# The One and Only Thing MAGA Gets Right Date: 2025-01-05 --- --- ### The One and Only Thing MAGA Gets Right > All the many corpses begin to speak > What ignorance is cannot be argued over anymore > It is too late for pleading white picket dreams > … > But I can hear the lie before you speak > There is nothing but progress to eat > And we are so fat and so hungry *From the lyrics of Blood Of The Past — Song by The Comet Is Coming* A world where humans have reached population saturation is fundamentally different from anything humans have experienced before. ![Image](https://disrael.github.io/blogs/assets/the-one-and-only-thing-maga-gets-right-4f519ad215.png) In the world before, there was, for those willing to accept it, a default human purpose. Humans are built to produce children and this fairly meaningful activity was available to the masses. At some point this century the majority of humans either no longer found bearing two children as meaningful or were no longer able accomplish it. Most likely producing children in a world of over 8 billion humans replete with global environmental and political issues, reduced meaningful child rearing. If the meaning was coming from increasing human diversity or security in numbers, 8 billion makes it hard to see the point. If the meaning was coming from the need for more labor, automation plus 8 billion also removes that satisfaction. Not only does lack of purpose mean that many people individually take less satisfaction in raising larger numbers of children, but it also means societies across the world are unable to muster more than hand waving gestures as birth rates decline. **From this point of view, and only this point of view, is it reasonable to conclude that America was once great and no longer is.** Another byproduct of this loss of human purpose, is that neo-liberals and progressives are like decapitated chickens still running around. For the neo-liberal the meaning of their great global order has collapsed. What is the point of all of those complex international supply chains in a world where peak efficiency for peak population growth is no longer desirable? Most progressives think that having achieved quantity, we can now focus on quality but what quality means is not clear. Is immortality a goal? Do we really need more travel or consumption? Sure we can all educate ourselves endlessly and pick up and dive into numerous hobbies, but without the glue of raising families our society will have less and less in common. Even the progressive goal of abolishing poverty is difficult to translate into a world that produces radically fewer children. A society obsessed with travel, consumption, education, and hobbies just naturally has less concern for inequality than one that tries to maximize birth rates. Arguably humans are way more capable of making sacrifices for other people’s children than we are for other people — this is the nature of neoteny. Of course the most clueless of all about the problems of population saturation are the far right. Imagine a country that was inspired by a moon landing and MAGA adherents screaming that we need to go to the moon again (or Mars). No it doesn’t work that way — been there done that. You can’t time machine us into the pre 8 billion population world just by ignorantly removing abortions, birth control, and no fault divorce. Simply head in the sand ignoring crowded conditions and environmental issues doesn’t make them go away. Furthermore the far right eschews diversity even though it’s the main logical reason for rearing children in a world slamming up against carrying capacity. Using greater population to achieve more and different kinds of culture might be something we could all get behind if white nationalists didn’t solely want more white nationalists. Nor does waiting for population levels to decrease return us to an unlimited growth culture. Population saturation culture and technologies are not very compatible with encouraging a world of pregnant, barefoot trad wives churning out children purely to please the patriarchy. Actually making America great again with a culture based on raising children requires new thinking. Almost a 180 degree reversal in the way we value the labor of home makers, day care, teachers, cleaning services, coaches, etc. Conversely finance, insurance, real estate and college education will have to be nationalized or subsidized dramatically. Corporations that don’t provide a family friendly lifestyle are useless to us no matter how supposedly efficient. Four day work weeks are now not only obvious but necessary to the survival of our society. The WFH debate should end — if there is no easy transportation or housing close to work then you can’t demand people come to the office for jobs that can be performed elsewhere. During the pandemic there were policies for access to paid family and medical leave, an expanded child tax credit and subsidized child care. All of that has to be expanded and made permanent if America is to be great again in the only sense it ever was.