Except it's a rural/urban divide. This is one of the main reasons the West tends to be more liberal overall: for all practical purposes, the hierarchy of the west was established by sea, and the major cities of the west were minor outposts until air conditioning and automobiles. Population in the west diffused from city to country. The east is the same just a hundred years ahead or so, such that the rural areas have less of a link to the urban areas. I think this is reversing. If I can pay you 2/3rds your salary to show up via Zoom? If you'll take 2/3rds of your salary because rent is 1/3rd what it is in San Francisco? You're gonna start complaining that there's no Whole Foods in Barstow, AZ. If enough of your friends do the same there's suddenly yoga studios.
My wife recently poked a hole in my theory by pointing out that having abortion be suddenly illegal is likely to deflate a lot of plans to move to, oh, thirteen states. I agree with her, she's certainly right. But there's also a broad contingent of Hollywood intent on boycotting Georgia, which is saying a lot considering how much production has moved there over the past fifteen years. Here's the thing: industrial production of whatever we're making is no longer tied to resources. It's largely tied to tax incentives and social conditions. For fifteen years it's been desirable for Hollywood to shoot in Georgia and Louisiana, no matter how regressive their governments are. For the past five or six, though, it's been tenuous. For twenty years it's been desirable for Hollywood to shoot in New Mexico. Which has gone from being republican-leaning in my childhood to being California-democratic. Sure - there's crazy there. They elected a libertarian governor (he ran as a republican, things went worse than expected). But in a global economy where broadband and organic food are enough, industry can pull out of a repressive state as fast as they can move in. I think this is going to suck. I think it's going to suck for an interminably long time, and I think it's going to suck amazingly hard. But I also think we're a long way from steady-state. Some jackass on Twitter tried to make this all the fault of everyone who didn't vote for Clinton because of course they did. He further scolded Democrats for only voting in national elections while Republicans reliably vote every time in every race. He wanted it to be true so badly, and so did his audience, that he didn't even bother linking to anything like facts. What he was trying to get to, which is much less hard to scold people for, is the fact that Democrats want their vote earned, while Republicans will vote Republican unless you've lost their vote. That's the question: how many Republicans are ready to opt out? how many will opt out come November? The basic problem the Republicans have is they've been pandering to their base for so long that their base has peeled them off fully to fascism. Most Americans aren't fascist; history would be much simpler if we were. I don't know how this resolves? But I know that if Republicans hadn't been a minority party for 40 years they wouldn't have to do all the shit they're doing just to get elected.