Free Republic

I regret the downfall of the soi-disant Ginger Growler. As corrupt and talentless as she was, the Deputy Prime Minister was, in a certain sense, real - in a way that Sir Keir never can be, except perhaps to favoured Ukrainian rent-boys. And her boast that she threw Boris Johnson off his stroke at Prime Minister's Questions by "flashing me ginger growler" was, by the standards of the age, a harmless jest that added to the gaiety of the nation. However, politicians only matter if politics matters. And the consistent message from the courts, the cops, the press and the...

In 2025, Germany faces a demographic and economic paradox: more and more citizens—especially young, qualified ones—are leaving the country, while the government and much of the economic establishment insist on the need to attract up to 400,000 net immigrants per year to sustain the labor market. The trend is not new, but it is alarming. Between January and April alone, 93,000 Germans left their country for destinations abroad. If the pace continues, the year could end with a historic record for emigration, surpassing the 296,986 cases of 2024. And contrary to the stereotype of the retiree heading for warmer climates,...

The writing has been on the wall for a long time: South Korea’s birth rate has dropped throughout much of the past decade, spelling trouble for the military as regional threats and global conflicts simmer. Now, a new report has found that the number of South Korean troops declined by 20% in the past six years, in large part because of the dwindling pool of young men – reflecting the shrinking workforce and swelling elderly population in one of the world’s most rapidly aging countries. The Defense Ministry report attributed the drop to “complex factors” including population decline and fewer...

Like most red-blooded American boys, from the beginning of middle school on, I was very interested in girls. Indeed, I spent pretty much the entirety of my teenage years trying to figure out how to get girls. I never did find a formula, but I was forever looking. For the most part, my days were filled with sports of every type, from scuba diving to motocross to baseball, football, golf, karate, the gym, etc. But the entire time, all of that, and school, was set against a mental backdrop of how to get girls, how to get a date…and, umm…more....

Not only is the U.S. failing to create enough new Americans through birth — it is also failing to turn immigrants into Americans in any meaningful sense.“First world nations are dying,” Pat Buchanan warned in his 2002 book The Death of the West.“They face a mortal crisis, not because of something happening in the Third World, but because of what is not happening at home and in the homes of the First World.”And what was not — and still is not — happening at home is childbearing. Buchanan was referring to fertility rates, which have been on the decline for...

The number of births in America in 2024 increased from 2023, but the fertility rate declined, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said on July 24.Births rose 1 percent from 2023 to 2024, the CDC said in a brief. The number of births in 2024 was 3.62 million.That’s down from 3.9 million in 2010 and 16 percent lower than the peak of 4.3 million in 2007. It’s about the same as most recent years, although just 3.59 million were logged in 2023.The fertility rate among females aged 15 to 44, on the other hand, declined by 1 percent in...

New York Times columnist Thomas B. Edsall broke down why he believes the Democratic Party has suffered significant losses among men — across nearly all demographic groups — in the lead up to, and following, the 2024 presidential election in an essay published on Tuesday. Edsall argued that Democrats have failed to recognize and deal with the costs of the "revolutionary change" in the societal order they have championed since the mid-1960s, which he believes has given Republicans the upper hand among men on issues based on "race, religion and sexual identity." "The Democratic Party lost ground in the 2024...

After the wide-scale apoplexy induced by reports of overpopulation, an ice age, global warming, and then climate change, the apocalypse of the season may be shifting to low birth rates and population loss. In recent months, authorities no less diverse and august than Pantsuited Demographer Hillary Clinton and Hillbilly Procreationist J.D. Vance have weighed in with their preferred remedies. I regret to report that no one has suggested any politically and culturally acceptable solutions, so it is time to grin and bear it. Mr. Vance, a seemingly dedicated Europhobe, proposes an oddly Continental menu of transfer payments to parents to...

Whether they’re doing it on purpose or out of just plain ineptitude, Illinois’ political leaders have been slowly destroying this state. More recently, they’ve moved into overdrive.What we’re talking about is all the wealth the state is giving up by pushing out wealthier taxpayers and inviting less wealthy people in. Not to mention the flood of illegal immigrants that have been “welcomed” to Illinois, many fully dependent on the state.Not only is Illinois a net loser of people to other states, but the people leaving Illinois make far more than the people coming into Illinois, making things even worse.The taxpayers...

A new Pew Research Center report shows that although Christianity continues to be the world’s largest religious group, its share of the rising global population has fallen over the last decade, mainly due to people walking away from the faith. The report, based on an analysis of 2,700 censuses and surveys, shows that the global population of Christians grew by 121.6 million people from 2010 to 2020, reaching some 2.3 billion people. As a share of the global population, estimated to be about 7.8 billion in 2020, Christians fell by 1.8 percentage points to 28.8%. The global population of Muslims,...

A new survey by the UN Population Fund shows that the most common reasons people name for not having more children are financial in nature.As Statista's Katharina Buchholz reports, among 14 countries surveyed, respondents named financial limitations or job instability as the most common reasons to have fewer children than they desired in all. Commonly, financial reasons, also including housing and childcare costs, made up the top 2 or even top 3 of the issues most often cited for lower fertility, for example in India, Indonesia, South Korea, South Africa, Brazil, Morocco, Hungary and Germany.You will find more infographics at...

As a Blue state teacher, I'm beginning to see a scary revelation Policy & Politics The fact of the matter is that liberals have fewer kids compared to conservatives. Enrollment is down and the birth rate cratered during the Great Recession. Lots of school districts, especially urban ones, are laying off teachers due to budget and declining enrollment. For those teachers who are still early in their careers and are used to being supported by a Union and receiving better pay and benefits, they may have to move in order to continue in this profession. They may have to move...

A federal court ruled in favor of religious and other broadcasters on Monday against a Biden administration rule that would have required them to annually report employees’ genders and ethnicities. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit vacated a Federal Communications Commission (FCC) “workforce diversity” rule from 2024 in response to lawsuits from the National Religious Broadcasters and other groups that argued the regulation violated constitutional rights. Trump-appointed FCC Chairman Brendan Carr celebrated the ruling as he continues his broader push to end left-wing policies at an agency with significant control over America’s airwaves. “The FCC’s 2024 decision...

[Catholic Caucus] Pope says Church must ‘confront forms of paganism’ in secularismIn his meeting with his brother Jesuits in Belgium, Pope Francis call secularization a “complex phenomenon” and noted sometimes the Church must “confront forms of paganism.”Speaking to 150 Jesuits in Brussels on Sep. 28, the pontiff answered a question from a member living in Amsterdam, one of the most secularized cities in the world.In his reply, Francis noted he didn’t mean a paganism like the one in the ancient world.“We do not need a statue of a pagan god to talk about paganism: The very environment, the air we...

After years of ominous headlines about the world's shrinking birth rates, there's a bright spot. The US birth rate increased slightly in 2024, according to preliminary data from the CDC. The 1% rise in births was largely driven by moms in their early 40s, who gave birth to 2% more children in 2024 than in 2023. Moms in their 30s and late 20s also experienced slight increases in births. Brady Hamilton, the lead author of the report, told Business Insider that the stats are a continuation of the trends of the last three decades. Women in their late 20s to...

Ezra Klein suggested that Democratic assumptions about youth support have proven 'completely false' amid President Donald Trump's return to power New York Times columnist Ezra Klein spoke with a Democratic pollster Tuesday about how the dream of an ascendant Democratic majority is imploding as younger voters, especially White men, flee the party. Klein interviewed David Shor, the head of data science at Blue Rose Research, a Democratic polling firm, for his podcast in an episode titled "Democrats Need to Face Why Trump Won." When Klein and Shor reviewed numerous charts, including one headlined, "2024 Democratic Support by Age – Split...

THIS IS A TRANSLATION: Ukraine will need to import over 8 million migrants from developing countries to a looming “demographic crisis” a employment leading sector specialized has been said. Vasily Voskoboinik, president of the All-Ukrainian Association of Companies for International Employment, past year, told the country’s state television on there will be an urgent need for migration from countries such as Bangladesh, Nepal, India, North Africa and Central Asia. He said: “According to estimates by the International Organization for Migration and the International Labour Organization, in will need 8.2 million workers. This is a huge problem facing our country. “We...

It is often said that the future belongs to those who show up. And the most relevant way of showing up, is having children.Anecdotally, it has been obvious for a long time that conservatives are more likely to have children than liberals, and apt to have more children. But the data are clear, and getting clearer:Brad Wilcox@BradWilcoxIFS ·FollowThe "relationship between voting Republican and having more babies is growing stronger over time." Given that Ds respond to R presidential elections by having fewer babies, this relationship could grow even stronger in the next 4 years...I think it is totally rational for...

A tough choice between Muslim Europe and Muslim Russia. Daniel Greenfield, a Shillman Journalism Fellow at the Freedom Center, is an investigative journalist and writer focusing on the radical Left and Islamic terrorism. Russia, with a birth rate of 1.5 children per woman, has invaded Ukraine, where the birth rate is 1.2 children per woman, to determine which nation with below replacement birth rates will go extinct the fastest. In the long run the only winners of the war to determine whether Ukraine will belong to the 1.2 or 1.5 people will be the Chechen and other Muslim soldiers doing...

One of our current cultural mantras is “you do you” - putting your personal desires over the greater good of others and society. In other words, living selfishly instead of selflessly.The manifestation of such a philosophy and its implications for our society is particularly acute when it comes to the institutions of marriage and family.As the late James Q. Wilson, former professor of government at Harvard University, wrote in his book, “The Marriage Problem”: “It is not money, but the family that is the foundation of public life. As it has become weaker, every structure built upon that foundation has...