Posted on 01/03/2002 7:56:52 AM PST by sinkspur
Pat Buchanan is aware that potential readers of his new book already either adore him or disdain everything he writes "because I am the one writing it."
So in The Death of the West: How Dying Populations and Immigrant Invasions Imperil Our Country and Civilization (Thomas Dunne Books/St. Martin's Press, $25.95), the ex-presidential candidate and conservative pundit is trying to back up his apocalyptic projections with facts and figures provided by such disparate sources as "Russian leader Mr. Putin, a British archbishop and the United Nations. By drawing on what anyone would have to consider neutral sources, this makes my message far more powerful."
The gist of The Death of the West's messages:
Low birthrates are decimating the population of almost every European country - by 2050, only one-tenth of the world's population (America included) will be of European descent.
The unchecked influx of immigrants into America, legal and otherwise, is gradually handing the nation over to insurgents who come to force their foreign values on us rather than accepting ours.
Political correctness on the part of unwitting Americans plays into the hands of those who intend to obliterate our culture.
The events of Sept. 11 may provide enough of a wake-up call, Buchanan says, to make "the death of the West" only a threat rather than a certainty.
"The book is about a point I've been making for a long time, that the West is dying," Buchanan says during a lengthy phone conversation. "If we don't change how we do things, we'll be gone by the middle of this century, if not before. The horror of Sept. 11, I think, awoke a lot of Americans to new realities. It's a healthy thing to remember there are people out there who want to destroy us."
In Buchanan's opinion, it took terrorist attacks on New York City and the Washington, D.C., area to drive that message home to an American public more intent on hedonism than heroism.
"The '90s were a time of prosperity I've likened to the 1920s," Buchanan says. "The '20s were about money, drinking, jazz. The '90s were money, drugs, rock. The '20s ended with the stock market crash, the Depression, then on to Hitler, Tojo, Stalin. The 1990s ended on Sept. 11. We're at the kind of place Walter Lippmann called 'a plastic moment,' a time when people can change their destiny. I hope this book helps that. I'm not so much predicting these awful things will happen as saying, 'This is what the end is if the numbers remain the same.' "
Not that he holds much hope: "To many American young people, people like me belong to a bad old era. They've been taught that in school, indoctrinated in it. They want to say goodbye to the way our generation did things. This is why I don't think much will be done about the problems we face."
Buchanan acknowledges he's saying things that most Americans would prefer not to hear and that many condemn as racist and inflammatory.
"My response is that it's too late in the day for political correctness," he says. "After Sept. 11, with those acts perpetrated by people we literally welcomed into this country, Americans ought to be aware there is such a thing as too much diversity, too much welcoming. Look: I've said that if you bring 100 Zulu tribesmen into Virginia and 1 million British, the British would be assimilated more comfortably. I base that on those British coming into an American culture based on English law and tradition. And when I said that, something that seems like a simple statement, I've been accused of racism."
Now, Buchanan says, "I could substitute Iranians or Saudis for the Zulu, and people might understand." And, he adds, originally citing the Zulus was in no way racist "because I'm friends with the Zulu ruler. It's just a matter of acknowledging the differences in culture."
Potential immigrants should be judged by one measure, Buchanan adds: "Are they likely to carry on our culture, which makes America a unique country and civilization? Or are they not?"
Population explosions in Islamic, African and Latin American nations are coinciding with a decline in the U.S. birthrate, Buchanan notes, citing U.N. studies. To bolster "American cultural" numbers, Buchanan concludes in The Death of the West, American women should be encouraged via tax breaks to increase the country's population: "A free society cannot force women to have children, but a healthy society can reward those who preserve it by doing so."
Though he doesn't broach the subject in The Death of the West, in conversation Buchanan is willing to also discuss his own future.
"Politically speaking, I ran two times for the Republican nomination," he says. "We came close in '96, and we'd have gotten it instead of [Bob] Dole with one more primary win. In 2000, we tried to create a new party. It didn't work. So my political career is probably over."
But Buchanan has no intention of abandoning public debate.
"I've done my best to say the things I thought necessary, and I intend to keep writing books and to keep speaking out," he says. "I love doing it. I hope the Lord gives me 25 more years. If people don't like me or my message, well, that's not my concern. Political correctness is almost an impenetrable shield of basic realities."
For education and discussion purposes only.
Great post as usual DoughtyOne. I must say I was surprised with what you said is going on in the medical field with taxpayer financed healthcare for obvious non-citizens. I didn't know it was that bad. Oh well, it is just another outrage among many.
My grandparents raised me to respect every human based on their own actions, not the color of their skin. The last topic I wish to discuss is the topic of culture. But as citizens who care about our nation and it's vanishing culture, we must stand up and be counted.
I support the validity of nearly all cultures. Some are obviously not worth supporting, but they are few and far between. Most should be supported. Our's certainly has every right to survive. Even that seems to be questioned these days.
I appreciate you addressing this tough topic. I'm sure you don't like feeling like you need to, any more than I do.
About five years ago I saw a spot on a lady from France that had come to the United States because she had a bad kidney. Once here she presented herself to a hospital in the United States. If I remember correctly, this happened in Chicago. There she presented herself to an emergency room with severe pain. The upshot was that as a visitor from a foreign nation, she was bumped to the front of the line. She got here replacement kidney while citizens waited. All costs were paid by the government. I believe it was a kidney. I can tell you it is a true story.
My mother was very high up in the Los Angeles county heathcare system nursing structure. She related to us that in 1990 over 90% of all LA County owned hospital births, were to those of illegal alien parents. That amounted to more than 90,000 births.
Once those children are born, they are US citizens. If the parents are poor, the child qualifies for support. The more kids, the more support a family can obtain. I have been told that illegals can no longer get these funds for support of the kids. I have a hard time believing it. I do know at one time they could get the births for free. They could get AFDC payments for support of the children. Once that was arranged they could get housing subsidies. Of course the support for the kids continued until they were eighteen.
I know that the yearly budget for the LAUSD was $9 billion dollars a few years ago. I also know that one third of the students in the LAUSD are the children of illegal immigrants.
You do the math. Hospitals in California almost went broke trying to cover the costs of giving away services for free. Try doing that with your business. I don't care what field you are in, imagine giving away services for free to any illegal that presents themselves to your doors.
How does it make you feel to know that your tax dollars go to pay for this?
Have you ever lisented to (7.415) on Fri. evenings (10PM, EST)?
My first few years teaching here in Taiwan, I often asked my classes their favorite style of cooking. Invariably the answer was "Chinese!" I mean 99% of the answers, in class after class! Having come from the free-thinking, other-culture imbued US, I was always shocked by the answer, the self-preoccupation, implied egotism and closed thinking of it all. But this is just typical of their cultural heritage. As you have noted, no one in the media would even comment on it. It is only mentioned in relation to preserving the American heritage.
While in Punjab, India a few years back, I got to know a fellow from L.A. He had lived there for 17 years, working and raising a family, but he couldn't speak any English! I asked him how this could be. He said English was unnecessary in LA! The schools, radio, TV, newspapers, neighbors, all were in Spanish! BTW this guy had been living there illegally all those years and upon returning to the States, was deported back to San Salvador. The guy had guts, though. He went to India on a spiritual quest and knowing full well he was giving up his life in the US, but he went anyway.
Had a good friend in CA who was a legal immigrant from Punjab, honest, hard-working. When his sons attended school the district put them in a Punjabi language educational environment. After a year or two, my friend found their English was not improving. He wanted to pull them from the program and the school district said impossible. He personally went down to the school and physically removed them from the class to mainstream them. Their English improved dramatically and right quick! A few years and like native speakers.
I agree we have a precious heritage in the American experience. Part of that experience includes some basics like our language, English. Another would be a good foudation in our literature especially the thinking in our founding fathers and the framers of the constitution.
However, I wouldn't mention color too often. My wife is Taiwanese, although my children were birthed by an anglo, who died of breast cancer. I can appreciate the arguments you make and in all fairness, the media and whiners can't have it both ways. If it is alright for the Japanese, Chinese, Blacks, American Indians, etc., to preserve their culture, so be it for the despised of all wretched creatures, the white, middle-class, male American.
But the courage I've seen exhibited by my Indian friend would put him in line with the better Americans of our great experiment. And some Sikhs I've known in the Punjab would make better conservatives in the US than some I've seen in CA or some authors from Boston of 1976!
Finally, I believe we are ultimately spirit, or soul, but that is just an intellectual notion , till I can prove it, one way or another. Until then, it is still "like attracts like", a mundane, natural, human phenomenon.
Should people of blood type AB or people who are insensitive to quinine be expected to desire to exist? I'm not saying I'm eagarly awaiting anyone's demise - but why is race (a largely trivial genetic quantity) somehow more eager to perpetuate itself than say blood type or male-pattern baldness?
What's even more entertaining, the more about it, is that the "culture" they're defending wasn't even largely created by them.
Pat bemoans that, among other, people of African descent won't respect "our" culture - despite the fact that African-Americans have been heavily influential in virtually every form of popular music that's been created in America. Pat I guess fears that immigrants won't eat American foods like hamburgers, frankfurters and pizza.
Yes. But immigration of Christians [both Catholic and Charasmatic] from Mexico and Central America would NOT threaten Western civilization, correct?
Personally, I would rather have a practicing Catholic family from Mexico live next door to me in America than a white, non-Christian European family from a 'Christian' nation like Bosnia.
[Sorry for the belated response. I just returned today from vacation.]
Yes.
Good. You just agreed with half of Pat's points. His book is just as much about Europe as it is about America, and in Europe, the vast majority of immigrants are Moslem or pagan. So at least as far as Europe is concerned, you agree that immigration threatens Western civilization.
You would also have to agree then that immigration of Buddists and Shintoists from the Far East, Hindus from South Asia, as well as Mohammedans from places like Pakistan and Egypt, threatens Western civilization in the US. The non-Christian element of US immigration is the one growing the fastest.
You also have to consider the fact that a high percentage of Latin Americans who come to the US leave the Church.
But immigration of Christians [both Catholic and Charasmatic] from Mexico and Central America would NOT threaten Western civilization, correct?
Only if you believe that religion is all there is to Western Civilization. Are you so sure there is nothing more to it? Think about this question, and then we'll discuss why immigration from Latin America to the US threatens Western Civilization.
Personally, I would rather have a practicing Catholic family from Mexico live next door to me in America than a white, non-Christian European family from a 'Christian' nation like Bosnia.
Bosnian Serbs and Croats actually are quite devote on the whole.
If you were to replace Bosnia with France, I would agree with your sentiment. Western Europe is becoming an atheist land, which is why I would oppose immigration from there just as much, perhaps more, than immigration from Latin America.
what i find interesting is that most stay at home moms are not white, the white women cant afford to stay home, and since they are working they dont get any tax breaks.
"most folks" meaning white folks. non-whites NEVER stop at just two children, why not? the government will support them. it is a money thing whether people admit it or not. i am a college educated, employed, tax paying white woman, i have a decent career and i am considered "middle class" (a class that is on a downward spiral) and i cannot afford to even have one child right now. yet, when i go into the factory assembly line at work, i see pregnant immigrants all over the place--usually on their 3rd or 4th child. most of these women arent even 30 yet. is it fair?
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.