Getting The Red Out (Volcanic Vomit Alert)

http://www.valleyscene.com/ennn.html ^ | December 2004 | Valley Scene

[Extremely Extreme Extremist]

Getting the red out

An old Cold War rallying cry declared, “You’re better dead than red.” While it’s a phrase that’s by now fixed in the public’s imagination, a post-election 2004 assessment seems to turn that old saw on its head. The new cry, shouted this time from the left, might be, “If you’re red, you’re dead — faster, anyway.”

A week after the Bush/Diebold ticket swept to a narrow presidential victory through America’s heartland, a less earth-shattering news item appeared that put those huge expanses of land blighting the electoral map with red ink into a little bit of perspective. (By the way, for all those right-wingers intent on further crowing about the vast territory that went to Bush in this and the last election, ask yourself whether land votes, and what it says about your candidate if it does.)

In early November, the United Health Foundation released its report “America’s Health: State Health Rankings 2004” and the results were a little pick-me-up for the downtrodden blue-staters who voted for John Kerry. We blue-state losers may not have gotten our preferred choice for president, but at least, it seems, we have our health. Indeed, despite comprising only 19 out of 50 states, blues make up eight of the top 10 healthiest, according to the report. No red state shows up until No. 5, and that state — Utah — is dominated by Mormons, whose religion prohibits them from smoking or drinking alcohol. Reliable blue state Minnesota tops the list, followed by New Hampshire, Vermont and Democratic stalwart Hawaii. Wisconsin ranks No. 9 and Kerry’s home state of Massachusetts comes in at No. 6.

Perhaps even more revealing, however, is that, starting with George W. Bush’s home state of Texas at No. 35, every bottom-ranked state in the Union is red.

As if we needed further proof that Bush voters are sick.

The rankings are based on a wide range of factors, including the prevalence of smoking, motor vehicle deaths, the prevalence of obesity, high school graduation rate, violent crime, lack of health insurance, infectious disease, children in poverty, occupational fatalities, public health spending, adequacy of prenatal care, infant mortality, total mortality and premature death.

So what does all this mean? Well, to be sure, taking a count of Republican-leaning states in a presidential election year is a pretty blunt tool for determining how political affiliation leads to public well-being. After all, correlation is not causation. And aggregate health is by no means the only measure of quality of life.

But with all the smugness that’s generally displayed on the other side of the aisle about how the wholesome, pure-hearted jus’ folks in middle America support Bush (possibly because they’re worried that if two gay guys in California kiss their own marriages will careen into a hedge, like George W. Bush on Schlitz Malt Liquor), it’s interesting to see how much worse off those folks may be in relation to their less bucolic and more gay-friendly peers. And it begs the question of how much better off might they be if they favored Democrats instead.

Well, long before that huge swath of red ink was painted across the middle of America (which is as fitting a metaphor for the upper class-tax-cutting, drunk-sailor-spending Bush administration as one is likely to encounter), others were asking some of these same questions.

Based on the 1996 presidential election results, L. David Roper, professor emeritus of physics at Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, undertook a detailed study correlating the strength of the respective parties in individual states with several measures of well-being.

Roper calculated correlations between states that voted Democratic or Republican with various health and other outcomes, including death rates, infant mortality, auto accidents, occupational deaths, suicides, gun deaths, drug-induced deaths, cirrhosis deaths, cancer deaths, cardiovascular deaths, violent crime, property crime, child abuse, toxins release, abortions, poverty, state prison populations, uninsured populations and college degree attainment. In most cases, states that voted Republican produced worse outcomes than those that voted Democratic. (More details of the study are available at www.arts.bev.net/roperldavid/politics/USHealth.htm.)

Of the indicators of well-being listed above, Democratic states scored worse only on drug-induced deaths, cancer deaths, violent crime and abortion rate. On toxin release, they scored worse on pounds per area but better on pounds per capita released.

Surprisingly, Democratic states even came out better — much better, in fact — on suicide rates. Despite the stereotype of the neurotic urbanite, the strongly Democratic New York had the lowest suicide rate in the nation. (This recalls what Woody Allen said in Crimes and Misdemeanors: “I don’t know from suicide. Where I grew up in Brooklyn nobody committed suicide. Everyone was too unhappy.”) And while it’s not surprising that the state with the highest suicide rate is Nevada, considering that their top three pastimes seem to be gambling, alcoholism and declaring bankruptcy, it’s a little surprising that the second-highest rate (nearly three times the New York rate) is in the reliably Republican Montana. Then again, these people probably wake up every morning, rub their eyes and say, “Oh my God, what am I doing? I live in Montana.” (Indeed, it turns out that rural areas are so overrepresented in suicide rates that the risk of dying of a gunshot wound in a rural area is roughly equal to that of dying by gun in a city, even though cities have much higher homicide rates.)

www.uphs.upenn.edu/news/News_Releases/sep04/firearmdeaths.htm

Some of these same trends can be seen internationally. The much-maligned countries of Old Europe were strongly pro-Kerry, as was Canada. These countries are also decidedly more “blue” politically than the United States. Not surprisingly, the United States lags behind Canada and Western Europe in life expectancy but leads these countries by a wide margin in homicide rate.

While it may be stretching it to suggest that the Donks adopt the slogan “Vote Democrat or Die,” these correlations are eye-opening. Indeed, this information should stand alongside other statistics showing that Democratic presidents have been better stewards of the economy (www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A29205-2004Jul30.html) and that the ruggedly individualistic red states suck more from the public trough than the whiny liberal blue states (www.taxfoundation.org/ff/taxingspendingupdate.html).

Then again, Adam and Steve should stay safely unhitched for at least another four years.

[12 Gauge Mossberg]

ask yourself whether land votes

Better to get votes from land than from crack houses and section 8 apartment complexes.

[freedomfiter2]

On toxin release, they scored worse on pounds per area but better on pounds per capita released.

It's generally the concentration level that causes the problem.

[COBOL2Java]

Of the indicators of well-being listed above, Democratic states scored worse only on drug-induced deaths, cancer deaths, violent crime and abortion rate

Reminds me of that quote from that great Democrat, Mayor-for-life Marion Barry: "Aside from the murders, DC has one of the lowest crime rates in the country."

[freedomfiter2]

even though cities have much higher homicide rates

They can't stand blue area people either, I guess we have something in common after all.

[BenLurkin]

Road Apples:

U.S. Freedom Index

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1292746/posts

[atomicpossum]

The rankings are based on a wide range of factors, including the prevalence of smoking, motor vehicle deaths, the prevalence of obesity, high school graduation rate, violent crime, lack of health insurance, infectious disease, children in poverty, occupational fatalities, public health spending, adequacy of prenatal care, infant mortality, total mortality and premature death.

Cherry picked statistics. 'High School graduation' is a measurement of health?

'Children in poverty?' A livable wage in the midwest is far lower than a poverty wage in the Northeast. If the definition of 'poverty' is the same dollar value, it's not the same standard of living.

Public health spending? So, big city socialism is healthier than living in the pastoral spaces?

Statistics are usually just carefully managed lies.

[Patti_ORiley]

MN is the healthiest state in the union and has been trending Republican for years -- which is why both Bush and Kerry spent so much time here. MN hasn't had a democrat governor for at least five election cycles and Republicans control the house while the democrats hold a slim majority in the senate. Wisconsin is 50/50 and will soon be a Republican state as well.

I think the writer of the article might want to think about another country -- after all, it's pretty bad here in America and Europe or Canada would certainly appreciate such a supreme being.

[Blue Jays]

Hi All-

Written by the jerks at ValleyScene.com:
"...Roper calculated correlations between states that voted Democratic or Republican with various health and other outcomes, including death rates, infant mortality, auto accidents, occupational deaths, suicides, gun deaths, drug-induced deaths, cirrhosis deaths, cancer deaths, cardiovascular deaths, violent crime, property crime, child abuse, toxins release, abortions, poverty, state prison populations, uninsured populations and college degree attainment. In most cases, states that voted Republican produced worse outcomes than those that voted Democratic..."

---

Let's see them recalculate their numbers using a conservative red vs. liberal blue model on a COUNTY-BY-COUNTY basis and see how the statistics present themselves.

Do the urban lefties really want to square-off against the rest of the country using the italicized parameters above?

~ Blue Jays ~

[Viking2002]

To the author: kill yourself.

[bassmaner]

Bush/Diebold ticket

This is a TREASONOUS statement. In a sane world, the perpetrator of such an insidiuous lie about the C-in-C during wartime would be rounded up and sent to an internment camp for the duration of the war.

I, for one, am fed up with this crap. It's time for GWB to suspend habeus corpus (like Lincoln did during the Civil War) and start rounding these TRAITORS up.

[ServesURight]

The author cites the usual list of liberal laundry statistics as proof that blue staters are healthier than red staters. High school graduation rate? Give me a break.

[12 Gauge Mossberg]

Let's see them recalculate their numbers using a conservative red vs. liberal blue model on a COUNTY-BY-COUNTY basis and see how the statistics present themselves.

Exactly! Besides, there IS no blue states. Some FReeper posted a map of all the blue state county-by-county. Most of these counties were RED. Even in fricking Illinois, Bush won 67 of 81 of the counties in that godforsaken state. The only blue areas were near St. Louis, parts of the Quad Cities, and of course, the area around Chicago.

[ModelBreaker]

The rankings are based on a wide range of factors, including the prevalence of smoking, motor vehicle deaths, the prevalence of obesity, high school graduation rate, violent crime, lack of health insurance, infectious disease, children in poverty, occupational fatalities, public health spending, adequacy of prenatal care, infant mortality, total mortality and premature death. In other words, states where the government spends a lot of money on 'health' are healthier. Of course the blue states score extremely high here--they have the largest, most bloated medicaid systems, the most subsidized health clinics etc. It's not at all clear to me that this is related at all to the health of the citizens.

[somniferum]

I always shut up lefties trying to peddle junk like this (Including that bogus IQ by state thing) by saying "Why dont you just save yourself a lot of time and rename your list 'Which states have the highest percentage of minorities?' ".

[SlayerOfBunnies]

I, for one, am fed up with this crap. It's time for GWB to suspend habeus corpus (like Lincoln did during the Civil War) and start rounding these TRAITORS up.

Uh - no. We're the good guys - remember? Clinton's gang (effectively) suspended Habeas Corpus in Waco, Ruby Ridge, etc. We don't play by those rules.

[Vision Thing]

I'm still waiting for a study showing the relationship between voting patterns and the number of psychologists per county or state. My initial theory is that the bluest of counties or states have the highest percapita of shrinks. I'm guessing the eggheads in academia agree with my theory, and thus, they refuse to conduct such a study. The last thing they want is the truth: Liberals tend to be mentally unstable and unhealthy.

[exnavychick]

Um...think I'll pass. Just because we don't agree with the authors of tripe like this doesn't mean they should be locked up. Last time I checked, we live in AMERICA, not some kind of police state. I don't like them either, but I much prefer they embarrass themselves in public than us embarrass ourselves by acting like the Nazi's these morons accuse us of being, thanks.

[exnavychick]

Great minds...lol.

[BureaucratusMaximus]

I, for one, am fed up with this crap. It's time for GWB to suspend habeus corpus (like Lincoln did during the Civil War) and start rounding these TRAITORS up.

I share your sentiment regarding the un-Americans who only seek to undermine freedom and American tradition...but be careful what you wish for. If someone like Hillary gets into the WH...we would be the intolerant trators sent to internment camps. People still have the right to be dumba$$es.