BUG, OR FEATURE? "'An individualistic culture, much more suspicious of government, favoring lower taxes, elevating private interests over public good and commonalities, is finally taking the reins,' [Minnesota State University at Moorhead political science professor Jim] Danielson said." (Source: a Regions of Mind speculation on Minnesota becoming a "red" state, via InstaPundit.) No discussion in the post of whether those "public good and commonalities" are in fact useful, or a due-process protection racket (more to come.) I recall something called a "certificate of public convenience and necessity" that inter alia precluded a Boston-Albany trucking company that merged with an Albany-New York City trucking company from hauling goods Boston-New York by way of Providence and New Haven.

Memo to political junkies: the colors flop with each election, if memory serves. The Republicans will be a proper Tory blue on the 2004 map, and the Democrats will be (draw your own inferences) red.