Interesting piece by Michael Lind, who I always find thought-provoking. Despite a lot of pessimistic talk, Lind says that long-term trends–with respect to ethnic and racial integration, religious fundamentalism, and the solvency of our entitlement programs–are actually quite positive:

Barring catastrophes, the US in 2050 will be much more racially integrated; will remain culturally and linguistically quite homogeneous; and will be much richer, easily able to afford to pay for social security and decent healthcare. And partly as a result of this unity and prosperity, the US will continue to be a major power, though not a solitary hegemon.

The chief challenges Lind does see are rising healthcare costs and decreasing social mobility. He also doesn’t mention anything about environmental or resource issues, which seem to me to loom just as large as potential big problems. I’m also far more ambivalent (to say the least) about increasing secularization, though Lind does make an interesting argument that the Religious Right is essentially an ethno-political movement of white southerners that has less to do with religion per se than is commonly supposed.