Why the massive rural/urban divide?

[MarkDel]

A lot of people are getting this wrong. Where you live does NOT determine how you vote. How you VOTE determines where you live. This is a totally new phenomenon in American culture and it's NOT a positive development for the social cohesion of the nation. And I say that as someone who is very guilty of this behavior himself.

Take where I live in the Atlanta area. The inner city votes Democratic by a wide, wide margin. Part of that is racial, but not entirely as the rich white people in the inner city vote heavily Democratic as well. Now come out to the extended suburbs and the picture is 100% reversed even though the vast majority of the people who live in Forsyth County (where I live) actually work in or much nearer to inner city Atlanta. Most of them are transplanted Northerners like me, and they selected Forsyth because it's the kind of place (socially, politically, etc...) where they want to raise their children.

It's almost exclusively about your FAMILY. When I was single, I lived in NYC, Philly and DC at different times...why? Well, near the bars, social life and less commute. Plus, as a single guy, I had no problem carrying a gun at all times to fend off the vultures who tend to congregate in the inner cities. But with a family, I wanted to move as far away from that crap as possible, both for reasons of security, and the desire to raise solid, productive citizens as my kids rather than the cretinous children I see coming out of inner cities at EVERY socio-economic level these days.

[MarkDel]

Also, after carefully reading this thread, there is something that is painfully obvious. Some very, very intelligent European posters may have a grasp of  the US political system, but they understand very, very little of the "layout" of the nation. They have a significant misunderstanding of the terms "country" and "suburb" and "exurb" and may even lack a complete understanding of "inner city"

These terms apparently have very different meanings in Europe than they do in the US. I guess that Al has a better sense than most, but even he is missing it a little bit. I guess this is one of those cases where you have to live in a given culture to totally understand it.