Josh's Weblog: People Moving to Warmer Political Climates

People Moving to Warmer Political Climates

In today's OpinionJournal Political Diary John Fund notes that more and more people are moving to where their politics are more acceptable:

Political scientists are turning up evidence that people are increasingly relocating to states where residents share their basic political values. Count the Motor City Madman, rocker Ted Nugent, as one of them. The lifelong Michigan resident, an enthusiastic conservative and gun owner, has pulled up stakes and turned Texan. He's even donating his services to help the local Crawford High School band raise the money needed to perform at the inauguration on January 20. He will hold a concert tomorrow night that he expects will raise a grubstake of $25,000.

Nugent had a wonderful outfitting store in Michigan (although it is somewhat dwarfed by Cabela's). I wonder if he will try to open up a similar concern in Texas. Competition will certainly be stiffer.

The idea is hardly new. Libertarians got together and proposed the Free State Project where a significant number of libertarians would join together and move to New Hampshire in order to dominate the local political scene.

The primary red versus blue determinant appears to be density, however. The closer together people live the more it seems that they must erect dependency on government services. I can understand police and fire departments, but there does seem to be a movement towards socialism when one's available piece of the landscape diminishes. Perhaps people demand government control of property because what they can afford is so miniscule. I live outside of town so I can afford 15 acres. I used to pay though the nose for 1,000 square feet in downtown Portland.

I don't miss it. And I don't miss the “tax them to death” mentality of my neighbors. Even so, I was not alone. When I ran for office in 1998 I got 15% of them to vote for me.

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Josh Poulson

Posted Friday, Jan 14 2005 01:45 PM