I am about halfway through a very interesting book that, so far, explains a lot about American politics. I thought I had a pretty good education on American History. But if this book is right, I missed a lot.

The thesis of the book is that North America, mostly the US but including Canada and norther Mexico, is made up of essential eight separate countries. Each founded by different people with different histories, cultures, governments, and expectations. For example, the French worked with the indigenous peoples while those from the British Isles worked to extirpate them. The Deep South, the agricultural part of it, was very slavery driven and governed by a few elites. Few other than the landed class had any say in government. The Appalacians were founded by Scots-Irish who basically governed themselves, period. New England was made up of all farmers, businessmen, artisans, and such who believed very strongly in community government. And so it went. Each was founded by folks with very different ideas and even the Revolutionary War was nowhere near a consensus action.

Long way of saying that Streamer is very correct that if the Democrats want to get back in the game they need to seriously look at history and expectations. That, and as I have heard a lot recently, they have to actually deliver programs that succeed.

I think the Right is winning a lot because people want something done to fix issues and the Left has simply not done much for folks. I am not sure the Right has done much, either, but the have promised change from the current morass.