Another Reason Why Republican Conventional Wisdom Loses Young People

Pat Buchanan's comments and video. Emphasis mine:

Mexico is the greatest foreign policy crisis I think America faces in the next 20, 30 years. Who is going to care, Andrea, 30 years from now whether a Sunni or a Shia is in Baghdad or who’s ruling in Kabul?

We’re going to have 135 million Hispanics in the United States by 2050, heavily concentrated in the southwest. The question is whether we’re going to survive as a country.

Am I missing something? Is this really something to be scared about?

This reminds me of an event on my campus I attended in October, in the heat of the presidential campaign, in which Peter Leyden spoke about Millennials. As he got to the part of his presentation where he reveals that whites become a minority in the 2040s, someone made audible noises of discomfort. This person later stood up during the Q and A time and called Obama socialist, among other things.

One of the many points of tension along the divide between the GOP and young voters is this difference in attitude toward diversity. Republicans traditionally take a straight-arm to diversity, not comfortable with it, with some members of the GOP even endorsing a bill a couple years ago that would have recklessly deported many hard working folks residing in this country. We know that Millennials, meanwhile, are the most diverse generation in America's history; many of us don't know anything other than the examples of increased diversity around us today: interracial relationships, affirmative action programs, GLBT friends, and brothers and sisters, etc.

So when Buchanan tries to use the heritage of the third largest cultural group in the United States to scare others, it's extremely ineffective, seeing as how 1.) this approach is anathema to young voters, and 2.) the white, working class -- his posse -- is contracting rapidly.

And yes, as long as Pat Buchanan is on MSNBC or any other mainstream TV news outlet representing conservative thought, he represents GOP conventional wisdom.

(h/t Daily Kos)