Miscellaneous
Since the 1790s, the United States has had six different party systems, or voter coalitions. As the country heads into its seventh party system, what will the New Republican and New Democratic parties look like in 2050? Will the Democrats and Republicans be around at all? In this episode, we cover the Whigs, Abraham Lincoln, Bernie Sanders, hip and healthy 120 year olds, a Hispanic plurality, the Apple Store in Shanghai, and the Seventh Party System. This is Robot F. Kennedy. SHOW NOTES John Adams’s letter to Jonathan Jackson (1780). http://thefederalistpapers.org/founders/adams/john-adams-letter-to-jonathan-jackson-october-1780 // The Republican Party is dying. The Democratic Party is dying. Everybody’s dying. Republicans control 32 state legislatures. List of U.S. State Legislatures: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_state_legislatures The Day The Republican Party Died (The Atlantic, May 2016): https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2016/05/the-day-the-republican-party-died/481176/ FiveThirtyEight’s Politics Podcast, episode from April 3, 2017: “The Political Calculus Of A Filibuster” https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/politics-podcast-the-political-calculus-of-a-filibuster/ Washington’s Farewell Address (1796): http://avalon.law.yale.edu/18th_century/washing.asp // Ten years ago, neither Bernie Sanders nor Donald Trump belonged to their respective parties. Bush Says Trump Was a Democrat Longer Than a Republican ‘in the Last Decade’: http://www.politifact.com/florida/statements/2015/aug/24/jeb-bush/bush-says-trump-was-democrat-longer-republican-las/ Is Bernie Sanders a Democrat?: http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/article/2016/feb/23/bernie-sanders-democrat/ The Party Systems in the United States: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Political_parties_in_the_United_States According to Walter Dean Burnham, party systems last for 30-38 years. Critical Elections: And the Mainsprings of American Politics (Walter Dean Burnham, 1970): https://www.amazon.com/Critical-Elections-Mainsprings-American-Politics/dp/0393093972 // The Seventh Party System U.S. Population Projections in 2050: http://www.pewsocialtrends.org/2008/02/11/us-population-projections-2005-2050/ Hispanic or Latino? (NPR, August 2015) http://www.npr.org/sections/parallels/2015/08/27/434584260/hispanic-or-latino-a-guide-for-the-u-s-presidential-campaign An estimated net 1.2 million Americans of the 35 million Americans identified in 2000 as of “Hispanic, Latino or Spanish origin,” as the census form puts it, changed their race from “some other race” to “white” between the 2000 and 2010 censuses, according to ... Pew Research. http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2014/05/05/millions-of-americans-changed-their-racial-or-ethnic-identity-from-one-census-to-the-next/ List of U.S. States by Hispanic Population: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_U.S._states_by_Hispanic_and_Latino_population On Columbus Day, let’s remember that Italians weren’t always white in America (Fusion, October 2015): http://fusion.net/on-columbus-day-let-s-remember-that-italians-weren-t-a-1793851764 Armenians were legally defined as white in 1909, In Re Halladjian: https://chnm.gmu.edu/courses/ncc375/rp/index.html Global Monoculture: https://www.globalpolicy.org/component/content/article/162/27553.html Party Identification Varies Widely Across the Age Spectrum (Gallup, July 2014): http://www.gallup.com/poll/172439/party-identification-varies-widely-across-age-spectrum.aspx The History of Retirement, from Early Man to A.A.R.P. — Bismarck Invents Retirement (New York Times, March 1999): http://www.nytimes.com/1999/03/21/jobs/the-history-of-retirement-from-early-man-to-aarp.html OTHER NOTES Price of lab-grown burger falls from $325K to $11.36: http://bigthink.com/ideafeed/answering-how-a-sausage-gets-made-will-be-more-complicated-in-2020