Because there are fewer right wing crazies in Europe.
I grew up in a rural area, and there were a LOT of people there waiting for government checks every month.
I didn’t think anyone claimed that. Some pointed out that rural areas are net recipients of welfare. That just means people in rural areas use/receive more government funding than they pay in taxes. Whereas city dwellers pay enough tax to cover all the government services they use, and then some.
I wonder if it’s really the suburbs that are supporting cities and rural areas.
Jean Marie Le-Pen or George W Bush?
Le Pen was never elected president, though.
Exactly. Far right wing nutters will not be elected to national office in any first world nation. Indeed in substance Bush wasn’t too different from Tony Blair.
What are the snowplows plowing? Who pays for those roads?
Do you have electricity? As noted in another thread, that’s heavily government subsidized - especially in Ontario - and it’s vastly more expensive in the sticks, per household, than in the city.
Rubbish. The only thing they shared was interventionist foreign policy, which in Blair’s case was largely predicated on his odd belief that Britain should back the US no matter what for ever and ever.
Blair did an interview for a British gay-culture magazine last year. Can you even imagine GWB doing that?
Funny - all my rural right-wing relations (mostly on the wife’s side of the family) are either receiving government assistance these days or actively working for the state. But it’s okay because, unlike the liberal scroungers, they don’t want to be.
More seriously, I suspect the fact that rural areas are more homogeneous culturally does a lot to encourage a conservative mindset. Positive exposure to other cultures and views encourages a more liberal outlook. When everyone around you looks the same and believes the same, it’s much easier to believe that your way must be the right one.
But that’s different. Getting a check from Uncle Sam doesn’t mean you’re not self-sufficient, but having somebody pick up your garbage makes you a leech. Don’t you know anything?
It’s okay for you to get a check from Uncle Sam because you pay your taxes (or would if you made enough money) and therefore you’re just getting your own hard-earned money back. Other people getting a check from Uncle Sam is not okay because you pay your taxes (or would if you made enough money) and therefore they’re getting your hard-earned money.
Well, alright, but I’m still not picking up your garbage, you degenerate!
The right wing dominates in rural areas in part because, since Reagan, it actively courts the religious. Rural people tend to be more religious for several reasons, some of which are:
-When your nearest neighbor is a mile or more away, it is nice to see them all at church once a week, catch up on things, etc. At least one of my farming cousins is a church going atheist for this reason alone.
-Farm work can be dangerous, and farmers don’t normally have health plans, workman’s comp, etc. You are more likely to need the support that churches organize and focus.
-You basically need to be predisposed toward hope and belief when your income is determined by the weather.
This is not to say that people in rural areas don’t have deeply held religious convictions, they are just reasons for rural people to belong to a church that most city folks don’t share, and results in lots more church going in farm country.
Interestingly, Central/Northern Rural New Mexico tends Democratic, while the Urban areas trend Republican. The Southeast Corner of the state (Oil Patch) trends more Republican though.
You seem to be forgetting Mr. Chaeny… 
I can only speak about the Australian Liberals, but you are missing the point that Right leaning anywhere else would be in commie pinko lefty territory in the US. Let’s just look at public health, for instance.
Tony Abbot - current Lib opposition leader, former Minister for Healthcare under John Winston Howard, former PM
Position on public health:
"Howard appointed Abbott to the key Health Portfolio in 2003, during a period of contentious Medicare reform and a crisis in Medical Indemnity Insurance, which was forcing doctors out of practice.[29][30] Abbott worked with the states to address the crisis and keep the system running.[26] (Emphasis added.)
Abbott was involved in controversy in 2006 for opposing access to the abortion drug RU486, and the Parliament voted to strip Health Ministers of the power to regulate this area of policy.[31] He introduced the Medicare Safety Net to cap the annual out-of-pocket costs of Medicare cardholders to a maximum amount." (wiki, which is pretty well sourced).
Note - 1. he’s in favour of public healthcare, and kept the system running when it might have otherwise gone away 2. an House run by the Libs took his power away when he tried to regulate RU486, 3. he capped out of pocket costs when he might otherwise have let people pay for healthcare.
Let’s try John Boehner
Oh heck, I won’t summarise, you can see here: John Boehner on Health Care
No. He votes no on any public health care for any reason at any time.
Thus - in your typical US election, which of these guys in a Democrat? Is it Abbot, or Boehner?
One must not forget that health care is not the only issue. Yet whenever one compares the politics of America vs. the rest of the world, that’s the only thing that keeps being brought up.
You’re right. Let’s try paid parental leave:
Abbot: “In March, 2010, Abbott, announced a new policy initiative to provide for 6 months paid parental leave, funded by an increase in corporate tax by 1.7 per cent on all taxable company income of more than $5 million. Business groups and the government opposed the plan, however it won support from the Australian Greens.[65]” (Same wiki source, plus I live here and I listened to the debate.)
Boehner:
“Voted NO on four weeks of paid parental leave for federal employees.
Congressional Summary:Allows federal employees to substitute any available paid leave for any leave without pay available for either the: (1) birth of a child; or (2) placement of a child with the employee for either adoption or foster care. Makes available for any of the 12 weeks of leave an employee is entitled to for such purposes: (1) four administrative weeks of paid parental leave in connection with the birth or placement involved; and (2) any accumulated annual or sick leave.”
No? What about state’s rights (with the caveat that the Australian Constitution is different than the American one - nevertheless, there are significant limitations on Federal powers):
The Man Himself, Abbott, quoting an article he wrote on his own website:
"Australian conservatives have typically made a virtue of our federal system of government.
The states, it’s thought, can act as a break on the arrogance of the national government and deliver services that are “closer to the people” than those delivered by a more “remote” government in Canberra.
As anyone studying, for instance, the history of water management in the Murray-Darling basin would have to concede, the states are far more often a handbrake on good government than they are a bulwark against potential dictatorship.
Search as one might, it’s very hard to find the examples of bad commonwealth government policy blocked by the states that would render plausible the “states protect our freedom” argument. " http://www.tonyabbott.com.au/LatestNews/ArticleswrittenbyTony/tabid/87/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/7095/SOME-THINGS-MUST-PASS.aspx
Boehner himself (I suspect, it’s a quote from a news article):
“In a letter sent Friday to Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour, chairman of the Republican Governors’ Association, Boehner wrote, “With a new majority in the House, a strengthened Republican Conference in the Senate, and an expanded team of GOP governors committed to reform, we have an opportunity for unprecedented collaboration on behalf of the American people in the effort to stop the expansion of federal power in Washington in hopes of returning power and freedom to states and individuals.”” http://www.usnews.com/opinion/blogs/peter-roff/2010/11/8/boehner-reaches-out-to-gop-governors.html
In some areas they agree, such as climate change, althought Abbott is to politically expedient to say what he thinks (anymore, he gets into trouble when he does.)
But the questions stands - which one here looks more like a US Democrat?
I should point out that a lot of American cities have been Democrat strongholds since the 19th century. Democrats created extremely efficient party machines which operated in large and middling cities and often completely dominated the electorate. New York City, Chicago, Louisville - the entire South after the Civil War. Their control wasn’t absolute, of course, but they were usually in charge and maintained that success more or less permanently. Some brilliant poltical operators like Thurlow Weed managed to push this back, but they couldn’t build on that.
This may have increased with suburbanization, but it can’t, I think, be said to have started there. Add in the complete Democrat domination of the Black vote, and well, some things explain themselves.
Given its inherently political nature, it’s probably time to move this one to GD.
Colibri
General Questions Moderator