Urban Democrats and Rural Republicans

[Zoomie1980]

I had to double check that this claim was not accurate.


Highways

■ Over 90% of the products made or shipped in the US travel on the nation's highways and bridges.

■ 74% of goods shipped in the US are transported exclusively by trucks.

■ There are over 160,000 miles of major roads that need resurfacing or reconstruction.

■ Currently, there is a $325.4 billion backlog of economic highway and bridge projectswaiting to be completed.

■ Road congestion cost the US economy about $63.1 billion in 2003.

■ Trucks carry three quarters of the value of freight shipped in the United States and twothirds of the weight.

■ Trucks moved more than $6.2 trillion and 7.8 billion tons of manufactured goods and rawmaterials in 2002.

■ Trucks are expected to move more than 75% more tons of freight in 2020.


Link

In term of total weight of all goods, true. But in terms of ton-miles trucks move 32% and trains move 28%, but in terms of bulk ton miles, trains move 72% of the ton-miles of that. That's things like ore, and bulk grains (ag products) and chemicals. Trucks still have to move it from rail ramps to final destinations.

But the big reason rail business is growing and truck business declining is trains remove the congestion trucks have brought to interstate highways, burn diesel far more efficiently per ton mile than trucks (much "greener") and the big kicker, rails pay for all their own "highways".

 

[Caligirl]

I think urban dwellers have become accustom to being dependent.

Now don't take this as any kind of insult. It takes a lot of infrastructure when so many live in such a small area.

When a water main breaks or the power goes out in my town it's an inconvenience. When the same thing happens in the city, it's an emergency.

No one comes to pick up the garbage? No biggie, I got a burn barrel. In the city, big problem, refuse everywhere.

Streets don't get ploughed? So what, I got a freezer full of food AND a 4wd. In the city it would be mayhem.

What I'm getting at is if the government shut down in my county, I might not even notice, but if the same thing happened in a metropolitan, it would be a disaster.

Now this is just a theory and perhaps one that others before me have advanced.

Feel free to poke holes in it or trash it completely.

A lot of people think that the reason cities are dem (and they are purply-blue v purply-red, not blue and red) is because of much more contact with other countries (big airports, chinatowns and so on, lots of other languages spoken) and thus the perspective of how inter-related the world is, how valid.independent/etc other cultures are, etc.

So opposition to Bush was not about wanting big government, it was because of his foreign policy not recognizing that you can't go into another country and lay down your vision of what they should do (democracy etc). It was about wanting SMALL governemt as relates to other countries.

In a sense, that is exactly what you don't the government to do in the rural areas, so you might understand why a lot of dems agree that it shouldn't be done in other countries either.

Urban tends dem because they understand that this is a global world, and rural republicans can sound very parochial a lot of the time.

 

[Missourian]

A lot of people think that the reason cities are dem (and they are purply-blue v purply-red, not blue and red) is because of much more contact with other countries (big airports, chinatowns and so on, lots of other languages spoken) and thus the perspective of how inter-related the world is, how valid.independent/etc other cultures are, etc.

So opposition to Bush was not about wanting big government, it was because of his foreign policy not recognizing that you can't go into another country and lay down your vision of what they should do (democracy etc). It was about wanting SMALL governemt as relates to other countries.

In a sense, that is exactly what you don't the government to do in the rural areas, so you might understand why a lot of dems agree that it shouldn't be done in other countries either.

Urban tends dem because they understand that this is a global world, and rural republicans can sound very parochial a lot of the time.

While this may be true of mega-metropolis', I don't think this theory would hold for Des Moines IA, St Louis MO, Montgomery Al, Jackson MS, Columbia SC, Charlotte NC, Tulsa OK and Kansas City, KS...just to name a few.

 

[Missourian]

Back from the depths...

 

[hjmick]