Geoausch

I’m thinking about the election again. After two weeks of trying to process Barack Obama’s insurmountable lead, I keep on coming back to the fact that we’re a divided country. It’s a divide that goes back to the dawn of the 20th Century, a divide between rural and urban America.  Sure, there are other divides (religious, ethnic, etc.), but it’s the rural/urban divide that engenders many of the other divisions. Even that is a little too general–I live in a large urban area, but I oppose Barack Obama.

For the past 8 years, every political talking head in the United States has tried to explain this phenomenon. Many of these hypotheses contain nuggets of truth, but I don’t think one explanation exists. For example, many liberal pundits immediately point to evangelical Christianity, the dominant faith in rural America, as the major force to the division between rural and urban America. Sure, evangelical Christianity plays a major role in the life of rural America and leaves an indelible mark on the lives of those in rural America; however, many people either in rural America or originally from rural America, such as myself, reject much of the Levitical law and social doctrine associated with evangelical Christianity. Again, religion probably plays a part in the division, but it alone is not the answer.

Instead of trotting out several of the old theories and discussing them, I thought I would offer a new theory to the divide between rural and urban America. I spent the first 26 years of life in rural America and the last 4 years in urban America.  One of the major differences I have observed are the range of services provided by urban cities. Most of my friends in high school, lived in unincorporated rural areas where you had to drill your own water well, so obviously public services such as public transportation, trash removal, and public recreational facilities were unheard of. When you live in an area like that, where you must provide your own water, your own transportation, etc., you learn to become truly independent and self-sufficient.  It’s easy to see how a rural American would find many Federal government programs superfluous. Again, if you’re forced to provide your own water, the most basic necessity of human life, why would you depend on the government for anything besides defense?

The city folk grows up in an area with the local government will literally provide for you every need under the right circumstance (water, food, shelter) and also provide many wants (transportation and entertainment), either free or at a cost. It’s easier for the city folk to comprehend a paternal form of Federal government where the “needs” and “wants” of a nation are provided for by a Leviathan-like body. Instead of worrying about where they will find water or health care, the city folkcan focus on activities of leisure. It’s no wonder that he or she would not be afraid of Obama’s efforts to increase the scope of government run social programs.