With his column referenced below, Hinderaker posts a map in the by-now classical red and blue, showing the states carried by Trump and those carried by Mrs. Clinton. If the separation into two countries along those lines should occur, the Red country has interior lines of communication, the Blue country does not.
Presumably some treaty permitting transit would be negotiated. However, to the extent that the various non contiguous parts of the Blue country represent different ethnic populations, is there not some likelihood that they will eventually further separate into several more countries, as did East and West Pakistan?
It is likely the Blue country would operate a European model of high taxes, well-funded social welfare services, on the order of France or Scandinavia. The Red country would take more of a low tax, opportunity-based capitalist model. Free movement between the two would exist for some period of months or years, but presumably not be open-ended.
The trouble with Hinderaker’s map is that essentially every large city in the current U.S. would want to be in the Blue country, including places like St. Louis, Denver, Atlanta, and Houston. On the other hand, every rural area including upstate NY, downstate IL and Central Valley CA would want to be in the Red country. There is just no way to have a country of cities, and another of rural areas, all mixed up - or is there?
I’m remembering the walled Chicago of the SciFi film Divergent. Maybe that’s the way we go, with cities as Singapore-style independent (or allied) city states and the rural parts of America being “another country” operating under different, looser rules.
Could this model work? I wonder if Divergent author Veronica Roth saw herself as a prophet? Or maybe the prophet was Harry Harrison with his Make Room, Make Room novel on which the Soylent Green film was based. I’d even make a case for Lee Kuan Yew, the designer of Singapore, as the real “father” of the successful modern city state.
It is looking like we’re going to get the chance to learn what will and won’t work, by trial and error. Because as Hinderaker points out, what we’re doing now is not working.
