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What I took away from this polling information is this is another indication of conservative self delusion.
conservatives say they prefer to live in rural or small towns by huge margins, yet based on where they actually live, that is not true.
Anyone can take a look at interactive maps of where Americans live, and the reality is that more and more Americans live in big cities or the suburbs of big cities, and fewer and fewer American live in rural areas.
Yet despite this reality, conservatives have deluded themselves into believing they prefer living in small towns and rural areas at the moment the fewest Americans live in either place.
This is what the nation is confronting a group of zealots who are completely blind to their own nation's reality.
If enjoying living 17 miles out of Yosemite is your idea of delusional I think YOU have a problem, not me.
I think that living in the city can actually be fiscally conservative. I've lived car free in two the most expensive areas in the country Cambridge, MA (near Boston), and Queens, NY.
I won't use my Cambridge apartment as an example because somehow by the grace of God and/or Darwin my wife and I were able to get an apartment there for a steal.
But in Queens we paid $1550 for a market rate apartment in the working class/immigrant neighborhood of Elmhurst. Is $1550 a lot of money? **** yeah it is.
But let's take a similar apartment in a place with little or no public transit. Let's just say for argument's sake we'll halve the $1550 and say $775. I'm not going to get into utilities.
In the course of the year, in Queens we spent $18,600. Yes, that's a lot of money!
In our hypothetical suburban apartment, we'd pay $9300. Somewhat more reasonable, right?
Then we add in transportation costs. I didn't have a metro pass, but my wife did. However, once again, for argument sake we'll add me in there. A NYC MTA card costs $112. multiply that times 2 and you've got $224. Then times 12 months a year and you've got $2688.
Add that to the 18,600 and you've got $21,288. Living and transportation.
Most married suburbanites I know have two cars. According to AAA, it costs the average person $9122. Multiply that times 2 and you've got 18244...almost exactly what we paid in rent for a whole year! Add in the $9300 and your total is $27544.
City-$21,288 This cost does not reflect long distance bus/train trips or the occasional rental.
Suburbs-$27,544. That total doesn't include the costs of buying two cars.
So living like that, we "liberals" are actually the fiscal conservatives.
this is right on for me. Even though Im young, I would prefer to live on some acreage or in the suburbs with a larger property than Manhattan for example.
If it hasn't been said yet, is it any surprise that people who make money and live in big houses tend to vote Republican. Of course it is a broad generalization but so was much of that survey (as mentioned by other posters). But to each his own.
Have you ever hear the expression ...."dress for the job you want"???
I voted for the party the people in the big houses liked.....cause I wanted that kind of money.
Now, I know about the liberal limousine.....but, they are way out of my league.
Political affiliations aside the town I have lived in for over 4 decades used to be a nice small rural town of 7000, it was walkable or you could just ride a bike if you were in a hurry. Not only did people know their neighbors but everyone else in town as well. Rusted pick-up trucks full of hay bales and farm implements were a common sight on the roads and the FFA had a "drive your tractor to school day" Life here in those days were more fulfilling less stuff but more friends.
Over the last 15-20 years the cornfields morphed into McMansion subdivisions, gated golf course developments which drew smug suburbanites like flies to a manure pile. These people who infested err inhabited the area have been nothing but a detriment to the area, they commute to jobs 25-30 miles away and on weekends shop at "upscale" locales 25-30 miles away. They view the local natives as beneath them and let them know it this attitude has made them unwelcome as they complain about everything and try to change things to be like the place the just left, usually a crap hole like Cincinnati, Michigan or Illinois.
Ironically this area has always been overwhelmingly conservative Republican to the point where elections are decided in the primaries with no Democrat challenger in November.
Keep in mind there are different flavors of conservative, some just taste like milk two weeks past the expiration date.
Makes sense to me. We just built a big house on a big parcel way out in DC suburbia and we shutter to think that anyone could consider "being able to walk to Walgreens" an attractive amenity in home buying. Gag!!
I've always chose places where I could drive to work in less than 15 minutes and have a two way commute of less than 10 miles (there is something to be said when you can go for more than a month without getting gas) . If I'd got a hybrid or a electric car like the Tesla product one might have to never buy gas again. Being able to walk less than a block to get to a CVS and a small grocery store or bodega is a plus as is having a few places to eat (other than Mickey Ds) . Add a post office and one is able to live with out a car. Which became a life saver when health problems made it a bigger health rist to drive a car and I retired out on disability and gave up my drivers license. Americans living in sunurbs with long commutes and having to drive to get anything are going to find out that old age or health setbacks can make them a prisoner in a tract mansion with little freedom and a lot of frustration unless they are wealthy enought to get a professional driver to get them around. Or they will be those people who are a danger to themselves and the rest of the motoring public by trying to drive (we all know the typr of driver I am refering to) when they are legally blind or have lost the skills expected of a safe driver.
If one decides that it is best to live in one place and not another...... You see how saying you want to live somewhere that you don't think is best is just delusional fantasies?
This is a huge problem with conservatives too much delusional thinking.
No, being practical is not delusional.
I may be conservative but I'm not rich and I don't have the luxury to live where my heart desires and still be able to provide for my family.
This is largely due to the economic conditions in the state I used to live in, as opposed to any type of difference in city vs rural.
Knowing that and doing what I have to do now, while at the same time working towards being (or in my case, going back to) where I would prefer to be does not make me delusional or a hypocrite.........it makes me a realist.
Conservatives know how to plan and save for what they want, be that a big condo in the city or the farm house they grew up in.
To each their own but life is too short to spend all of your time driving everywhere.
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