A Grim Forecast

Writing in the Orange County Register, demographer-turned-pundit Joel Kotkin steps back, takes a long view of world society, and reaches a conclusion that, if you believe it, could make you cry.

To combat what they see as nativism, including any unfashionable attachment to western civilization, the progressives who run Facebook and Google have allied with the politically correct left’s thought police. Kumbaya values will be packaged in schools, the media, the arts and fashion, shaping the views of the next generation while the last America-centric generations die off.

Ultimately the successor to neoliberalism will not be the resurgent nationalism of Steve Bannon’s fantasies but an autocratic one manufactured in Beijing, Manhattan, Silicon Valley and the academy. Largely unappreciated today, we someday may look back at the waning neoliberal era with some nostalgia, lamenting the failure of a noble idea that failed.

And make no mistake, Kotkin is himself a member of "the last America-centric generations." This isn't a conclusion he relishes.