Two Tickets: Two Americas

At the Corner, Stanley Kurtz has an excellent mini-article or extended blog post on what November and the rest of this decade portends for America:

Remember just after the 2000 election when the famous red and blue map first appeared? It shocked us at the time, and for more reasons than one. Geographically, red counties overwhelmed the blue. Although they amounted to half the country, Democrats were clearly concentrated in just a few populous urban centers and university towns, especially on the coasts. It wasn’t just the geographic predominance of red that surprised, though. It was the contrast between the map and the election that preceded it. The Bush/Gore contest hadn’t been filled with passionate arguments or open ideological divisions. The map emerged as a kind of revelation, a glimpse into the rough, polarizing currents silently flowing beneath a more placid electoral landscape.

The 2012 election reverses all that. The combination of a slashing, class-warfare-based campaign by President Obama and now Mitt Romney’s selection of the boldly conservative Paul Ryan means that we face an epic presidential contest that will openly turn on fundamental philosophical differences between red and blue America. How did we get here, and what does it mean for our future? Above all, now that our internal battle is well-and-truly out in the electoral open, will 2012 decide whether red America or blue America wins for good?

Definitely read the whole thing.