicks in. That is what happens when economic unsustainability begins to outrace all the imaginary numbers and the accounting tricks that involve selling debt in exchange for debt and building all the debt into a tall house of debt cards and the knives come out and the sacrifices begin. And like all cannibal feasts, it's a question of who gets cut and who does the cutting.

The unofficial cutting order on the left, after everything else has been drained, the rich have fled to their tax havens and small businesses sell things that fell off trucks on the way to the government giveaway, is native pensions, immigrant benefits and then their own salaries. The natives will howl, of course, but the question is will they be able to do anything more than howl.

The left can control the table but democracy is also a number. The right amount of votes can change the nature of the game entirely. It's all a question of thinking long term and planning for the right moment, instead of the right sellout. Compromises don't win elections, strategic tactical grievances do. And then when the moment comes, the overton window opens, the grievance gets hurled and the game changes.

The difference between the left and the right is that the left has a five-year plan and the right has a five-second plan. The left knows what it's going to do four years from now when the numbers look even worse than they do today. But what is the right going to do? Run another cheerful capitalist who promises to use his Olympics experience to fix the economy, but never really seizes those grievances and goes for the throat? That's what the left is counting on.

And until then maybe it's time to serve up some more amnesty. Because who can have just one portion of a delicious demographic treat like unsustainable economics fused with millions of free votes?

No game is unwinnable. But you have to know the odds and play to win. Demographics, like all other games, is winnable, but you have to know how to play the game.


  1. Mike Darancette14/11/12

    Why are the "Boomers" so passive? Can't they see that we are the ones to be sacrificed to pay for the Brave New America?

  2. Does anyone know the breakdown by age of the Republicans/Conservatives/Evangelicals who refused to vote in this election? Can't help wondering how many were Baby Boomers (born between 1946 and 1964), the narcissists chiefly responsible for driving this country to the Left. It now appears that on the Right the holier-than-thou, more-Conservative-than-thou, my-way-or-no-way types were also unable to put country before self. Are they any less narcissistic than their age counterparts on the Left?

  3. 67% of single women voted for Obama. This had nothing to do with ideology, or rather t he ideology had its roots in the hard wired behavior of women to seek a protector and to keep their options open for a strong male (government).

    The sad reality is this: as long as women have the vote, you are never going to be able to truly limit the government, anymore than you can convince a girl swooning over her bad boy lover that her man should go to jail for shooting up a bank. They simply arent wired for it.

  4. While the right always finds problems with what the left does and the agenda and laws cranked out, they never undo any of the damage done under a leftist administration.
    They may lighten it up a bit, sometimes, but they damage is allowed to stand.
    The nation is the loser.

  5. Anonymous14/11/12

    Daniel, stop wasting your time writing these great pieces and please set up a political consulting/speechwriting firm. The dumb-brained Republicans like Boehner that want to capitulate to Obama need you!

  6. @Mike Darancette
    The 'Boomers' did their bit in the 70s. Most are in their 60s and older now. As one gets older there is less ability to fight.

    Why don't the younger generations stand up now?
    Passivity and apathy seem to be the way of the under 50 crowd.

  7. You need to listen to Christian radio more. Without a doubt there was and continues to be a very strong anti Mormon current on the evangelical right. On some radio shows I've heard it referred to as a quote Satanic Cult unquote.

  8. Lemon, true

    Anonymous, to open a consulting firm, you need to talk a lot about social media engagement and how to win the Latino vote

  9. In boxing, the one that wins is the one that can make their opponent play into their game plan. Republicans have been playing the Democrats game plan, and because of this, losing miserably. The Democrats will push their Socialist agendas, because now they believe they have a mandate to do so. And the Republicans in the House and Senate will attempt to stop them, playing right into the Democrats hands. So when a bill proposed by the Left goes down in flames, the Democrats (both elected officials and media pundits) will claim, 'this was the one that would have fixed the economy if it wasn't for the Obstructionist Republican TEA Partiers!' And so then many people who don't realize that the NY Times, ABS, NBC, CBS are not the only media sources out there will believe that Republicans voted down a "Jobs Bill" even if the "Jobs Bill" had nothing to do with "Jobs" and everything to do with raising taxes. This is exactly how Obama was reelected and the Democrats retained the Senate.

    To use another boxing axiom, Republicans need to stop walking into the Demobrats range, stop playing into their game plan, and make the Demobrats chase them. If a bill is proposed that will raise taxes, all Republicans either vote present, or stay home. IF a bill comes up that weakens the Constitution, then and only then should they oppose. Because as long as the Constitution is intact, all the damage the Demobrats cause can and will be reversed. If they implement their own game plan, this will expose the Demobrats wholes for all to see. WHEN the higher taxes cause further economic problems, and the Republicans can't be blamed for obstructing, Liberalism and Progressivism will be exposed for the hoax that it is.

    Have faith people. Conservatism works every time it is applied.

  10. @Lemon Lime- "Why don't the younger generations stand up now?"

    We are, but as Daniel hit upon, there are a lot less of us than there are baby boomers so we never get the attention we would need to make an impact. Older generations always have recieved more attention because they require more assistance. A 60 something year old doesn't appreciate changes in Social Security and Medicare. Look at the Ryan plan, he had to put in a caviate that "No one under 50 will see any changes." Yet as we all know, it is all those people under 50 that are footing the bill for it.

    The hard truth of the matter is that Social Security is nothing more than an award for people who achieved the goal of reaching their 65th birthday. Congrats, here's your grandkid's money!

  11. Anonymous14/11/12

    Dan,stop knocking your self out with this political stuff & turn to the economic issues.
    The radical left are basically nihilistic;they hate whatever authority is in power at the time & seek to destroy that authority.They are very sick people consumed with hate & bile.The radical people in Obama's gov't are economically clueless,they can destroy but they can't build anything.Their programs,once they are in power,are unworkable.
    One great wit said that "the Golden Rule is he who has the gold rules".The radicals now in power cannot run a functioning society without the capitalists who they seek to destroy.They will choke off business activity with their insane policies & will push society into an economic nosedive.The dangers from these policies will destroy them along with the rest of America.As of now big business & investors are hoarding 4 trillion dollars of cash that the fear to invest.businesses of all kind are shrinking or closing.what will happen will not be a replay of Germany or Russia uder Hitler or Lenin.It will more like the Spanish Republic being torn apart by insane factions inside of the government or perhaps Chile under the rule of Salvador Allende.Democracy & freedom are very important but lose their meaning in an impoverished,starving society.The present regime in Washington cannot survive because the military hates it.When push comes to shove the only way they can stay in power is with armed repression.They cannot repress the country if they have no troops!


  12. Passer by14/11/12

    I always wondered if socialism could gain power in a society dominated by older people. The premise always was that the working class is the majority, so it deserves to rule - The Rule of the Proletariat. Yet at some point working people will be a minority. Then what?

  13. America has seen by it's own eyes that democracy is NOT ideal. In any discussion about which system works best for the people no one can beat the argumentation by well educated conservatives for a fiscally sound and moral society, yet it are the numbers that count, the great, bought off with mirrors and beads, educationally dumbed down, numbers that provided Obama with his victory Change the system back to that of ancient Greece, let only tax payers (or those of merit) vote and no present day type "social" democratic party shall ever rule again.

  14. Jimmy the Saint14/11/12

    "No game is unwinnable."

    As is the case with Three Card Monte, sometimes the only way to win is to not play. Once you put money on the table, you've already lost.

  15. Except that the 50+ Americans paid into the system already. It's their money to begin with.

  16. @ Adam Greenfield..
    No The younger generation is doing squat.
    Mostly they talk and whine.
    Small numbers is a lame excuse.
    In the 70's people protested whatever their numbers. They just got up and did it and the war came to an end because of the vocalization.
    And, as Keliata remarked, Boomers have paid their dues and paid into social security and medicare for decades.
    It is the liberal way to place blame on everyone else. People on the right are learning to do the very same thing now. Talk big and do nothing.

    You see nothing with young people today like what occurred in the Boomer generation.
    Like what they did, or hate what they did and stood for, they did something and they got heard.
    They made the nightly news and it mattered.
    They were passionate about their beliefs on both the left and the right.

  17. VA_Rancher15/11/12

    Lemon Lime Moon,

    Was not OWS on the nightly news mostly young idiots crapping on police cars an calling for anarchy on their iPhones?

    I would argue the youth of this country, their brains nicely washed in public school and liberal arts colleges jumped up and did exactly what their task masters wanted them to do eager for their FREE Gubmint Cheese...

    I've been a senior level guy for a while, have you ever interviewed these young college grads? OMG their non-existant work ethic, their inflated false "self esteem", their need to start at VP level, I could go on, and on, and on... The death of America is written on all the empty heads of the "recent graduates" of the last 10-15 years...

    The permanent Democratic/Socialist majority is pretty much aged 15 to 29 right now... They have become what they were taught to be.

    When you happily send your progeny off to the enemy camp for their education because you can't be bothered to "train up a child in way he should go..." you should not be surprised when they work for the enemy and VOTE for the enemy.

    America is toast without MASSIVE change.

    Been nice knowing y'all.

  18. VA_Rancher15/11/12

    I've had a bit of an epiphany just now...

    #1 - Doomsday or Armageddon, whatever name you choose is inevitable, the Bible says this is so.

    #2 - In reality what is happening here is not that different from what is happening across the globe. I've been saying for at least 5-10 years the Islamic Atomic bomb is already in France? As soon as the Islamic immigrant youth of France (or whatever NATO country) is of sufficient % and voting aged, France will fall (it is in their nature) and will become an Islamic nation. The nililistic natives with their negative birthrate simply cannot overcome the invasion of babies. Just as Dan titled this essay, it is simply a numbers game.

    About the time all the Islamo-Babies are ruling France, the OWS "I want Socialism" youth of America will have swelled into the ruling (drooling?) class and the burgoening Caliphate of France will roll over the other EuroTard countries either with conquest, or due to those countries OWN invasion of the Islamo-Babies.

    Europe will shockingly and suddenly fall and simply become the "Middle East, Northern Division" and there will be no-one to oppose them...

    Crap. This seriously sucks...

  19. DrTorch15/11/12

    A great essay. Excellent.

  20. lemonlime- Name the key issue that applys to large swaths of 20-40 year olds that we can all unite on? Remeber, many from my generation have been indoctrinated from Kindergarten to Grad school by baby boomers who in the 70's were loud vocal and a large segment of the population. Baby boomers are a generation who were raised in a 4-5 kid houshold where my generation is an average of 1.3 kids per family. We are divided between the brainwashed and the less traditionally educated. But we are absolutely active. Unfortunately mostly on the wrong side. Baby Boomers were not the most active in the OWS movement. Yes they are bad and wrong, but it is activity. We also however happen to be the most active in the TEA Party as well.

    Then again, maybe if I didn't work 60-70 hours a week in order to finance all the boomer's retirements, I could be more active politicaly.

  21. Adam, put on your big boy pants and stop whining before I send you to your room.

  22. Va_Rancher, yes I have interviewed them.
    Yes they have no skills.
    Some have heart, however and want to be trained and tutored and mentored. That is a saving grace I think.

    If children are trained at home they are harder to move from side to side when they are grown.
    "Train up a child etc..."
    But how you teach is most important and example is everything.

  23. "We also however happen to be the most active in the TEA Party as well."

    That is good to hear.

  24. Many of the OWS crowd feel that Obama has turned his back on them and the working class.

    They feel betrayed by him. It's understandable since many of the abuses of police power have come on Obama's watch. While they're not considered part of the Republican base some of them can be swayed.

    Republicans were ridiculed for hanging on to the guns and bibles. Twenty-somethings are being subjected to heavy-handed police tactics and are being put on watch lists for protesting, the constitutional rights to freedom of assembly and speech.

    The Right and the Left have things in common.

  25. Mark Steyn summarized these points quite nicely a few years ago:
