Everything west of 522 should be WV and everything east should be Maryland.
Western Maryland asks West Virginia to 'consider adding us' to their state
61–70 of 113 posts
Re: Western Maryland asks West Virginia to 'consider adding us' to their state
#62> a media market based in Pittsburgh Pittsburgh, PA? On a map the western parts of Maryland seem vaguely as close to Pittsburgh as they are to Baltimore. Even if they were closer to Pittsburgh, PA why would media in Pittsburgh, PA cover events in western Maryland (since it's still kind of far away and Pittsburgh isn't that big a city)? I also don't know what they mean by "media market" being in Pittsburgh, again, if…
It's probably the reverse direction of what you're thinking, it's not that events of western Maryland would be covered by neighboring cities, more that western Marylanders would be more likely to subscribe to Pittsburgh media than Baltimore. Media that comes to mind include radio, bbroadcast TV and advertised events in local papers.
Re: Western Maryland asks West Virginia to 'consider adding us' to their state
#63Earlier quoted context omitted.
Because one party wants two more uncompetitive senate seats.
And the other party doesn't want people having representation at all. For the record, the popular vote percentages for the Democrats in the past 3 senate elections were: 53.0%, 58.2%, and 47.0%. That averages 52.7%, so gaining an extra two senate seats would still mean the Democrats were under-represented. (I know that the purpose of the senate is not to represent each citizen equally, I just thought it was worth poi…
Most of the people living in DC work for the federal government either directly or indirectly. That represents a huge conflict of interest, and was the reason DC was created in the first place. No one lived in DC before it was created, so the people that have put down roots there did so knowing they wouldn't have representation in the federal government.
Re: Western Maryland asks West Virginia to 'consider adding us' to their state
#64Fun fact: they would be moving from the state with the highest median household income to the state with the lowest. I suppose this would only make Maryland richer by that metric. Personally, I’d rather cut my own foot off with a rusty steak knife than live in West Virginia, which has basically nothing going for it except some decent wilderness. It doesn’t help that I have relatives there who love the confederate fla…
My genetic grandfather live in West Virginia, i'd say it is way more diverse than you think it is. I depends where you go though. People who live there are great, i thought at the time i met the only true left candidate in the US (It was before Bernie was a thing). Back-to-land'er hippies communities are a joy to frequent: they play music every time they're not hiking, brewing, building their home or tending their ga…
I drove through rural West Virginia about 6 years ago. Along the road I spotted a broken down van, and I pulled over to see if they needed help. There were three of them, and they were each twice as big as me, and I’m 120kg. I gave a ride to one guy who barely fit in the passenger seat. We got to talking, and he was a retired coal miner. Super friendly. About 30km down the road, he asked me to drop him off at a tiny grocery store so he could walk around and find his preacher, who also happened to be the local tow truck driver.
Re: Western Maryland asks West Virginia to 'consider adding us' to their state
#65I am not sure I understand the goals here. Gerrymandering 2.0? WV lost a seat in the 2020 census. Would move seats from Maryland to WV. From Blue to Red. I like to idea just to square off WV's eastern panhandle. It would look nice on a map with a flat top.
The article lists several reasons: culturally they feel closer to WV, they want to be able to do things like fracking that MD has outlawed, they don't feel heard by the MD government on issues like gun rights and taxes. Essentially they have a cultural divide that has grown deep enough that they want to secede. It's unlikely to happen while Joe Manchin is in office, though; he would likely pitch a fit and get Democra…
If there are natural resources that can be extracted, taxed, and create jobs in those counties and WV already supports the avenue of fracking, I'm not entirely sure Manchin would immediately shut down the idea. I'm sure WV would rather have Frederick county MD to extend state boarders closer to DC and grow the state economy from there.
It surprises me though that citizens in those counties would want to have the state shift below their feet to WV, one of the poorest states in the union. Maybe taxes are cheaper which would be good for them?
Re: Western Maryland asks West Virginia to 'consider adding us' to their state
#66Earlier quoted context omitted.
DC doesn't want to be part of Maryland (they like being independent and feel that Maryland's concerns are not theirs) and Maryland doesn't want DC (they feel it would move the centre of gravity of the state even further towards the DC suburbs, making it worse for the further-flung parts of the state). National Democrats would also like two more Senate seats (and both DC and Maryland are predominantly Democratic, DC a…
By these arguments nearly every sizable city in the country should be its own state. >DC doesn't want to be part of Maryland (they like being independent and feel that Maryland's concerns are not theirs) and Maryland doesn't want DC (they feel it would move the centre of gravity of the state even further towards the DC suburbs, making it worse for the further-flung parts of the state).
I think honestly when the 3 largest cities in the us each have more people than the entire United States did at independence it is worth asking what sort of political reforms are possible
Re: Western Maryland asks West Virginia to 'consider adding us' to their state
#67Earlier quoted context omitted.
And the other party doesn't want people having representation at all. For the record, the popular vote percentages for the Democrats in the past 3 senate elections were: 53.0%, 58.2%, and 47.0%. That averages 52.7%, so gaining an extra two senate seats would still mean the Democrats were under-represented. (I know that the purpose of the senate is not to represent each citizen equally, I just thought it was worth poi…
Most of the people living in DC work for the federal government either directly or indirectly. That represents a huge conflict of interest, and was the reason DC was created in the first place. No one lived in DC before it was created, so the people that have put down roots there did so knowing they wouldn't have representation in the federal government.
I don't think there is much of an ethical point to "Yeah you're disenfranchised but it was your great great great granddaddies choice!"
Re: Western Maryland asks West Virginia to 'consider adding us' to their state
#68Earlier quoted context omitted.
Population of California: 39,656,838* Population of North + South Dakota: 1,645,198* Persons per senator in California: 19,828,419 Persons per senator in the Dakotas: 411,300 Getting highly-overrepresented people to give up their overrepresentation is a hard ask. *latest US Census figures
It's not over-representation, as the senate was never supposed to represent citizens, it was supposed to represent the states. At the time of the declaration of independence, there were some states much larger than others; Virginia had a population of ~747k, and Delaware was at ~59k.
State governments are supposed to represent the people of the state. The people who designed the system just didn't trust the masses. And people can disagree with the design.
Re: Western Maryland asks West Virginia to 'consider adding us' to their state
#69Earlier quoted context omitted.
Massachusetts claim to Maine in the first place was opportunistic and tenuous to begin with whereas the borders of WV and MD (or many of the other states people want to rearrange) have been where they are now for 100+yr.
I strongly believe we only really think that in retrospect because the borders changed long before any of us were born. Additionally, while splitting off Maine was for a good cause - it was essentially just a hack to keep the senate balanced in the lead-up to the civil war.
Maine brook off because during the War of 1812 England conquered a huge chunk of Maine and the good people of the rest of Massachusetts were too cheap to do anything about it.
Re: Western Maryland asks West Virginia to 'consider adding us' to their state
#70Earlier quoted context omitted.
DC doesn't want to be part of Maryland (they like being independent and feel that Maryland's concerns are not theirs) and Maryland doesn't want DC (they feel it would move the centre of gravity of the state even further towards the DC suburbs, making it worse for the further-flung parts of the state). National Democrats would also like two more Senate seats (and both DC and Maryland are predominantly Democratic, DC a…
By these arguments nearly every sizable city in the country should be its own state. >DC doesn't want to be part of Maryland (they like being independent and feel that Maryland's concerns are not theirs) and Maryland doesn't want DC (they feel it would move the centre of gravity of the state even further towards the DC suburbs, making it worse for the further-flung parts of the state).
But people in those sizable cities can already vote for and are represented by a senator.