EVERY so often in the US there is another little demographic news flash that shakes the foundation of the American heartland anew.

Across the airwaves yesterday was a report that by 2023, minorities in the US - non-whites, but meaning mostly Hispanics - will make up the majority of all children in the country. That means white children born in the US today will be in the minority of all children in the US before they even finish high school.

This coming minority status is accelerating: 2023 is seven years earlier than predicted five years ago. Birth rates among the mostly Catholic Hispanic population run at a much faster clip.

And it means whites in the US - adults and children - are due to become the minority in just 30 years. Which brings us to Rush Limbaugh.

The king of American shock jocks will reach an audience of about 20 million people a week and his bombastic, fly-the-flag and snappy oratory taps into something that many conservative whites - the base of the Republican Party - are feeling over the demographic changes to their country: that the America they know is slipping away.

These views inform plenty of the debate in the US over things such as immigration, particularly illegal immigration, which incenses millions of Americans, because any child born in the US of illegal immigrants automatically wins citizenship.

http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,25148716-5015648,00.html