Friday, February 15, 2013

Alternative Divisions Of North America

With the resentment that Republicans feel over Obama's re-election, some believe that it would be best to make the United States less united, and divide it, and Canada, up in two countries, one consisting of conservative "Red states" and one of liberal "Blue states". In one version the conservative part is called "Jesusland" and the liberal part "United States of Canada".
Hawaii isn't showed, but as it is the most left-leaning state in America (apart from the District of Columbia which technically isn't a state) it would obviously be part of "United States of Canada". One could of course also argue that Jesusland is too big, as it includes several states won by Obama not just in 2008 but in 2012 as well, including Iowa, Virginia, Ohio, Florida, Colorado, Nevada and New Mexico. It seems that the map is based on the 2004 elections when those states were won by Bush. One could of course also question calling the liberal country "United States of Canada" as not all of Canada is left-leaning, and having the conservative country called Jesusland, would make objectivists and atheist libertarians feel unconfortable in both countries.

Regarding the fact that not all of Canada is liberal, an alternative version has the most right leaning Canadian provinces, Alberta, Saskatchewan and Manitoba, be made part of Jesusland. In this version, the liberal part is renamed to "Snobberia" (it is obviously a Republican who has made it) while Quebec is made independent and renamed "Surrenderville" (presumably because it is French-speaking and the French are regarded by many Republicans as "cheese eating surrender monkeys"),


The funniest part was designating Nunavut as "too cold to care", a reference to the fact that the temperature tends to be -40 degrees (both fahrenheit and celsius) in the winters there, rising to only 5-10 degrees celsius (41-50 degrees fahrenheit) in their "summers".  That is the explanation for why despite having an area of 1.88 million square kilometers (725,000 square miles) it has only about 32,000 people (most of whom are eskimoes/inuits).

It is somewhat strange to include Yukon and Northwest territories in "Jesusland". Considering the majority support for left leaning parties (the Liberals, the New Democratic Party and Greens), it would make more sense to include them in "Snobberia". Or alternatively, given the fact that these provinces are nearly as cold as Nunavut, one could also include them in "too cold to care".