Red State, Blue State

I live in a blue state, but in a very red part of a blue state, which doesn't mean that it's populated by communists but rather by conservatives. My personal leanings are more toward the blue so i tend to avoid discussions of any color with my mostly red neighbors. Mixing red and blue makes magenta, which is the liberal elitist's way of saying purple. I suppose it must be the undecided folk who are purple.

The whole red state/blue state silliness didn't make much sense to me until i remembered that you learn your primary colors in pre-school and kindergarten. I also noticed that whenever people refer to the red state/blue state concept they always list red first, blue second, just like in "One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish". So, anyway, i don't think this idea was arbitrary at all, but instead a deliberate attempt to explain the electoral college at the level of a Dr. Seuss beginning reader book.

So i figure that the various news organizations that use these simplifications think we're just as stupid as we think they are. I bet this also explains the popularity of Bill O'Reilly, since he sounds just like my elementary school principal. Mostly likely the election results in November will not be expressed in terms of numbers of popular or electoral votes, or even in percentages. I expect them to use pictograms of beachballs. "President Bush has this many beachballs, and Mr. Kerry has this many beachballs. Can you tell who has the most beachballs?". Unfortunately, Florida will still have trouble tallying the votes/beachballs and the election outcome will be entrusted to the judges on American Idol, just like the constitution mandates.