Also, government failures do not seem to affect Democrats as much as Republicans. Look at Detroit. An example of the failure of Democratic leadership but still one of the bluest areas in the U.S. As more of the U.S. has the demographics of Detroit (or Cleveland, Baltimore, Philly, LA) the same voting patterns will occur.

Shaun said that having to vibrant parties is important to the U.S. But he (and everyone else) has never offered a model that demonstrates that two parties dedicated to handing out the maximum level of goodies can occur. Thus, the U.S. will become a one party state just like Detroit is a one party city.

I am not worried about it as much as interested in its impact on the U.S. However, the reason everyone but the Cuban exile in Miami (who are generally very European in ancestry) vote the same way is that the government treats them all the same way and treats them differently than it treats whites. Hispanics are groups by the government for quotas, affirmative action minority set asides, mentoring programs, etc. The Democrats have over 100 congressmen running unopposed and that number had been going up since before 2000.

The other reason or the Republican collapse is that the incompetence and stupidity of the Bush Administration which has sped up the process. Now, upper class whites are as likely to be Democrats as Mexican-Americans. Also, since Bush, Hastert, and Frist were all so stupid and incompetent, the Republicans lack the next generation of leaders and have no issues to run on. Any Republican running on smaller government, fiscal responsibility, or cutting spending will be laughed out of any political rally.

Thus, in the end, as the demographics and politics of California expand of the rest of the U.S., national politics will resemble what California has today.

Anyway, my understanding is that SD is particularly worried about the impact of changing demographics in the US and whom each party draws. In particular, the current white majority is decreasing as a percentage of the population, while other groups, blacks, Latinos, and Asian-Americans, are all increasing. Since all of those group, particularly African-Americans, vote most often for the Democratic Party, it spells doom for the Republican ones. The demographic trend will not change and so the future of the parties will not change.

Where SD and I argue is that I don't think the relation between demographics and voting must be the case. I see little reason, for instance, that a 4th generation Texan rancher whose roots are Mexican, a Cuban exile in Miami, a shop owner in NYC whose parents are Puerto Rican, and a Nicaraguan migrant worker picking grapes in eastern Washington should all vote in the same way — unless our society or our political parties insist on treating them as one single group so that these Americans have to vote as Latinos or Hispanics rather than as ranchers, shopkeepers, and farmers. SD's reponse is probably to simply point out how people actually vote and extrapolate.

The Republicans Party will cease to exist long before it will ever be able to appeal to blacks. You should have asked the host what he would do if the Republican party collapses and ceases to exist (or at least becomes are irrelevant as the Libertarian Party)?