This is getting somewhat addictive. Yet another red state/blue state comparisons, with ever more predictable results. This, however, is what you might call the ur-text of these comparisons, the divergence among us from which all the others flow. Here, you see a map showing the geographical concentration of the percentage of people in the country who have a ninth grade education or less.
Now, I was reluctant to print this picture, as I was unable to get to the underlying data, but I am doing to for two reasons. First, it is totally consistent with what one would expect. Second, the basic data is confirmed by no less an authority but Fox News, right here. Once again, New England places several (three) states in the top five.
Now, the fact is that, from the point of view of Southern politicans generally, and Republicans in particular, their poor performance is a feature and not a bug. It is only be keeping people uneducated, and therefore more susceptible to the classic arguments they've used to control rural whites, primarily racism (“you've got more than the whites, don't complain”), now spiced with homphobia. We in the North must therefore not be complacent. There is a concerted effort, in which our own governor is a participant, to eviscerate public education and hand it over to the corporations. As it is in their interest to keep the masses ignorant, we can look forwards to an educational system that increasingly teaches vocational skills (after all, we are going to need more domestic servants) at the expense of critical thinking, which means that someday, we may very well see these maps turn a uniform color.
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