The Left's focus on manipulating population trends is not going to serve it politically

The focus over recent years on the Left on a suburbs vs. core cities dichotomy is interesting.  Certainly it has at its roots in the collectivist impulse.  It's easier to herd the cattle-masses into the pen when they're concentrated within a manageable area.

It's also pretty clear that basic Left snobbery is a major factor as well.  The dense concentration of commercial activity just off the interstate exits in the suburbs may offer a passer-through Starbucks coffee or a hearty soup and fresh-baked, crusty loaf from Panera, but it is in the gentrified section of a historic inner-city neighborhood, or the tree-lined street near the university campus where you can get the authentic artisan version, the version without the corporate taint.

Joel Kotkin at the Daily Beast points out the differing prioritizations of socioeconomic issues in cities and suburbs, and how this plays itself out in respective voting patterns:

 As will become even more obvious in the lame duck years, the political obsessions of the Obama Democrats largely mirror those of the cities: climate change, gay marriage, feminism, amnesty for the undocumented, and racial redress. These may sometimes be worthy causes, but they don’t address basic issues that effect suburbanites, such as stagnant middle class wages, poor roads, high housing prices, or underperforming schools. None of these concerns elicit much passion among the party’s true believers.

The miscalculation is deep-rooted, and has already cost the Democrats numerous House and Senate seats and at least two governorships. Nationwide, in areas as disparate as east Texas and Maine or Colorado and Maryland, suburban voters deserted the Democrats in droves. The Democrats held on mostly to those peripheral areas that are very wealthy—such as Marin County, California or some D.C. suburban counties—or have large minority populations, particularly African-American.

Kind of interesting that the wealthier the suburb, the more inclined it is to vote Freedom-Hater.

Kotkin then points up an example of the foundation of delusion on which the Leftist enterprise is built.  We've seen it in so many areas:  climate, health insurance, gender identity.  As to whether any individual Leftist really swallows his ideology's line on any of these, or employs it for the purpose of hustling, is not always easy to parse.

For instance, are they telling themselves something they really believe when they swear that most post-Americans prefer stacked and dense to to spacious and expanding?

HUD Secretary Shaun Donahue, for example, has declared the move to the suburbs is “over.” People are, he has claimed, “moving back into central cities and inner ring suburbs.” To help foster this trend, administration policies at HUD and other agencies have been designed to fulfill Donahue’s vision of getting Americans out of their suburban homes and cars and into apartments and trains. These policy initiatives include large “smart city” grants for dense development, restrictions on new building, the promotion of high-speed rail links that would supposedly reconcentrate economic activity in the urban core. The administration’s strong support for regional governments, and its attempts to force suburbs to diversify their populations (even though they are already where minorities increasingly move) are thinly disguised efforts to promote densification and put the squeeze on suburban growth.

Kotkin demonstrates that this orientation is not going to serve the FHers politically.  The suburbs are going to grow, and inner cities aren't.   So maybe this is a case where post-America's normal people should sit back and let he FHers bask in their delusion.  As is the case generally, they are looking at harvesting from a field that is no longer producing more each year.

Freedom has growth on its side.