"These stupid non-stories need to be exposed whenever they pop up."

You made your stupid point three times, we get it.

"No, it's not the truth, and it ceased being the truth when the federal government federalized citizenship as well as the rest of the so-called "bill of rights".

You insisting something is true, as you usually do, without any argument, because of one of your legendary "socialist" professors you purportedly had, doesn't make a damn bit of difference."

The truth I was mentioning was about the 3-2 city council resolution you're making out to be an instrument of secession. You know, the one you responded "I. Don't. Fucking. Care." to?

Fine, wonderful.

I'd say many countries received their subdivisions in a time when communication was a hell if a lot slower. Their size reflects it, as to make government closer to the people and easier to understand. Nowadays, the distance from citizens to central government is soooo much smaller. I think it makes a lot of sense to scale up the size as well.

For example, the Netherlands still has 12 provinces, which we could do away with in one fell swoop, and nobody would notice.

"Evansville, Indiana in the same super-state as Pittsburgh? Chicago as a border town, when Chicagoland could arguably go as far west as Rockford? The UP attached to Upstate New York? It's ridiculous."

All three of these examples strike me as minor distinctions/corrections. Saying "Chicago plus its (expansive) suburbs" instead of "Chicago" doesn't change the rightful cultural distinction made between the Chicago area and southern/middle Illinois, which is what I was discussing. I don't know whether I would necessarily group Evansville with Pittsburgh; I would probably put it in Appalachia and rename that to something more indicative of the expansion (Upland South?). But that's also pretty minor. And while connecting the Upper Peninsula with Upstate NY might not make a lot of sense to you as a political entity, I'd argue it certainly fits as a cultural grouping, which, again, is what I was actually discussing.

We're absolutely discussing political entities.

I have no idea why you think the UP is culturally like Upstate New York. The UP's very distinct from the rest of Michigan. If anything, it's more like the North of Wisconsin and Outstate Minnesota.

As for Chicago, you really have to go fairly far south and west to escape it. While a place like Kankakee isn't a "suburb" it still has much more in common with the built-up area around Chicago than the vast expanse of farmland punctuated by colleges and prisons which make up the rest of the state.

Sure, fine, give UP to the Grainery region and attach Chicagoland to the Great Lakes.

Wow, controversy solved.

I know this is just a thought experiment, but there are serious consequences to ideas like this.

The problem you face when you start dividing people up into these "cultural" entities is that you are encouraging and unleashing centrifugal forces. You are encouraging the differences between upstate NY and NYC, or between East Tennessee and Memphis, instead of that which they share. You aren't making it any easier to govern the territory now known as the USA. If anything, you are making dissolution more likely. You think we have gridlock and culture wars now?

And you think we have secessionist movements now? Northern Virginia would be petitioning to be out of Appalachia. You think West Texas would be content to be dominated by SoCal? Spokane is closer to Idaho culturally, than to Seattle. It's been pointed out that Indiana is a divided state, but so is Ohio. So is Florida. Where do you draw the line? People go to war over that sort of thing.

No, UP should stay with Great Lakes. Too attached to MI

A much more glaring problem is that of NOLA, which I'd sooner see grouped with the Caribbean but its distance makes it weird.

These regions make more sense, I believe, when expanded with the rest of North America. Alberta joining the Mountain States, BC joining the Pac NW, Saskatchewan & Manitoba joining the Grainery, Ontario joining the Great Lakes, northern Mexico joining the Southwest, and the Maritimes joining New England.

One of the reasons why the Southeast is "so large" is because it's one of the economic-cultural regions that is entirely self-contained within the US. Other regions have a lot of spillover.

You quoted me explicitly talking about cultural groupings and not political entities. If you're going to argue my comment was incorrect, don't remove it from its context to do so.

I was thinking about Upstate NY and UP as both being similar due to influence from Canada, but (a) it's not strong enough to make up for other cultural differences and (b) I wouldn't include either with the Midwestern polity, so I'll grant that. I think my broader point stands, though; these are all relatively minor distinctions that can be acknowledged without influencing the broader cultural picture very much, which is what I was discussing.

I wouldn't redraw the political boundaries either, at least not on a state level, if you want my political input, but I'm far more interested in the implied cultural groupings than the political discussion.

Yeah, New Orleans (and I'd even argue the entirety of southern Louisiana) would be better classified as Caribbean than "continental" Deep South. The main reason Louisiana is so culturally distinct from the rest of the South is that it's essentially a Caribbean state within the continental US; it's not the prototypical "Deep South American" state like Alabama or Mississippi are.

This really only holds for the southern part though, northern Louisiana is essentially just an extension of Mississippi or southern Arkansas.

Upstate NY can probably be Ukrained. The Adirondacks and capital district are more New England-leaning, the southern tier, central and western NY are more midwestern.

Putin, you might also like:

Shaping our Nation by Michael Barone
American Nations by Colin Woodard
Albion's Seed by David Hackett Fischer

"You think we have gridlock and culture wars now? "

One would hope that governance would be easier if polities were more culturally similar than dissimilar.

Yeah, those polities would all govern themselves away from each other. You'd need a very loose Federal system.

Thanks for the recommendations.

Basically you are talking about turning the US into the EU. A bunch of culturally contained polities that lack a real common bond, outside of geography and economic advantage, to keep them all Federated together.

It'd facilitate a move towards a North American Union though, which is probably inevitable.

I sort of picture some time in the future it ending up like "I Robot." One hegemony with one "state" per continent.

And I see the exact opposite happening. Look at Scotland, Catalan, and these movements here in the States. I see decentralization.

Look at what DIDN'T happen. Look at countries that want to join the EU/NATO/UN/other organization. If you consider over history, we have generally moved to larger and larger nations with more and more centralization. Compare to tribal government, or even familial.

Those organizations give economic benefit. I agree that we'll see larger free-trade zones, or currency federations, or whatever. But I get the sense that people want to govern themselves and define themselves in smaller units. They cling to those parochial identities more as the world globalizes.

I think the tide of smallness has passed. The recession made smallness look very vulnerable (Ireland, Iceland, Cyprus, etc), and scared a majority of Scots into staying in the UK. Like the 1930s, the global economy is beginning what I think will be a trend of protectionism and trade barriers and small states will no longer find the world economy open enough for them to flourish.