In 1977, John Holdren, Assistant to the President for Science and Technology, co-authored the 1,000 page book “Ecoscience” with Paul and Anne Ehrlich. One section, titled “Population Law,” cited the radical group Zero Population Growth and said “it has been concluded that compulsory population-control laws, even including laws requiring compulsory abortion, could be sustained under the existing Constitution if the population crisis became sufficiently severe to endanger the society.”
“Few today consider the situation in the United States serious enough to justify compulsion, however.”
I ask, who’s Constitution are you reading Dr Holdren? The idea that there could be a time when such measures could ever be considered is in my mind appalling. And this man has the President’s ear.
Rick Weiss, the Office of Science and Technology Policy’s Director of Strategic Communications, said the material at issue was from “a three-decade-old, three-author textbook used in colleges to teach energy policy.”
He could “easily dismiss” fears that Dr. Holdren favors government control over population growth. “He made that quite clear in his confirmation hearing,” Weiss said.
He then quoted a section of the confirmation transcript in which Sen. David Vitter (R-LA) asked Holdren whether he thinks “determining optimal population is a proper role of government.”
“No, Senator, I do not,” was Holdren’s reply, according to Weiss and a transcript of the proceedings.
In other remarks at the confirmation hearing, not cited by Weiss, Holdren told Sen. Vitter he no longer thinks it is “productive” to focus on the “optimum population” for the United States. “I don’t think any of us know what the right answer is.” However, not knowing the “optiomal population” does not dismiss the idea that Dr. Holdren does not believe that there is a need to control populations through government mandate.
The three authors summarize their guiding principle in a single sentence: “To provide a high quality of life for all, there must be fewer people.” Fewer people, is fewer people regardless of whether it is a predetermined “optimal” number. This reminds me of the kind of parsing exemplified by “depends on what the definition of is is.”
Politically expedient flip flopping on previously published views is not uncommon in todays world of politics. One has to now look to current administration policies to determine whether Dr Holdren was telling the truth about his “change of heart”. Actions always speak louder than words.
One of Obama’s first acts as President was to restore $50 million dollars to the UNFPA. “I look forward to working with Congress to restore U.S. financial support for the U.N. Population Fund,” Obama said in his executive order message in January
According to Weiss, Holdren “made clear that he did not believe in coercive means of population control” and is not an advocate for measures expressed in the book “and they are certainly not endorsed by this administration in any way.”
President Obama ignored the connection between the UNFPA and the Chinese forced-abortion program. A State Department investigation came after a ground breaking probe led by the Population Research Institute. Former Secretary of State Colin Powell said he had no doubt that the UNFPA was complicit in the population control program. “I determined that UNFPA’s support of, and involvement in, China’s population-planning activities allowed the Chinese government to implement more effectively its program of coercive abortion,”
“Our investigation remains valid,” Colin Mason, PRI’s Media Director said. “We put boots on the ground, and made the results available to anyone who wanted them. Those who would disregard our findings show an appalling lack of respect for human rights.
President Obama is no respecter of human rights as evidenced by his no vote on an Illinois bill that would require medical treatment for viable babies that are born during botched abortions.
Vitter asked Holdren to revisit his past statements about environmental catastrophes that have never come to pass and to clear up his 1986 prediction that global warming was going to kill about 1 billion people by 2020.
“You would still say,” Vitter asked, “that 1 billion people lost by 2020 is still a possibility?”
“It is a possibility, and one we should work energetically to avoid,” Holdren replied.
Okay, now I’m confused! If there is a desire “To provide a high quality of life for all, there must be fewer people.”, as Dr Holdren and his co-authors have previously stated, then why worry about a billion fewer people due to “global warming”, which we now know to be a hoax.
There seems to be a contradiction here, or is there? If the ultimate goal is really about creating a world government, the pieces begin to fit. The current crop of “liberal progressives” seek control, not just at the national level but at the global level and it seems that they will use any means possible to reinforce the idea that some single world governing body is necessary to address whatever perceived ill is being sold. If you can’t convince people to relinquish sovereignty with the threat of overpopulation, try to sell them through the “sky is falling” global warming scam.
Always with the end justifies the means goal of a single governing body with progressive elitists in charge.
In Dr. Holdren’s book one section is devoted to the idea of a “planetary regime” that might be given responsibility for “determining the optimum population for the world and for each region and for arbitrating various countries’ shares within their regional limits.” When I see the words “planetary regime” I can only come to one conclusion. A world government.
Now let’s fast forward from a textbook written 30 years ago to the 2009 United Nations Climate Change Conference to be held Dec 7-18 in Copenhagen.
Former Thatcher advisor Lord Monckton stated, “I read that treaty and what it says is this: that a world government is going to be created. The word ‘government’ actually appears as the first of three purposes of the new entity.
“The second purpose is the transfer of wealth from the countries of the West to Third World countries, in satisfaction of what is called, coyly, ‘climate debt’ – because we’ve been burning CO2 and they haven’t. We’ve been screwing up the climate and they haven’t. And the third purpose of this new entity, this government, is enforcement.”
It all fits. One world government with progressive elitists in control redistributing wealth on a global basis. Obama has stated that he considers himself a “citizen of the world” and he’s also said that you can know him by the people with whom he associates. Could this be the end game? Is this one world government part of Obama’s career path?
Wake up America… these are dangerous people. Very, very dangerous.
Director of Operation – Global Poker Federation
Served seven years in the US Army with one tour in SE Asia and a three year tour in Karlsruhe Germany.
Graduated from Utah Technical College with a degree in Business Management
Previously worked with Boeing as a Computer Applications Analyst / Industrial Engineer – Provided top level management within the Military and Missile Systems Division with performance metrics and analysis.
Absolutely. I have believed this since BO was campaigning, and your writing here only reinforces that. You know when it’s mentioned, tho’, the “tin foil hat” accusers come out. Someone tried to bring it up on “Brian and the Judge” the other day, and boy, was he gotten rid of quickly.
Hmm, this sounds like a classic case of Nazism. Mandated abortions are nothing more than a blunt upfront use of sterlizing a certain, “problem group” of a population by using a grey area in the debate what consists of life instead of wholesale slaughter of adult subjects as done by various Facist and Communist Governments of which is a disgusting monster of a subject. The more these people push such personal agendas, passed or not, the more the citizens of the United States will awaken one way or another. The age demograph of 15 to 32 will be the theater of which this philosophical war will take place the most as history lessons about World War II will be further censored from Middle School, High School and College levels across the nation.
I guess we really do repeat history, if so then will these lot be willing to be the new Xerxes?
On a side note to misfit Obama trying to take over the world with constitutionally nonexistent federal powers. please consider the following. Voters can actually take a giant step in restoring state sovereignty as early as the 2010 elections, IMO, if we plan carefully. Learning from the socialist motto, “never waste a good crisis,” Constitution-defending patriots need to do this. They need to make it clear to voters that they need to be rescued from a union thug who is unthinkingly exercising nonexistent federal powers from the Oval Office on behalf of special interest factions who are as clueless about the Constitution as he is.
More specifically, patriots need to get the word out to new and existing voters that we need to elect pro-state power lawmakers to both the state and federal legislatures for the midterm elections. Once in office, these pro-state power lawmakers can politically repeal the ill-conceived, anti-state sovereignty 16th and 17th Amendments, much like Constitution-ignoring DC Democrats are essentially repealing the rest of the Constitution at this time. Pro-state power lawmakers can do so by using their legislative votes to eliminate constitutionally unauthorized federal taxes, and likewise illegal federal government interference in people’s lives.
Finally, the following link should help give people an idea how state sovereignty-ignorant voters have shot themselves in the foot with big, corrupt federal government as a consequence of the ill-conceived, anti-state sovereignty 16th and 17th Amendments.
http://www.ronpaulforums.com/showthread.php?t=199792
@Conservababe
I do have a “tin foil” hat. It has a built in antenna that has an O’bullshit filter. Marginalization will be the order of the day for anyone that might bring light to the possibility of an agenda, but I’m old, cynical and thick skinned. Now where did I put that hat?
Another good opportunity to link to Fall of the Republic:
@Mike’s America
Wow… I watched the entire 2 1/2 hour video. There’s some really powerful material here.
Everyone should watch and then draw their own conclusions.
Don’t forget, Obambi sponsored the ‘Global Poverty Act”, in the tune of $750 billion dollars, before running for the presidency.
Rampant population growth threatens our economy and quality of life. I’m not talking about the obvious environmental and resource issues. I’m talking about the effect upon rising unemployment and poverty in America.
I should introduce myself. I am the author of a book titled “Five Short Blasts: A New Economic Theory Exposes The Fatal Flaw in Globalization and Its Consequences for America.” To make a long story short, my theory is that, as population density rises beyond some optimum level, per capita consumption of products begins to decline out of the need to conserve space. People who live in crowded conditions simply don’t have enough space to use and store many products. This declining per capita consumption, in the face of rising productivity (per capita output, which always rises), inevitably yields rising unemployment and poverty.
This theory has huge implications for U.S. policy toward population management. Our policies that encourage high rates of population growth are rooted in the belief of economists that population growth is a good thing, fueling economic growth. Through most of human history, the interests of the common good and business (corporations) were both well-served by continuing population growth. For the common good, we needed more workers to man our factories, producing the goods needed for a high standard of living. This population growth translated into sales volume growth for corporations. Both were happy.
But, once an optimum population density is breached, their interests diverge. It is in the best interest of the common good to stabilize the population, avoiding an erosion of our quality of life through high unemployment and poverty. However, it is still in the interest of corporations to fuel population growth because, even though per capita consumption goes into decline, total consumption still increases. We now find ourselves in the position of having corporations and economists influencing public policy in a direction that is not in the best interest of the common good.
The U.N. ranks the U.S. with eight third world countries – India, Pakistan, Nigeria, Democratic Republic of Congo, Bangladesh, Uganda, Ethiopia and China – as accounting for fully half of the world’s population growth by 2050.
If you’re interested in learning more about this important new economic theory, I invite you to visit either of my web sites at OpenWindowPublishingCo.com or PeteMurphy.wordpress.com where you can read the preface, join in my blog discussion and, of course, purchase the book if you like. (It’s also available at Amazon.com.)
Pete Murphy
Author, “Five Short Blasts”
I pulled the above comment by Pete Murphy out of the spam filter. For those that believe, as Pete apparently does, population control is key to mankind’s survival, I have to ask this burning question…
Just who gets to decide who gets to procreate, and who does not? Perhaps the exemplary example of this type of thought would be Hitler and his quest for the perfect Aryan “super” race.
And speaking of race and population control…. why is it the class warfare plays in virtually every issue, but is noticably absent in the population control debate?
Population growth has been declining overall, yet the population control crowd still continue their agenda. However where great imbalance of population explosion is happening, they refuse to tread.
So Pete… would you like to be the one to tell the Muslim faith they are no longer allowed to procreate, and immigrate to the western developed nations at their current levels? I’d like to be around to see that one….
And while you’re at it, perhaps you’d like to address the US population growth, as it relates to illegal immigration and not birthrates?
Population controls were tried in the 1910’s and up to the late 80’s under Facist and Communist countries, with the deathtolls for certain nations (China) reaching up to 70 million dead from famines within “peacetime” moments of those nations alone due to Government involvement in collectivism practices. So I don’t know where you’re going there with your introduction paragraph pushing for your little book ad there, Pete. The only way to solve poverty is to, “Teach the man to fish” and force them to rely on their independence but our current Government systems is to slopply toss the fish to the masses via broken entitlement programs.
As for American labor fields, I belonged to a Union for the Aircraft Industry and have myself been a student of Business in College and from my personal experiences I can tell flat out that modern day Union chapters are a large damaging factor to our labor forces and job market. My own Union, without a debate or discussion within the paying member base, choosed to listen to a very minor group of members related to a job saving plan presented by Cessna that involved temporary wage cut and refused this plan. Cessna employed roughly 10,000 people within Wichita, Ks and now only has roughly 3,000 within Wichita working at the moment and about 1,500 across the rest of the nation due to this refusal of wage cuts. Beechcraft is in the process of further relocation of their manufacturing lines and assembly lines to Mexico after the Union had commenced a Strike against the company over wages last year. The increased wages of labor members along with decreased sales of product has put a serious strain on both businesses in the Aircraft field and both are moving from being an American company to being a Chinese (Cessna) company or a Mexican company (Beechcraft) due to lower labor costs and Corporate taxes applied by the Government. All of these things stack up to cause a collapse of a business which in itself is a major cause of poverty, not a simple population increase.
And there is the contrary problem to that statement of yours is that the last two generations, Mine and the latest one, is in a decline in numbers versus the Baby Boomers. American families are having fewer children versues the Greatest Generation and their grandparents yeilding families with up to 4 to 8 children. Today’s average family consists of mainly 1 or 2 children per household these days and many people are chosing to adopt instead of bringing in a new child into this world. This, along with the weak labor market, is causing a serious drop in payments to Social Security to those who are taking payments out to the ratio of currently roughly 3 payers to 1 paid and by 2030 the ratio will be 2 to 1 or 1 to 1 which is a very dangerously low situation versus the 16 to 1 ratio when Social Security first was put into effect.
@Pete Murphy
Thanks for the post. I won’t disagree that people might reduce their purchases of material goods as the space to store those goods diminishes. I have recently moved from a 3300 square foot home with 3.4 acres to a 900 sq ft condominium and the first thing I did was rid myself of a lot of material possessions. Now days I’m very conscientious of what I purchase and where it can be stored. I have a public storage space for some of my possessions that I simply could not part with at the current time which of course adds the expense of “cost of storage”.
I probably won’t be buying an RV, boat or any ATV’s anytime soon as I have no where to put such things. Yes, this might adversely affect the manufacturers of such devices but to the benefit of other enterprises such as restaurants, rental companies, and other service industries.
The choice of how I spend my discretionary income simply re-directs the economic benefit of my spending from old school endeavors to other enterprises.
Over the course of time we’ve seen a lot of manufacturing move to places such as Mexico where there is a pent up demand for goods like washing machines, televisions, microwaves etc. These manufacturing plant moves should create a greater demand as the indigenous population now has the income to purchase such devices and hopefully help thwart the rising flood of humanity pouring across our southern border. This is good for the Mexican worker and the international corporation and for the stockholder such as myself that have curtailed material purchases and instead invested in such companies. If I consumed all my resources I would not be able to avail myself of these opportunities and true to your thesis eventually I would be living in poverty, especially if it is my job that had been outsourced south. And if unfettered immigration, legal or illegal, is allowed, how long before the indigenous people are living in poverty?
Now… to the question of “optimal” population. When it comes to the indigenous population, Government has no business in any sort of population control other than that of limiting or expanding immigration numbers.
One final thought… what happens to society when manufacturing technology though automation, creates an enviornment where “lights out manufacturing” is the norm rather than the exception? Do we eradicate everyone but the technicians that keep the automatons working?
Population size is not the cause of poverty, no matter how many spin this issue. The cause of poverty is either Government involvement as in the Collectivism projects within Communism and Facist attempts of “solving” a problem group of peoples by forced relocation and “job” assignments though the Government. In China’s case, mass number of farmers and small villages were relocated into industrial areas while the Government attempted at handling the tasks the farmers knew more about. This little project lead to up to 50 million people dieing from man made famine as the Communist Government failed at land control over these lands during peace times.
Poverty is caused in a Captialist system by a business going broke though massive failure of sales, taxation, or swelling labor wages. This form of poverty under standard Laize Faire situations will be minimal, as the business would collapse and cease to be but the goods or services by that company will still be in high demand and a new business will be born to handle the demand. If the demand shifts to a different good or service, people will still be needed to handle the work load, as such those who are in poverty in a Capitalist society are mostly squarely the person at fault for not actively seeking a job. Yet these days are not any means a Laize Faire time as the Federal Government and Union chapters demand more and more powers and regulations, which places fiscal burdens on businesses which is causing businsess to shed jobs now and very shakey to employe new workers due to the series of major boosts to Corporate taxation that businesses may face in 2010 and beyond. We sit now at a 39.5 percent corporate tax, which means that potential budget for the next fiscal year will be 39.5 percent smaller which means less workers/services/captial investments in future operations of the next fiscal year and even a possiblity of cuts in such investments to get into the black.
“Rampant population growth…” is the most important phrase in the entire post. That implies a population rutting like a bunch of rabbits.
Murphy, you are preaching to the wrong people. For a culture to sustain itself it must have a minimum fertility rate of 2.11 per thousand. The fertility rate in the US and Canada is 1.6 per thousand, in Europe it is 1.38 per thousand. The Muslim fertility rate is 8.1 per thousand.
How does your significant other look in a Burka?
Great topic and commentary. Mike your film is the best horror film in 60 years.
To MataHarley:
First of all, it is you who is injecting race into the discussion, not me. Instead of jumping to all kinds of ridiculous conclusions, you could have just asked how I’d propose addressing the issue.
First of all, yes, the rate of population growth is declining. The world’s population is now growing at a rate at which it will double in 50 years, instead of 40 years as it was doing. (The UN projects that it will not double in the next 50 years, instead growing by about 50%, since they also project the decline in the growth rate to continue.) But the end of population growth is nowhere in sight.
You might like to visit my web site to learn more about my proposals for addressing this situation. I’ll try to “nut-shell” it here. First of all, it’s impossible to address globally. It can only be done nation-by-nation. What better nation to show how to do it ethically than the U.S.? No one likes the approaches taken by China and India.
First of all, it’s important to understand that U.S. population growth comes from two sources almost equally – from immigration and from the net growth in the native population. Our current fertility rate is about 2.09 children per female, not 1.6 per thousand as Red 73 above states. But, upon closer examination, we find that the highest fertility rate is among the foreign-born population. The fertility rate among native-born Americans is very close to 2.0. (Even that rate is slightly too high, due to our steadily increasing life expectancy. To understand, imagine a life expectancy of infinity. The fertility rate would have to decline to zero to attain population stability.)
Thus, the key to attaining population stability in the U.S. is to reduce immigration to the point where it eventually equals the rate of emigration, eliminating it as a factor in population growth. Reducing legal immigration that much will be difficult enough. So it only makes sense that illegal immigration needs to be completely halted. Cuts to legal immigration should begin with employment preferences, followed by students, followed by family preferences.
Still, some slight reduction in the fertility rate is necessary. Who should get to decide who gets to procreate? That decision should be left to the people. All the government needs to do is provide some economic incentive in the form of tax policy to influence that decision toward smaller families in general. There’s no need whatsoever for the kind of coercive practices employed in places like China. Who cares how many children any one family chooses, as long as the overall fertility rate drops slightly? Ultimately, nearly every family’s decision about how many children to have boils down to an economic one – how many they can afford. Since taxes are perhaps the biggest drains on our incomes, then taxes are a major factor in that decision. Tweaking tax policy slightly (like reducing the deduction for each dependent, for example) is all that would be needed.
Ultimately, our population will stabilize one way or another, as dictated by simple laws of physics. It will happen either through a lower birth rate or a higher death rate, or some combination of the two. Those opposed to any effort to reduce the birth rate have, by default, chosen a higher death rate. There is simply no escape from that simple fact.
Of course, you’re not going to buy into any of this unless you understand how overpopulation is driving up unemployment and poverty. So I encourage you to put aside preconceived notions about the subject and look into my theory with an open mind. Once you understand the need to stabilize our population at a sustainable level, you’re faced with some very tough issues. If you arrive at that point, I’d be interested in hearing how you would propose achieving population stability.
@Pete Murphy:
Hey Pete….have you had your vasectomy yet?
Hey Pete, a political party that headed Germany in the 1930’s up to the end of World War II kinda tried to shove that snake oil of yours; oh I think it was that infamous little Nazi party with a madman spewing that same little ideal. Millions onto millions of humans dead due to a radical ideal such as yours with the hell bent attitude of a super race, a point you’re subtly making at. If you so want the population to decrease then either sterlize yourself and your children and leave those who refuse to follow your ideals alone.
And I am highly disturbed how you are viewing Immigrants and their familes of America as a substitute bane in replacement of the Jewish People that Nazi Germany went after. Ignorance is bliss apparently, as almost every Citizen that is Caucassian hails from an immigrant family, so by your own postings that you and your family along with over 100 million Americans should be surpressed and/or killed due to Immigrant histories? That is a madman’s stance and I don’t partake to that kindly. America has been one of the, if not only, nation that has been highly accepting of legal inbound immigrants for decades. Up until Union and Government regulations hindered businesses and technological progression, there was a serious need for more workers than there were Americans and legal immigrants gave the ablity to fill this demand for labor. Illegal immigrants is of a different matter, the easiest way to address this problem is to force a National Trade Langauge which forces all advertisements, press, and business to be conducted in English only yet allowing people to privately communicate in any dialect and langauge they see fit. Ontop of this Trade Langauge would be a fair labor law that mandates a business can not pay employee people below the minimal wage (which Illegals are) and have heavy enforcement in place to use current business laws that shun paying employees under the books. A page from Oklahoma relating to how to deal with Immigration problems should be taken, not from your fantasy piece of work in Facist tounge.
The hidden “benefit” of cutting 500 billion from Medicare and expanding the number of people utilizing its services is the huge savings the US will reap from the early demise of seniors that are currently drawing social security benefits when some government bureaucrat (read that “death panel”) decides that because said senior is no longer an actively producing member of society we can off them. Screw the health care cost savings… those would pale by comparison to the savings we’d see in reduced Social Security benefits. In addition, the sooner we off these parasites of society the sooner we can tax their estates.
Obama Care…. die baby die. No pills for you! Has anyone seen where I left my soylent green?
Let’s kill two birds with one stone…. and a few old people too while we are at it!
Oh damn, I’m old! Never Mind….
@Mr Irons
The way I’d handle illegal aliens. I’d give people here illegally notice that they had 90 days to liquidate their assets and leave the country. Those that failed to depart, when caught, would have all assets confiscated and auctioned with the proceeds used to pay down the National Debt and then immediately deported.
Until such a time as that occurs, I’d bill the nation of origin for any medical care furnished to illegal aliens that are native to that particular country.
I’m sure glad my ancestors got here before there was a United States…. it means we didn’t immigrate to the US, we founded it.
Which brings me to the subject of Native Americans (Indians for the unPC)
Chief ‘Two Eagles’ was asked by a government official, ‘You have observed the white man for 90 years. You’ve seen his wars and his technological advances. You’ve seen his progress, and the damage he’s done.’
The Chief nodded in agreement.
The official continued, ‘Considering all these events, in your opinion, what did the white man do wrong?’
The Chief stared at the government official for over a minute and then calmly replied.
‘When white man find land, Indians running it, no taxes, no debt, plenty buffalo, plenty beaver, clean water. Women did all the work, Medicine man free. Indian man spend all day hunting and fishing; all night having sex.’
Then the chief leaned back and smiled.
‘Only white man dumb enough’ to think he could improve system like that’.
The histories of the American landmasses piror to Spanish invasion weren’t as peaceful or blissful as that Donald. Many tribal conflicts and major wars between the likes of the Aztec and Mayans and other major Empires predating European assault racked this land for centuries. And even of those of Native American decent are themselves immigrants themselves, nomads traversing lands for milliena before the Spanish awoken to the prospects of the “New World.” But I will give you that one, it was the British and the Spanish arrogance to divide up and claim what land, “they owned.” But each single man and woman on this piece of land did not orginaly hail from these lands naturaly, all of us had to migrate here by land or water. What has happened is the fact each future generation of our families have adapted to these lands, and all of us now passionately call this home as it should be. That is where the problem is: We are splitting ourselves apart just because of orgins of our family lines when we are all in the same problem together.
The one thing that was truly horrific of United States History is the horrifc series of Native American conflicts during colonial eras of the 1600’s up to the 1800’s bloody warfare. The Tribes of freemen of the Native American population did not unite against a common enemy, and if they had done so then the Spanish up to the British Colonists who called themselves American later on would have been defeated and pushed away from attack by a force well adapted to mobile warfare well before Europeans undersood the concept in alien terrain for their militaries. And then there was the racist attitude of the US Federal Government and Army towards Native tribes in the 1800’s whom were either netural or peaceful for the most part which created a shut down of all means of diplomatic solutions to a rising issue that lead to horrificly unneeded bloodshed.
Thank you for illustrating my point that while it’s common to inject race/culture into so many issues, it is distinctively absent – even dodged, as you so aptly demonstrated – in the population control debate, Pete.
Rather than suggesting some nefarious reasons as to my statement on the high Muslim birth rate, you might want to consider that culture/race plays heavily into family size and attitudes towards procreation. This is even true with Christian vs Mormon family size. Another “racist” religion demeaning statement? Hardly. Just a recognized fact with no attitude whatsoever on my part.
To rely on the UN’s predictions (scoff, cough, snort…. the same group in charge of climate change predictions…. LOL) stretches credibility. I shall instead turn to the current CIA Factbook statistics on birthrates by country, where the US is ranked 153rd in 223 nations.
Fact is birth rates among Muslims is, according to an Asia Times summer 2005 article, the second highest in the world next to sub-Saharan Africa. Had one of those UN graph predictions then, where the Muslim population, tho declining, was still well ahead of China, Germany and the US.
In 2003, even Europe’s Muslim Street was acknowledging that the Muslim population growth was 3 times that of non-Muslim.
This all begs, once again, the question of you… will you be the one to tell the Muslim, or even those of the Mormom faith, how many children they are allowed to have? How do you propose doing this if not with government mandates to accomplish your ‘save the earth’ population control?
China has had a one child law since 1979, established by Deng Xiaoping. Yet the 2009 CIA Factbook statistics still have Chinese population growth at 14 births per 1000, positioned at 150 to the US at 153.
I do agree that illegal immigration control weighs heavily into a nation’s population growth. I doubt you’ll get any conservative’s argument about cracking down in illegal entry into this nation. But perhaps more important than nanny government mandates and immigration control is the obvious… education and literacy.
As even the UN noted this past April, when addressing Muslim birth rates, the drop in Middle East birth rates seems to suggest that education plays a huge factor.
Conversely, one would think that advocating for a modern and free Middle East… perhaps using that Dubya unpopular term of advancing freedom and Arab/Muslim democracy in nations run by despots… is far more effective than simply placing rules and regs on family size. In other words, voluntary and not mandated. And most certainly not the goal of Sharia rule nations, or the quest of the jihad movements.
“Some slight reduction in fertility is necessary”…. really? How do you reasonably factor in natural catastrophic disasters… from pandemics to other natural forces…. that are virtually unpredictable? How has mankind survived as long as they have without such minds as yours? Baffling…. One might also wonder that if we had “just enough” population to suit you, a fast moving and uncontrollable pandemic could theoretically wipe out the perpetuation of the human race. In fact, if all the “climate change” gloom and doom happens, aren’t we supposed to lose immense numbers of human life?
Then you say:
No, “the people” should not get to decide who gets to procreate. That is a very individual freedom… family size… that I will die fighting before relegating to “the people” – which is another way for saying a law/voting process.
And what’s with this “how many children… as long as the overall fertility rates drops slightly” bit? Are you also suggesting that if “the people” decide upon a x drop in population via government mandate, that it not be distributed evenly? Should those who wish one to two children sacrifice their nominal desires because another family chooses 9-10? Because my farmer/neighbor wants a large family, should I yield my desires for a small family because it achieves the overall “drop” you desire?
It is dangerous waters into which you wade. You are not given the rights, nor carte blanche power to determine population growth… or power over life and death… simply because you wave a “save the planet” flag.
Yes, it will. And all without government control. Just as in past cultures when they over farmed their lands, and ended up dying of starvation if they did not advance and wisen up, it’s part of life’s cycle. Life spans may be getting longer, but we are still carbon units, finite and vunerable to our own failings.
Those who oppose mandates to reduce birth rates do not choose a higher death rate, as you suggest. This is rather an extreme position, taken from a defensive stance, I might add. However if you are suggesting that a refusal by government to control birth rates translates to a government who achieves that same control by having death panels – those in high government positions who decide who is worthy of treatment based on productivity – then I might agree. Either way, it is government mandated intrusion into where they have no right to be.
Your population arguments truly defy the state of economic affairs all over the world today. THe baby boomer generation is rapidly advancing the end of life. Yet the problem remains that there are not enough working young to contribute to their care by robbing their future Medicare dollars (in the US, or similar systems in other western nations) to replace the government’s irresponsible theft of Medicare trust funds they’ve been collecting from us boomers since mid-60s. Ponzi schemes never work.
With your notions of population explosion, a robust young population would have no problems sustaining the boomers into the future… just as the baby boomers provided numbers and tax revenue to care for the WW generations. To use this as a foundation, I’d say we need population increase, not decrease.
But frankly, I don’t advocate any human body of rule attempting to play pious deities. Most especially on a “save the planet” argument.
Just does not compute.
@ Mr Irons
My last post, with the exception of the proposals concerning illegal aliens, was a feeble attempt at levity. I’ve always been a bit of a court jester, just not a very good one.
@ MataHarley
I do believe that Pete’s “left to the people” is not a call for any sort of vote on who can and cannot procreate. I have been to Pete’s website and from what I have been able to gleen from his writings his primary aim is a protectionist trade policy using population density as a weighting factor for determining various tariff levels.
Donald, I understand from his statement of “economic incentives” where Pete was going. However this, again, translates to an odd form that results in only the wealthy being able to afford large families. And again, if it’s an average/mean of population growth, what happens when the wealthier take advantage of the large family ability, negating the ability of lesser solvent families doing the same?
What happens when the quota is reached? Do we go over the magic number? Or do we start issuing licenses to procreate? Perish the thought, and all attempts lead to some sort of government enforcement for an end goal.
Lastly, I can’t think of anything more counter productive than protectionist trade policies based on birth rates. This is counterintuitive to the entire notion that better education (which generally results from a developing economy) naturally leads to a more reasonable birth rate. Might as well shoot one’s foot off, eh?
I owe you an appology Donald for not seeing satire then. I am sorry.