Dear Republicans: You Have Already Been Replaced

Why are Republicans suckers for every half-witted conspiracy theory ever concocted? Consider the latest obsession of Tucker Carlson, poster boy for mediocre white dudes, the so-called Great Replacement theory. It holds that Democrats want to replace white Americans with immigrants, apparently so they can win elections.

To start with, this is just recycled Hitler, who claimed it was the already-in-place Jewish population of Germany, acting as part of the Great International Jewish Conspiracy, that was going to replace the country’s Aryan population. So right from jump you’re working with the fruit of a poisoned tree.

It bears mentioning that the entire Republican obsession with white America’s low birth rate is recycled Naziism. Hitler was against abortion, just like Republicans, and for the same reason. It’s not just Carlson, either — I saw a column by Ross Douthat (talk about a guy who deserves the nickname Monsignor) a couple of weeks ago on ways to deal with America’s declining birth rate. Apparently any option, including anti-abortion forced-birth laws, is preferable to increased immigration.

Second, anyone capable of doing the most basic research should be aware that the metric that correlates most closely with declining birth rates is higher income levels. As noted in the linked article:

Women tend to give birth to no fewer than three children in countries where GDP per capita is below $1,000 per year. In countries where GDP per capita is above $10,000 per year, women tend to give birth to no more than two children.

The same holds true of income levels within countries. So, to answer Monsignor Douthat’s question, the most effective way to increase the white birth rate would be to decrease white income — or, alternatively, you could raise the income of Blacks and immigrants so they wouldn’t have so many kids, but that would require something Republicans truly loathe, spending money.

So if you consider this a problem, what are the possible solutions? Well, there’s the rub — there aren’t any, at least none that don’t involve social engineering on a scale Republicans pretend to disdain. In truth they have no qualms about restricting the freedom of others, hence their half-century-old attempt to put the birth-control genie back in the bottle, not realizing it’s not a genie, it’s toothpaste, and it’s not a bottle, it’s a tube.

If you can’t force white people to have more children, and you don’t want more brown people, restricting the population of the country to those already living here and their (declining number of) offspring looks like a plan — an ironic one. Considering that it’s a movement obsessed with money, you’d think conservatives might someday learn the simplest lesson in economics — a larger population means more economic activity. But that would, of course, require learning, and is therefore anathema to people devoted to justifying their emotions and their ignorance.

This might be why Republicans are perpetually pissed off — they want mutually exclusive things. You want a strong economy in a country with a declining birth rate? Bring in more immigrants. But alas, they hate immigrants — after all, they speak strange languages, and most Republicans are certain they’re doing it so they can mock fat-ass Republicans. So that’s out.

Why are they so convinced they will be replaced? Because they know, deep down, that they’re very easily replaced — that’s why businesses bring in all those immigrants in the first place. The corporations Republican voters have empowered for decades are the ones who decided that white people just aren’t worth the bother.

That’s why jobs have gone overseas, and it’s why companies like meat processors import workers for the jobs they can’t export. You have already been replaced, and by the very people you foolishly thought were looking out for you.

Congratulations, Republicans. You are the people who can be fooled all of the time.