Why the massive rural/urban divide?

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Demographics mean that *both* parties are essentially urban now (if we include suburbs, exurbs and commuter villages etc. as "urban" which, if we're doing a strict line between urban and rural, we should). Essentially the Democratic Party is the party of the inner core of a "city" while the GOP dominates the outer limits. The idea that the Democratic party is the party of latte sipping yuppies while the GOP is the party of slack-jawed yokels and rednecks just isn't true, no matter how much the media and many partisans from either side seem to wish that it were.
Rural areas have been left by the wayside and abandoned by both parties save for a few token gestures; significantly the GOP now does badly in some rural areas where it was once the master (the Upper Mississippi is the obvious example, but there are others) and we all now this is the case with the national Democrats...
Seeing as the issues that the two serious candidates made a fuss over last election were yon social/wedge issues, then it is to be expected that most rural areas voted for the more conservative of the two candidates. Had the issues been unemployment, economic development or healthcare, you'd expect the reverse of that to be the case. That Kerry got so solidly hammered in most Democratic rural areas is entirely his own fault and not part of some great national "trend" towards urban/rural polarisation; many rural Democrats did well in Congressional races and *especially* in the State Legislative elections (look at Montana).

To finish, some rather sobering maps:

[Filuwaúrdjan]

No idea about exurbs/inner suburbs split but I think rural - suburban - urban is roughly 20-55-25 or 17-58-25.

Some of that "rural" % will be commuter towns and stuff. Almost always included in "rural" and never really should be...

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Got a better term?

Commuterland. Or any of the numerous variations upon that general theme.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

I said a better term.

I took "better" to mean "accurate".

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The fact that they are not rural. They are outposts of the cities in areas that were once rural, they are places inhabited by people who live urban lifestyles, work in indisputably urban areas and have white collar jobs. Even the houses are usually distinctly urban.
The only "rural" thing about these areas is the tendency for fair sized spaces inbetween each cluster.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Rural means out in the country.

No it doesn't. Only property developers think that.

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Don't think I actually mentioned poverty so...

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Property developers and the dictionary.

An ordinary dictionary isn't a great place to look for complex geographical terms, but if you insist, here are some dictionary definitions of the word "rural":

"Of the country, country people or life, or agriculture"

"Of the country, a country-dweller"

And a neat little description of "country" from the second dictionary; "rural districts as distinct from town".

[Filuwaúrdjan]

So out in the country, as I said.

No... that's not what it says at all... and at the same time it depends what "the country" is determined as being.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

It implies that it is not urban, which the country is not.

Not so. If it did then suburban areas would be classed as rural; they aren't.
Fundamentally things like lifestyle, employment, place of work and, in many cases, building designs are the best ways to find out if an area is urban, rural, suburban, etc, etc than any alternatives that I can see.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

The fact that something implies the lack of something else, does not mean the lack of that latter something defines the former.

Irrelevent. "Rural" is essentially defined by what it is not not what it is.

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No, no it isn't. I've been over this a couple of times already and you just refuse to listen. You're like a spoilt three year old at times.

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No it doesn't. Keep your snobbery to yourself.

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No it is not. Just because you happen to think something doesn't mean that everyone else does.
I seriously doubt that someone living in a real rural area would describe commuterland areas as being in anyway "rural".

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I don't have my own definition of rural. I tend to try to use definitions that are actually accurate and that are generally favoured by people who actually know what they're talking about.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

It's defined by the country.

What exactly is "the country" then?

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Nope. Certainly didn't do that. You just squirmed around it. Although as I pointed out, a dictionary isn't the be all and end all of this sort of thing.

Oh and in future don't post things along the lines of the playground response "I know you are". Thanks.

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How exactly? It's not *impossible* that such an area might be rural, it's just not very *likely*...

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Again, what do you mean by "the country"?

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Hmm? I think I'm using the appropriate definition in the appropriate way. You are free to disagree.

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[Filuwaúrdjan]

I would say that for a poor person, rural living is not necessarily easier than urban living.

It isn't. Trust me on this...

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Very true

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Even truer

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Yep. As opposed to almost nothing at all or nothing at all... where I grew up the only public transport (other than school stuff; largely "minibuses"; in most cases these were glorified transit vans...) was one sh*tty bus that left around 9-ish in the morning and came back around 5-ish in the afternoon. And this wasn't on all weekdays either... for a while it was just Saturdays...