Now we have this bloc of red states in the South who are backward, racist, intolerant science deniers, and they've managed to get just enough on the winning side of the electoral map to make the advanced, multicultural, cosmopolitan science-respecting blue states' lives miserable.
That chunk of states should be a separate country. Then they can go their own way and the rest of us can carry on without them.
Humans are happier if they're grouped together with their own tribe, and not with other neighboring tribes they don't identify with. In this way it's like some of the problems in Africa and the Middle East where the groups there had borders imposed on them that didn't follow this simple principle.
For example, take a useful look at CityLab's Congressional Density Indicator [1]. There are zero "pure urban" districts that are represented by Republicans, regardless of the state (red, blue, purple), and there are nearly none among the "urban-suburban mix" districts (again regardless of state).
Viewed through yet another lens, by percentage of landmass, Alabama is more is more "blue" than Illinois and Oregon [2]. Your characterization could use a little more thought and refinement.
[0] https://www.niskanencenter.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/09/Wi... (see section beginning page 12)
[1] https://www.citylab.com/equity/2018/11/citylab-congressional...
[2] https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2018/upshot/election-201...
On the other hand, I really like the idea of splitting apart the country in a way that frees most of us from a large enough number of the people who are holding us back. I don't think that's possible to do in a fine-grained way. It only makes sense if done for some large contiguous regions. And the states in the southeast who actually did try to break away a few generations ago seems like an obvious way forward with that.
Here is another look at some of the natural regions within the country: [1]
I'm also aware that changing the voting systems we use holds a lot of promise for some of the same underlying problems we're talking about, and am completely open to that as an alternative to, or in addition to, my suggestion to break up the country. But that too seems very difficult politically.
[1] https://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/17/opinion/sunday/a-new-map-...
I'm not a political scientist, but at some point the increasingly larger 60% of the population is going to take this country back. I hope they're able to do it without a war.
There is a comfort that comes from the instability of party switches. The parties don't cooperate, which means less can get done. Anything that puts anyone in an area where one of the gangs of politicians can actually do something, is to be avoided. We've learned that the hard way in Wisconsin.
As a general rule, it's always best to split up your government as much as you can.
Your strategy is one guaranteed to ruin your country.
This opinion requires a great deal of justification.
The book American Carnage is a fantastic deep dive on this (and extremely fair and even-handed, despite the bombastic title).
If "that" is the cause-effect relationship claimed above, no we are not "seeing" this right now. There is a huge difference between events and the narratives, accurate or otherwise, which some people use to explain those events. The system under consideration is insanely complex, with an immense list of causal factors at play. To me, in my opinion, it's obvious that the causal relationship described above is at best a tiny contributor that is, itself, dependent on other factors also being present. At worst, it's completely wrong and a distraction from understanding the real causes.
Now there may be a point of diminishing returns. As in 5 parties are as good as 10, are as good as 15. But that's an academic question, and we're not even at 5 parties yet.
On the other end, maybe 500 parties is self defeating, as you say. But we're nowhere near that either.
On the other hand, too many parties becomes unwieldy, and I'd argue that 10 is already going to be too many in practice.
Historical experience in the early 20th century led many countries to develop minimum bars, e.g. parties with fewer than 5% of the vote not getting any seats in parliament.
No EPA. No DOE. No equality under the law. No EOC. No NLRB. No Amtrak. No federal enforcement of consent decrees. No voting right act. No gay marriage, etc?
Edit: Thanks for downvotes. Every single one of these is enforced by federal and not state courts. It is federal court that gave us Roe v. Wade, for example. It is a federal court that prevents Alabama from running its own little fiefdom. It is a federal courts that gave us Brown v. Board of Education.
If each state has its own version of the CDC (and other similar agencies), then that's fine, but they also need to have a lot more sovereignty over things like (in this case) being able to close their borders to neighbouring states whose agencies may have come to differing conclusions about what measures are needed.
Commerce Clause of the US Constitution stands in a way. It (the Commerce Clause) has been a bedrock of the federal government pushing through progressive policies onto the states.
If you live in a house of five and each person buys their own groceries and cooks their own dinner, it does not matter how you scrimp and save. It is still cheaper on the whole to buy raw ingredients for dinner and make it for five people. The cost goes down dramatically>
Yes there is a CDC in every state. It would be utterly ludicrous spend of cash to have an independent, not cooperative CDC in each state attempting to manage and solve the same problems.
This makes sense, but what about one level up? I live in an apartment building, and in our building each family buys their own groceries and cooks their own dinner. It does not matter how much you scrimp and save, it is still cheaper on the whole for the building to buy raw ingredients and make dinner for all families. The cost goes down dramatically.
This also makes sense, but what about one level up? If each building buys groceries and cooks dinner for all of their homes, it does not matter how much they scrimp and save. It is still cheaper on the whole for the entire city buy raw ingredients for dinner and make it for all of the buildings and their families. The cost goes down dramatically.
This also makes sense, but what about one level up? If each city buys groceries and cooks dinner for all of their buildings and homes, it does not matter how much they scrimp and save. It is still cheaper on the whole for the entire State to buy raw ingredients for dinner and make it for all of the cities, their buildings and their families. The cost goes down dramatically.
This also makes sense, but what about one level up? If each State buys groceries and cooks dinner for all of their buildings and homes, it does not matter how much they scrimp and save. It is still cheaper on the whole for the entire Union to buy raw ingredients for dinner and make it for all of the States, cities, their buildings and their families. The cost goes down dramatically.
This also makes sense, but what about one level up? If each Union/country buys groceries and cooks dinner for all of their buildings and homes, it does not matter how much they scrimp and save. It is still cheaper on the whole for the entire world to buy raw ingredients for dinner and make it for all of the nations, States, cities, their buildings and their families. The cost goes down dramatically.
We both agree that at some point, this stopped making sense. The question is: is an ideologically divided Union of 330 million people across 50 states with their own Constitutions and governments equivalent to a “house of five”?
The current system is effectively all 50 states in an eBay-style bidding war over the same limited resources.
https://www.fsis.usda.gov/wps/wcm/connect/fsis-content/inter...
But alas, one of those founders, Jefferson, argued we should rewrite the constitution every 19 years.
And another founder, Hamilton, argued that ambition must be made to counteract ambition. And that government is a reflection on human nature, most directly its citizens. https://avalon.law.yale.edu/18th_century/fed51.asp
Politically, it moderated him significantly. He started off as very pro-revolution, pro “watering the tree of liberty with the blood of tyrants and patriots”, and by the end he ended up regretting France not shifting into a constitutional monarchy. This is after both witnessing The Storming of the Bastille in person (he was an ambassador then), defending the September Massacres[0], and knowing quite a few people who were executed during the terror.
At some point, those taxes would be so high, people would start leaving the state, and at the point of bankruptcy, the state would be a ghosttown.