by John M. Curtis
(310) 204-8700

Copyright January 20, 2002
All Rights Reserved.

ith whip and chair in hand, xenophobic impresario Patrick J. Buchanan rattles America's cage once more, promoting his new book The Death of the West on a nationwide book tour. While Buchanan was slapped in the 2000 election, his latest diatribe wins high praise among disenfranchised Whites. Addressing a shrinking audience, Buchanan fingers birth control and unchecked immigration as a growing threat to the American way. Citing compelling U.N population data, he singles out multiculturalism as today's plague on Western society. The Death of the West supports Buchanan's eccentricities with cold scientific proof, attributing alarming demographic trends to dwindling European birthrates. Objectionable as it may be, Buchanan finds America's irregular heartbeat—a cultural arrhythmia creating a "conglomeration of people with nothing in common." While Buchanan antagonizes immigrants and socially conscious readers, he diagnoses a disturbing cultural trend.

      Buchanan contends that exploding immigration—especially from Latin America—stresses America's "melting pot," infects it with a modern day tribalism, promotes ethnic divisions and "political correctness," and sacrifices cultural homogeneity. "Historians may one day call 'the pill' the suicide tablet of the West," writes Buchanan, a devout Roman Catholic, who, like Rev. Jerry Falwell, sees abortion and birth control as America's undoing. In reality, hardworking upwardly mobile couples believe there's nothing wrong with family planning. To Buchanan, Planned Parenthood—and other such groups—represents the bane of society, embraced by White-Europeans and ignored by other racial and ethnic groups. Together with open borders, Buchanan believes these trends will transform America into a third world country by mid-century. But when Buchanan speaks of the "third world," he's referring to bloodlines and pedigree, not socioeconomic factors. Racial balancing doesn't necessarily lead to the type of "third world" that Buchanan envisions.

      Liberal immigration policies don't automatically lead to cultural disintegration, unless political leaders abandon the policies and social engineering needed to reeducate newcomers. Buchanan cites four "clear and present dangers" to American society: (a) declining birthrates among Americans of European descent, (b) exploding immigration of peoples of "different colors, creeds and cultures," (c) rising "anti-Western" cultures antithetical to established religious, cultural and moral norms, and (d) abandoning nationalism or "defection of ruling elites" to the idea of world government. Calling for more rigorous cultural education is one thing, but sealing off borders, limiting immigration and banning abortion and birth control won't recreate the kind of nationalism that saves American society. Buchanan's right that today's multiculturalism sacrifices the "melting pot" needed to embrace the host culture while, at the same time, preserving important ethnic traditions.

      Declining birthrates of White Europeans are easily attributable to modern medicine, economics and pursuing the American Dream. It's difficult to achieve success if you're strapped like "Old Mother Hubbard." Exploding immigration of peoples of "different colors, creeds and cultures" don't threaten American society as long as the government and educational systems properly indoctrinate American values. Rising "anti-Western" cultures are only a problem when loyalty to ethnic groups and religions comes before one's country. And a "defection of ruling elites" to the idea of world government doesn't mean that supporting globalization led by American corporations causes the death of nationalism. Buchanan's message is obscured by his own zealotry about his longstanding pet peeves. When he rails against "rampant promiscuity and wholesale divorce and taxpayer funding of abortion," he goes overboard, rather than remaining focused on how multiculturalism hurts American society.

      Ironically, "rampant promiscuity" and higher out-of-wedlock birthrates are found more among American-White-Europeans than recently immigrated non-Whites. Buchanan's message gets even more muddled when he talks about America becoming "de-Christianized," when modern Protestant sects rebelled against the orthodoxy and heavy-handedness of Puritans and Quakers. Though a practicing Catholic, Buchanan forgets the tension with Protestants over more liberal interpretations and practices of Christian faith. "While the prognosis [to save America] is not good," writes Buchanan, America must reclaim its White-Christian roots, despite the present "coarseness of her manners and decadence of her culture." Buchanan's a strange hybrid between the religious right and White supremacists whose obsession with mixing bloodlines cause alarm to almost everyone. If he'd stay focused on the downside of multiculturalism, he'd convince a lot more people. There's nothing wrong with Buchanan's suggestion to give tax breaks to hardworking parents, enforce immigration laws or hold a National History Bee. Sealing off the borders, limiting immigration, banning birth control and abortion, and calling for a national religion won't improve the "melting pot."

      Buchanan's correct identifying multiculturalism as a problem for an orderly and sane society. Host cultures have every right—indeed obligation—to inculcate specific values to assure cultural continuity. Reciting the Pledge of Allegiance doesn't violate separation of church and state or anything else. Governments must indoctrinate newcomers and existing citizens with messages that promote cultural identity. Whether it's creating new monuments, writing new "pledges," or celebrating national holidays, governments must play a more active role in cultural education. Rather than sealing off borders, banning birth control and abortion, or lecturing about morality, establishing a new cabinet level department of "Cultural Education" would help rebuild America's dented melting pot. Promoting nationalism with better slogans and new cultural programs would be far more realistic than reversing inexorable immigration trends. Governments have no control of skin color but they can set cultural standards for educating citizens. No one ever said that creating utopia was easy.

About the Author

John M. Curtis is editor of OnlineColumnist.com and columnist for the Los Angeles Daily Journal. He's director of a Los Angeles think tank specializing in political consulting and strategic communication. He's author of Dodging The Bullet and Operation Charisma.

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