The last two and a half decades have seen a public relations
assault by the conservative elements in American society. They
made people believe that they represent the best of America, and
that they are driving America forward. With the data in, I find
myself in a position to show the monstrous fallacy of their
argument - a fallacy that very nearly places it in the category of
the Big Lie and that has unbelievably gone unchecked for almost 25
years in mainstream media.

In the book The Great Divide, John Sperling performs an analysis
of the two Americas: what he called Metro and Retro. He places
the Northeast Coast, Great Lakes and Western Coast states - states
that mostly vote Democratic - in the Metro category, and South,
Midwest and Rockies - states that mostly vote Republican - in the
Retro category.

...According to his computation, the Metro states
over years 1991 to 2001 paid $1.4 trillion in taxes more than they
got back; the Retro states, during the same period, received $800
billion more from the government than they paid in. The Metro
states possessed 65% of the population, paid 71% of all taxes, had
10 times more Nobel laureates than the Retro section of the United
States, and specialized in manufacturing, financial services and
information industries - all of them non-subsidized - while the
conservative states of the country specialized in government-
subsidized farming and extraction.

Does anyone else see the sheer absurdity of what we've been
hearing over the last 25 years? Of what we've been living - of
what was told to the United States? The conservatives shout that
the government takes away American taxpayers' money - then live
off of American taxpayer. The conservatives shout that they are
the engine of the economy - then produce one tenth the number of
Nobel Laureates that the Liberals produce and pay 29% of federal
taxes and live off of government subsidies. You don't want no
government on your backs? Fine then, make your money honestly like
the liberals. Get rid of the agricultural and extraction subsidies
and unchecked ranching on federal lands and work, like the
liberals, in a globally competitive marketplace where you compete
with people from other countries and see who's honestly the best.