Pun Salad

Back when I was a young'un, checking out books on the conservative side of the spectrum, I read The Suicide of the West by (then) one of the primary big-thinkers at National Review, James Burnham. It was about how mid-twentieth-century Western liberalism was no match for a Communist ideology that was out to bury us.

Old habits die hard, so this book, with its catchy subtitle "The End of the World As We Know It", by (now) one of the big-thinkers at National Review was a must (eventually) read.

Steyn's thesis-in-a-nutshell: Europe as a bulwark of enlightened Western liberalism is pretty much doomed to eventual domination by radical Islamism. Part of the problem is raw demographics: the Judeo-Christian/secular fraction of Europe is failing to reproduce adequately, while the Muslim population is exploding due to immigration and general fecundity. Another factor: Europe (either as a whole or individual countries) doesn't seem to be very interested in defending Western civ, mired in a cultural impotence that mirrors its lack of reproductive vigor.

At the time of the book's writing, 2006, it was probably easier to be (relatively) optimistic about America avoiding Europe's fate; since then, however, we seem to be eagerly marching toward Europitude as well.

Steyn and Burnham are poles apart in terms of writing style: as far as I can recall, Burnham could be relatively stuffy. Steyn, as any recent NR reader knows, is witty and accessible, drawing heavily on pop culture and telling anecdotes.

The parallel with the Burnham book was much on my mind while reading this one, though: obviously, we (more or less) muddled through our fight with ideological Communism, no thanks to liberals. Any way we can blunder our way through this mess? Steyn's cheerful style doesn't offer a lot of hope on that score. But, as Yogi said, predictions are difficult, especially about the future.

Although there's an index, the book is free of footnotes or references. So that's a quibble: if you want to read the sources behind any of Steyn's assertions or anecdotes, you'll have to fire up the Google and do your own digging. (One of the Amazon reviewers says Steyn's just wrong in his allegations about Muslim fertility rates in Europe. I have no idea, but it would be nice to know where Steyn's numbers come from.)