America’s regional divide

My chief preoccupations is the gap between rural and urban political values.

Cities tend to be more “liberal” and Democratic. Small towns tend to be “conservative” and more Republican-leaning.

One natural side-effect of the tension between city and country folks is that regions with more big cities — say, the East — tend to vote differently than more small-town centered regions.

A case in point this election cycle is the South, our most rural region.

If the southern states were electing a president, John McCain would win in a landslide. According to Gallup, he’s currently winning 54% of the vote, compared with Barack Obama’s 39%.

Compare that with the standings in the East, where Obama leads 51-40%.

That’s a huge gap in sensibilities.

In fact, Obama leads handily in every region of the country, except the South. Midwestern voters favor the Democrat by 48-42% margins; and in the far West, Obama is almost as popular as in the East.

A lot of ink has been spilled about strategies for reconciling these regional divides.

But it seems clear that for years to come Southern voters will be supporting very different politicians from the rest of the country.