Demographic Difficulties

Many elderly citizens in my small western Maine town of Lovell were summer people from Massachusetts, Connecticut, and Rhode Island who always planned to live here full time after retirement. I expect that’s true in other towns in a state where “Vacationland” is stamped on our license plates. I’m semi-retired myself and part of my income, aside from my teacher’s pension and Social Security, is from managing vacation properties here. It dovetailed nicely with teaching and I kept doing it after retiring in 2011. The small contractors I use for plumbing, excavation, carpentry, etc. tell me often how hard it is to find help — especially competent help.

Maine is the oldest state in the country, demographically speaking. According to a recent Boston Globe article: “Maine is one of only two states, along with West Virginia, where deaths now outnumber births,” and “many young people move away in search of opportunity,” further exacerbating the problem. Counties in northern Maine see declining populations while York and Cumberland counties in southern Maine are increasing by three and six percent respectively. Median age is 44 statewide. There are more people over 65 than under 18. The over 65 demographic is predicted to rise 37% by 2016 while all other age groups decline, according to the Globe.

Maine people are having fewer children and New England, according to a New York Times article, is “the least fertile region in the U.S." Without immigration, which is at record levels, regional population would very likely be declining. People I meet in the Portland area who are in their twenties and thirties are more likely to have dogs with them than children and I’ve written about that several times over the past fifteen years. Nationwide, according to lifescience.com, “there were about 60 births per 1,000 women ages 15 to 44 [in 2017], which is 3 percent lower than the rate in 2016, and the lowest recorded rate since the government started tracking birth rates in 1909.”

Why don’t 21st-century Americans want to have children? When I looked into the problem for previous articles, opinions varied. Some young people said openly that it was selfishness — that children are expensive and require a lot of work for a long time. Some women said they wanted to avoid stretch marks and saggy breasts. Some had parents who divorced and didn’t want any of their children to go through that painful experience. Some said the earth’s environment couldn’t handle too many more people and they wanted to reduce their carbon footprint.

Catholic pundits suggest it’s a lack of hope. Young celebrities like the 29-year-old Congresswoman Alexandria Occasio Cortez (D-NY) declared recently that the world will end in twelve years if we don’t take drastic steps like passing a “Green New Deal.” That certainly lends credence to the no-hope theory for her demographic. The Catholic Church taught (I don’t know if it still does) that despair is a sin, and that suicide — the ultimate despair — is too. AOC recommends that her cohort forego having children and eating meat as well because of the methane cows expel from their rear-ends. She wants us all to be childless vegetarians.

The Catholic Church’s influence with young people has seriously declined in America and in the entire western world. The liberal Pope Francis has made several public statements against abortion, but I don’t believe he’s said anything about artificial contraception. That too was declared sinful by his predecessor, Pope Paul VI in his 1968 encyclical: Humanae Vitae. Never have I heard a sermon on that teaching in any Catholic Church I’ve attended, it being politely ignored since its issue fifty years ago. Pope Francis has spoken out about climate change, about which he’s a fellow traveler with the Democrat Party, but nothing about the “carbon footprint” of more children — not yet at least.

The unemployment rate is so low now that we’re essentially at full employment all across America. There are more jobs than people who want them. Although you may not believe it if you look out the window here in western Maine, summer is right around the corner. Building contractors, landscapers, restaurants, resorts, and many other businesses will be desperate for workers and we’re simply not producing them. Savvy business people are recruiting in eastern Europe and elsewhere for seasonal employees. Fewer high school or college kids want to work the way they did decades ago.

What are we to do? Some European countries offer financial incentives for women to produce more children. Maybe we can do that here too but it won’t be enough. Our culture has changed from one that encouraged couples to have children to one that discourages them. For that trend to reverse will take a very long time.

Left and Right February 12, 2019

Gino starts talking about a dead goose that he loved, which had been hit by a car in Jackson, NH. He wrote a letter to the editor about his grieving and got lots of feedback. We go next to the battle for Trump wall funding. Do we think he will declare a state of emergency? I say yes. Gino doesn't declare exactly what Trump may do. We go on to European immigration by Muslims and how politically destabilizing it is. George Soros is concerned that conservative backlash moving European nations rightward -- because of immigration which he has financed, both here in the USA and in Europe. He is worried the EU may disintegrate and wrote an op-ed about it. I describe the expansion of no-go zones in Europe where Muslims let no one in, where they have their own police and courts. Demographers forecast the trend to accelerate because Muslims have five or six times as many children as native Europeans -- and they're harassing Jews. Muslim Democrats elected to US Congress recently are increasingly anti-Semitic as well. I introduce Alexandria Occasio Cortez's proposed "Green New Deal" and read specific items from her FAQ released last Friday. It was endorsed by five announced Democrat presidential candidates and it's painful to read. After reading four or five specific items in the proposal, Gino acknowledges it's crazy and it will never happen. Then he actually blames the right for it. Why? He offers no evidence. We travel over a lot of territory. As I make points Gino doesn't like, he quickly introduces red herrings. He changes the subject so as not to respond to my arguments -- especially about the newly-elected, radical-leftist, Democrat members of Congress and takes things in a different direction. I go along, struggling to keep my tone moderate, and countering with facts. Ultimately, he plays the racist card again, and again with no evidence, because I criticize statements from newly-elected Muslim, Democrat members of Congress.

Left & Right January 2, 2019

Newspaper publisher Mark Guerringue again sits in the left chair and we begin with Trump's wall. The producer asks us if the wall is built without funding from Mexico, will it hurt Trump's reelection chances in 2020. I say no. If he gets a wall at all, or part of one, it would be good for him. If he loses this standoff with the Dems and doesn't get funding for his wall, that will hurt him badly.

Mark agrees and cites Bush 41's "No New Taxes" pledge as a comparison. Should Trump not get his wall, he could be in trouble for reelection.

We go to Mitt Romney's op-ed in the Washington Post critical of Trump's character. I contend that if Romney's move portends decay of Trump's Republican support in the Senate, that could spur the new Democrat House to begin impeachment proceedings because the likelihood of finding Trump guilty in the Senate might increase.

Again, Mark agrees. He thinks Trump a terrible person and Republicans who support him sell their souls. He says Democrats will be forced to impeach. I contend that Democrats are driving the impeachment investigations, not being forced by circumstances.

Mark cites former Trump Attorney Cohen's testimony about payoffs to women with whom Trump had affairs as impeachable offenses. I disagree, citing Alan Dershowitz and suggesting that Trump's base knows what he's like and supports him anyway because he gets things done. Mark interrupts, suggesting that no one should be supportive of Trump because he's a terrible person and I should be more critical of him.

I contend the Meuller Investigation exists to divert attention from Obama officials spying and interfering in the 2016 election against Trump and Trump's base sees it that way -- that cooperation between mainstream media and Democrats drives Meuller's efforts. Mark calls that another conspiracy theory. I point out that no evidence of collusion between Trump and Russia has come out because there isn't any. Mark says we don't know because there's an investigation going on and we have to wait for results -- and to talk about it is pointless.

Mark cites the Trump Tower meeting, but gets riled and interrupts when I try to comment on the meeting that he brought up. Things get contentious and Mark asks to change the subject.

Mark brings up global warming and a NASA report citing that 97% of climate scientists say human activity is mostly responsible for global warming. I dispute that claim and remind Mark that we have had many heated discussions about this in another forum. I had previously cited thousands of other scientists who refute the 97% "consensus." He derides those scientists as funded by petroleum interests and therefore not reliable.

Again he gets riled up that I still don't agree with his global warming claims and interrupts me when I offer conflicting evidence. It goes on that way for several minutes until nearly the end of the show.