Don't forget, Urban (blue) states CARRY the Rural (blue) states, taxwise.

[El Pinko]

One more point in the whole media-created "dems are toffee-nosed intellectual snobs out of touch with small-town apple-pie America" meme...


The same rural America that eats up the right's rhetoric about "small government" and "self-reliance" is always first in line at the federal funding trough, lapping up more largesse,

while the urban states are the ones forking over all of the tax money and getting LESS from the government.


http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A19566-2005Jan18.html


Red States Make a Mockery Of Self-Reliance
By Steven Pearlstein
Wednesday, January 19, 2005; Page E01


In his inaugural address tomorrow, I'm guessing, George W. Bush will take a moment to reaffirm the "red state" values that returned him and the Republican congressional majority to power. You know, things like self-reliance, free markets, small government and fiscal rectitude.

Funny, that. I have in front of me the latest report from the Tax Foundation showing how much each state gets back in contracts, benefits and subsidies for every dollar of taxes paid. And it shows that, with a few exceptions, the anti-government red states are the net winners in the flow of funds while the pro-government blue states are almost all losers.

Among the biggest winners in 2003, for example, were New Mexico, at $1.99 for every tax dollar paid, followed closely by Alaska, Mississippi, North and South Dakota, Alabama and Montana -- the "red-ink states," as Ken Cook of the Environmental Working Group calls them. The biggest loser was New Jersey, at 57 cents per dollar paid, followed by blue states Connecticut, New York, California, Massachusetts and Illinois.

....

In other words, we now have a new red-state political majority comprising voters who, while professing distrust of government and disdain for the values of the blue-state minority, are only too happy to rely on Washington and blue-state wealth to keep them in the style to which they have become accustomed. This rank hypocrisy might be laughable but for the fact that the fleecing of the blue states has increased markedly over the past decade as Republicans tightened their hold on Washington. And the early signs are that it's about to get worse.

[KharmaTrain]

1. Red States = Biggest Government Subsidies

One reason the GOOPs have done well in the South & West is that they could "bring home the bacon"...rolling in billions for their states in one form of corporate welfare or another. If it wasn't some earmarked "study" or project, it was favoring the contractors and other big donors (most in the red states) that have fattened up big time with the Iraq war for profit. Just look at the scandals with Ted "NO" Stevens and Don Young for examples of how this system not only worked but went to extremes.

By "volume", Blue states pay more in taxes due to population and income. What I see interesting is now that the GOOP is out of control in the House & Senate how they've gone to real slash and burn...trying to make earmarks an issue as to try to prevent Democrats from taking advantage of the same "perks" they had...and used to extremes.

[eomer]

2. Edit to fix your subject line?

Should be: "Don't forget, Urban (blue) states CARRY the Rural (blue red) states, taxwise."

[El Pinko]

3. Damn it, I left for a while. Now it's too late to change.

'DOH!

[Thothmes]

4. Tax money is spent were tax money is needed. That is the way it works

So what. do you recommend that we spend the tax dollars only in the states that pay them.

[RedCappedBandit]

5. I think he is suggesting that the right wing morons..

accept the fact that they benefit from taxes.

[Thothmes]

6. I would suggest that it may be the poor

and disadvantaged that really benefit from these tax dollars. Do we cut them off because they live in Alabama or rural Kansas?