[bert]

Until the bluzone surrenders to the revolution.

[Noumenon]

It's long past time for Atlas to shrug.

[handk]

What I want to know, while we're on the subject, is this: who picked the colors? Or rather, who assigned the colors? Ever since the famous map came out, I've always been ticked off that someone picked "red" for the conservatives, when in fact, it makes infinitely more sense for the commie-libs to be the "reds", right?

[MissAmericanPie]

"Item: teacher disciplined for telling Mexican kids in her US class to stop disrupting the class (she's a "racist" for so doing). The other kids in the class continue to get no education and the Liberals think that's just fine -- for other kids. The LIberals opt out of the system by sending THIER kids to private schools."

My son is upset because his favorite teacher was fired for saying taking drugs is like playing Russian Roulette. Zero tolerance for talk of guns, and this is in Texas.

[Held_to_Ransom]

Two Americas: for how much longer can we prop-up the failed "Blue" America?

Until you pay your debts for all the money the red states syphon out of the Federal government from them. Don't hold your breath, the red states have never gotten out of debt since 1787 aren't likely to ever start.

[rmlew]

I hate to tell you but most blue counties pay more in taxes than the get back. The zip codes 10021, 10022, and 10028 spend more in income taxes than many red states.

[tpaine]

Item: A conservative estimate puts as much as 35% of the American economy underground. Taxpayers are fed-up with having 50% or more of of their hard-earned pay taxed by the feds, the state, Medicare, Medicaid, etc. So people do the natural thing: opt out of the system by going cash-only, off the books.

______________________________________

Item: The cash pot froggies are slowly being boiled by more & more 'reporting regs' on ALL large cash transactions.
-- Be prepared to account for a source of the cash when you buy or sell cars and other big ticket items in the near future.

[JoeSchem]

The solution is simple. The Union must be dissolved. Let the fifty states go their own way. Then there's no longer a federal monopoly on being American, and there will be fifty governments competing for law-abiding, taxpaying citizens.

[archy]

CW II AND FSP Porcupines ping/s!

Sorry for any overlap from both lists....

-archy-/-

[Concentrate]

Item: "Blue" America is financially bankrupt, and California is a glaring example. "Blue" America has degenerated into a coven of grasping, mentally diminished, selfish, thuggish special interest groups who have become increasingly violent in fighting over what is left of the Big City Democratic machines that have run things for the past 150 years. The "blue" islands on the 2000 map can best be described as cancers on the national MRI -- blighted areas of malignant, imploding selfishness that are trying to spread across the entire national body. And the "red" nation has to keep paying for it.

I have to wonder how much longer this will be the case. The defacto separation of "red" and "blue" has already occurred, and is fat too profound to be fixed by any social "bussing." At what point does the whole scheme collapse? And how is this going to be expressed and dealt with in the coming 2004 elections?

FR is going to get a lot more interesting if a Dem wins the oval in '04, which is entirely possible. If they win, it will be terrible, but at least we'll have somenoe to blame it on.

[tm22721]

Yeah but the problem is self correcting.

The dollar will continue to fall until it is no longer the reserve currency, and we have joined the third world.

BUMP

[austingirl]

This is what happens when nearly 50% of the population pay no federal income taxes - it will only get worse. Thank God I live in Texas, even though Austin is insanely liberal.

[moodyskeptic]

On the right track, but too general, because in a given blue county or state there is a concentration of "givers" that pay for the majority "takers".

Los Angeles County is a good example. The drive for Valley Secession was an effort to cut loose the huge areas of underclass dependents, so that working Valley residents would not be footing the bill for people 60 miles away.

Take a look at any gerrymandered demo voting district, it captures plenty of "poor" area and just enough taxpayers to hold control.

The real battle is inn the cities: the good vs bad part of town. The bad part of LA has been growing for 40 years.

[Kay Ludlow]

Your article is so true. I would say, though, that if you look not just at the state "red/blue map" but also at the county level, what you'd see is red/blue is really an urban/rural issue.

Rural americans have gone about their lives for the last 50 years assuming they live in a representative republic and their freedom is guaranteed. They've only begun, in the last decade, to notice how much the federal and state government has been incrementally infringing on that freedom. Rural people have failed to be active in the legislative process (farm subsidies are lobbied for by farming conglomerates headed by urban people). A consequence of that is urban conservationists have been pushing programs down to the state and local level that seriously infringe on individuals rights, and show an great lack of understanding of what rural areas really are like.

The failed social programs were all aimed at urban voters, who tend to believe taking care of things is someone elses (governments) responsibility. Rural people are more independent, and believe they should solve their own problems.

In my view, the battleground today is in the suburbs BECAUSE it's where the urban and rural meet. Will the urban people come to understand freedom and independence by living with rural people? Or will they bring their urban ways into rural communities, pass urban regulations, and destroy the rural way of live? At the state and federal level, most legislators are urban people these days, and it shows in their priorities. They need to be lobbied by both sides on those rural vs urban issues, but the rural people have only recently seen that need.

I see this battle going on in communities across Pennsylvania, with urban people moving in and demanding the community change to suit their urban sensibilities. In some areas they win, in other areas they are laughed out of town.

It will be interesting to see how this turns out in a couple more decades. It appears that the young, even the urban young, have developed some awareness of the freedom that's being lost; how they choose to address it (through political activism or through complete disregard for the law) may play a big role in the future.