Of prairie shitholes and moonshine welfare

This map can be read in two ways: one, as the county-level distribution of who voted how in the November 2004 election, or, alternatively, of who pays for whom.

It's a truism that blue states like New York, Connecticut and California pay for red states like Alaska, Mississippi, Tennessee and Alabama.



The reality is even more complex. That's because, even within paying blue states and receiving red states, there's a split. For example, the City of New York, while sending about $12 billion more to the Feds in 2005 than we got back, also subsidizes the rest of this state to the tune of $11 billion. Similar numbers obtain in the other metropolitan areas that create the wealth of this country - Boston, Los Angeles, Chicago, San Francisco, Washington, Las Vegas, Miami, Seattle, Denver, Dallas, Memphis or Austin. The map showing population (and wealth) distribution illustrates that quite nicely. That blue island on the East Coast about the size of the Midwest? That's New York City and Long Island.

The simple truth of the matter is that Howard Dean was on to something when he said, long before Jack Abramoff, Randy Cunningham or Bob Ney really hit the headlines, that republicans have never worked an honest day in their lives. Individuals aside, on a macro level, that statement is entirely accurate.



This map illustrates the point further by zeroing in on metropolitan areas of blue states. As you can see, there is a distinct correlation between economic dynamism - upstate New York and downstate Illinois are depressed shitholes, as are areas of Kansas, and entire red states without a vital metropolitan/Democratic core like Wyoming - and Democratic votes. It's especially noteworthy that states becoming more vital and productive - Colorado, New Mexico, Arizona, Virginia, Georgia, and Montana - are trending Democratic. Montana, for example, while it voted for Bush, has a Democratic governor and legislature, and will oust its last R senator, the reptilian Conrad Burns, in November, it seems. By contrast, formerly solidly Democratic West Virginia has degraded into an economic shithole - and is trending republican the more it relies on Washington to pay for it.

The irony, of course, is that the welfare queens - just to give the baby a name - in the depressed and unproductive areas of the country vote for a message that would, if implemented, kill them. They may talk small government, but in reality, without the largesse provided by the Federal government via Social Security, military bases, and lots and lots of other handouts like useless government jobs, bridges to nowhere, rural electricity paid for by the Feds, and all the other federal infrastructure, the red states and red areas inside blue states would wither.

That's not an idle academic exercise. The welfare queens of red America know how their bread gets buttered. If you have any doubts, look at the dud that was Dear Leader's Social Security privatization scheme in 2005. Faced with the prospect of a major reduction in their main lifeline - or how do you think those dying rural counties survive? - the shitholes decided that, thank you very much, but they'd prefer to continue receiving their handouts. I'd prefer not to hear any more glowing lectures from republicans about the virtues of capitalism, frankly, until they voluntarily get off the welfare we pay them.

The question is this: how much longer will blue states and the vital blue cities trapped inside red states, like the Johnson County metro area in Kansas, put up with what amounts to taxation without representation? Wingnut government amounts to a gigantic extortion racket, whereby us blues get sucked dry to subsidize the reds. By all means, let's end welfare - the welfare that didn't stop 97 of the 100 poorest counties in this country from voting for Bush. The shitholes are screaming to be cut off - let's do it.

The poorest county in America, coincidentally, is McPherson in Nebraska; it voted for Bush four to one. Let them starve. We're tired of that sucking sound from our wallet.