Anti-American Metrics

In the event you’ve been living under a rock, here’s the latest gem from Sarah Palin:

“We believe that the best of America is in these small towns that we get to visit, and in these wonderful little pockets of what I call the real America, being here with all of you hard working very patriotic, um, very, um, pro-America areas of this great nation.”

Michele Bachmann, further solidifying her role as the craziest fucking person on the planet, followed-up Palin’s comments by going on Hardball and calling for a full congressional inquiry aimed at finding members of Congress that hold “anti-American” views. So it’s kind of like McCarthyism, except run by a woman that hordes foster children as a primary source of income.

Anyway, if this is going to be the new GOP narrative I figured I’d use numbers (the GOP’s worst enemy!) to figure out who these “pro-Americans” are.

Jobs seem to be pretty American. Americans work, socialist moochers take the hard-working people’s money to abort babies and buy drugs. So I guess we can say unemployment rates should be an anti-American metric. And who has the five highest unemployment rates in the country (not counting territories)? Why that’d be Mississippi, Alaska, Michigan, South Carolina, and Kentucky – four red states and one blue state.

And who’s taking on the largest per capita tax-burden to pay for these lazy commies? Hawaii, Wyoming, Connecticut, Minnesota, and Delaware. Four blue states and one red state.

Well, maybe it’s not the economy that defines the anti-American areas, maybe the metric is more social. The sanctity of marriage seems to be a talking point for the GOP and the GOP seem to know who’s anti-American and who isn’t. So what states have the highest divorce rate? Nevada, Arkansas, Alabama, Wyoming, and Idaho. Five red states. Surely that’s a mistake! What about the states with the next highest divorce rates? West Virginia, Kentucky, Tennessee, Florida, and Mississippi. Four red states and one mostly red state. The lowest divorce rate, by the way? District of Columbia – the bluest “state” in the union. Gay-loving Massachusetts has the third-lowest divorce rate.

Ok, so the anti-American distinction is not economic and it’s not based on family values. Military? Who’s paying for the Iraq War? Surely those are the pro-American states. Oh, the top five contributors to the Iraqi War budget are California, New York, Texas, Illinois and Florida, three solid blues, one mostly red, and one solid red. Well, maybe the blue states pay with money and the red states pay with their lives. So, what state has the highest per capita Iraqi casualties? Granola-munching Vermont. Delaware is also in the top-5 and then, admittedly, it does turn a bit red. But certainly not definitive proof of pro-Americanism.

Maybe it’s per capita Starbucks? Top five is DC, Washington, Nevada, Colorado, and Oregon. Hell, even per capita Starbucks, the true bastion of liberalism, has two reds in the top five. What could be the metric the GOP uses?

I’ll tell you one thing, it certainly isn’t 9/11 casualties. It was primarily anti-Americans that died in that one. The pro-Americans just like to use it as an excuse to label us anti-Americans traitors.

I'm out of ideas. Is there any metric that the red states DOMINATE that could be used as the anti-American metric? Of course there is: toothlessness. West Virginia, Kentucky, Tennessee, Alabama, Louisiana...hell, you don't get a blue state until you get to Maine at #17 (and even us liberals are afraid of people from Maine).

So there you go, if you have no teeth you're pro-American. I’m fucking done with this campaign.

Labels: editorial, politics

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