perfidy

That comparison doesn't explain Ohio, Indiana, or the upper midwest. None of them were ever slave states, yet are Bush supporting states now. Also, it fails to explain Maryland, which was a slave state that stayed on the union side.

If anyone wants to believe that everyone who voted for Bush is a bigoted racist cracker, feel free to be amused by the comparison. Liberals are of course the sophisticated cosmopolitan nuanced people who are incapable of bigotry. Like implying that half the country is racist. But you know, some of my best friends are liberal.

Buckethead,
I think you're actually oversimplifying. As you know, Ohio has 'gone southern' over the past 50 years or so as people have migrated north to work at military bases and auto plants. Indiana's southern half has always been culturally part of the Great Mistrustful Midwest. There have been books upon books written on the "Maryland Exception," and I think the most important thing to keep in mind there in modern terms is that Baltimore city/county, Annapolis, and the 95 corridor define the majority of the state's voters. When you get outside of there, it's indistiguishable from Virginia/West Virginia/the rest of Appalachia. Historically speaking.

I'm actually thinking of expanding on this later today if I have time.

J,
It's because every person in the red states wants to enslave blacks, kill homos (of every tone) and outlaw libraries. Just as every person in the blue states wants to turn your children gay, ban bibles, and surrender the country to Allah.

I mean, sure in Amherst or Ithaca you're gonna get that, but c'mon.

I like your earlier nod to population density, with allowances for TX and VA. Can you marry that into a free state/slave state riff?

Yo GL, my major malfunction is with the Press and their quest for easy answers, no matter those answers' relation to reality. To a lesser extent, I weight less than our good friend Brdgt the impact of race relations on the cultural fabric of the Great Red L. Why the takedown?

As for population density vs. free/slave, that's a nonstarter. Population density is far more dependent upon geography, government policy, and immigration patterns than it is upon any specific economic arrangement. With the exception of ranchers and farmers, who I discount because land was literally an infinite resource for quite a while during western settlement, the interactions between different economic arrangements just don't have a lot to do with population density. Sure, manufacture needs cities and farms need land, but the big picture in my opinion shows no clear division.

The North had just as many nearly-empty states as the South (Ohio, Pennsyltucky, Indiana) , and the South had just as many states dominated by urban areas as the North (Alabama/Birmingham, Georgia/Atlanta-Savannah-Augusta).

Anyway, that's a lot of bits dead to argue a relatively minor point. Done now.

J,
Whoa, not a takedown. I didn't throw that brick at you, but at the fedora wearing, steno-pad wielding reporter sneaking up behind you. I was having fun with the ridiculous and completely unhelpful tribalism that dominates politicspeak these days. And I forgot to add that blue states HATE freedom.

The press creation of a cultural cold war between blue and red is really kinda funny, which is why it's too bad that so many take it so seriously.

I'm oversimplifying? What about the fact that thirty years and more ago, the south was solidly democratic? Or that the Republicans were in fact the party that freed the slaves? Putting a map from 1860 and implying that because of a mild resemblance to a current electoral college map from the recent election, people who voted for Bush are racist is just calumny. I pointed out that it doesn't explain a couple states to illustrate that it might - might - be a flawed model. I could have posted a map from 1960 that would make the opposite claim. Any oversimplification that exists, exists in the original post.

I haven't posted much on Bush's victory, because I didn't want to seem like a swaggering, gloating asshole. You have exhibited a very mild form of whining asinine behavior, especially compared to Ross, or double plus especially to the type of rhetoric emanating from places like the cover of the UK daily mirror.

It's pissing me off. Bush winning the election is neither the end of the world, a la Ross, nor evidence that the 49 million Americans who voted for him are racist dipshits. More on this later.

Bucket, where did I whine? Moreover, where did I claim that Bush voters are racists?

I had to dash off this post in a hurry, so I managed to leave a lot out. Let me underscore my point: it's not race, it's culture. The map on top is not only a map of slave versus free states at the opening of the War of Southern Intransigence. It is also a rough map of the prevailing cultural attitudes in the USA at the time toward government, economics, and a bundle of other factors-- immigration, taxation, and religion among them. That is the important point.

That slavery happened and was perpetuated in areas where English settlers tended to distrust centralized authority to their very bones is not a historical accident. The frontier of the South-- up there in the mountains, and eventually the interior-- was peopled by poor Irish- and Scotsmen who were either fleeing the Troubles or were indentured servants. In either case, when they got a house and a plot of land, all they wanted was to be left the hell alone.

The green area in the map above was settled at different times by different populations, for different reasons. Their ties "back east" tended to be stronger (especially in northern Ohio and the Great Lakes region), except where superseded by the same kind of backcountry folks as populated the south; for example the hills and mountains of Western PA, who not coincidentally voted for Bush.

So: forget race. 'Tis only a fillip. The appeal of the Republicans in the South (and in a giant swath of the middle west, much of which was settled by honkies around the same time-- intriguing) hinges on their ability to speak to shared values that date back a good 120-150 years. I still need to ponder exactly how that's working, but that's the point I wanted to make. On the other side of the coin, I also need to make sure that I don't descend into historical determinism by claiming that the patch of land your great grampy cleared clearly predicts your electoral behavior today. The STATE map is pretty clear, but the 1:1 correlations dissolve at the county level, which is to be expected. Historical culture is a palimpsest, not the writing.

"You Republicans" are not all racists, and I'm not that stupid so as to imply that. Yes, I'm bummed about the election and feeling grim about the next four years. After all, I disagree with Bush & Co. in some major ways. But, please, don't lump me in with the Haters. I'm more a Disapprover.

And, I hate our freedom.

B,
I wonder if you're too sensitive over it. Johno's posts don't seem any more lefty than otherwise when he tackles political issues, and my whine-o-meter hasn't stirred. Besides, he has a sense of humor over his semi-libertarian, kinda-Democratic, wholly-Constitutional political amalgam not shared by the heavy-serious types who had their self-identity and measure of worth wrapped up in political leaders.

Anyway, you can't confuse Euro press with Ministry types. Personally, and I know you didn't ask for advice, but here's some anyway respectfully offered: stay away from British press entirely. In the immortal words of Abe Simpson, it just "angry-s up the blood". You and I are on the big side- you up moreso than out as I am- but our hearts have to work hard enough as it is. Why allow furriners to induce heart trauma? Besides they'll be conquered soon enough- Bush doesn't have to play nice with Europe in this second term like he had to in his first.

That was a joke.

But all that aside, I don't see why you can't be a gloating swaggering asshole if you want to.

GL, Perhaps a little oversensitive. The reason I said "anyone" in my first comment is because I realized that Johno did say that it was brgt's contention that the maps reflect attitudes toward race. My wife and I have been subjected to a lot of annoying commentary in the two days following the election. Me, I've got a thick skin, but whining liberals claiming that the world is coming to an end because of racist dipshits like my wife gets my blood boiling. The daily mirror piece is of course a product of the British press. But is sums up the attitudes of quite a number of people we have interacted with in the last three days.

Johno, sorry for saying that you whined. But throwing those maps up and explaining why they were there together (a la brgt) is an implication of racism. Perhaps not one that you agreed with, but you passed it along. Some people say that all niggers is worthless. I don't know myself, but that's what they say. And yes, I am in fact grossly overstating the case - for reasons that I will explain in a forthcoming post, as soon as my son stops hitting me with his stick.

And maybe I will be a swaggering gloating asshole.

Bucket, that's the thing. I disagree with Brdgt. The maps put together purport to show one thing, which is supposedly obvious. I think they show another thing altogether, which is not obvious. That's why I was careful to differentiate 1860 from today, and draw separate conclusions, and why I was careful to note that "states' rights" used to be code for "slavery" in the antebellum era. Maybe I should have added to that sentence this clause: "but today means something completely different when uttered by serious people."

In my opinion, taking me to task for implying racism based on that would be like me accusing you of endorsing Falwell because you went to church last week.

Let me be even more clear: I'm not calling anyone a f**king racist! Race =! Racism.

I will get into this more in my post, but I do not think that Johno thinks that I am a racist. However, I am not so sure about brgt. The kind of thinking that motivates comparisons of that sort is in my recent experience rampant. The reason that I made the compaison that I did in my last comment is that when people say things like, "I can't believe so many people are so stupid" in the presence of me or my wife - who both voted for Bush and are not stupid and generally the friends of those making the statement - I get irritated.

Find any vitriolic comment uttered in the last three days with the word Republican in it. Replace "republican" with "nigger" and that sentence becomes something horrific, that would never, ever, ever be uttered by the enlightened yet horribly discomfitted Kerry voter. It is bigotry to make blanket statements such as this. Further, it displays an arrogance and self delusion so powerful that I can't even fathom it.

When people who know me and my wife, make in our presence statements that they would never dream about making towards any other group save, perhaps, fundamentalist Christians - I am indeed offended. To pretend to political awareness and to be so ignorant of the actual motivations and thinking of your opponents is frankly stunning. To be completely uncognizant that such statements might actually prove offensive to someone who is republican is unbelievable. One such person actually, after being confronted with this, said, "Oh, we don't mean you!" Well, of course not. You just meant the other 59 million people who voted the way I did. They are hateful, ignorant, warloving trailertrash. But not you.

Buckethead, why do you hate our freedom?

Btw, your electoral map is now dated. Iowa just went for Bush.

I hate your freedom because I am a godfearing, white male republican. My fondest desire is to see hippies interned in camps. I want to ban the Village Voice and imprison all the homersexuals. My ignorance and hate have blinded me to the virtues espoused by the founding fathers. Oh, and because I am greedy for oil. Don't forget the oil.

I was serious about the hippies.

B,
Work on a college campus for awhile. The assumptions made by faculty, students, and staff results in an arrogance unrivalled elsewhere.

But now I'm losing track....is it red-state Buckethead who hates our freedom, or blue-state Johno? And if they both hate freedom so much, why not work together on that and get on with enslaving the rest of humanity?

While you're at it, please make it so my next gallon of milk is less than $4.