Are xenophobia, racism, and gun rights paying off for you, Missourians?

No. Most of the state is a s*&^hole with median household incomes of about $35-40K. Last I checked, about 85% of the state GDP is from St Louis, Kansas City, Jefferson City and Columbia, ie the blue dots. It's failing.

But gerrymandering has handed disproportionate power to the people living in the failing areas who vote for people to perpetuate the spiral and punish the few bright spots of economic activity, education, art and liveliness.

Recently, I had to drive to a small town about 2 hours south of St Louis. Most of the drive was through ragged small towns with a gas station/convenience store, a small school and a bunch of run-down houses with junk vehicles on the lawn. Occasionally, there would be this huge, extremely well-kept house with acres of manicured lawn around it (many even had small ponds). Most likely wealthy people from one of the cities who got the land cheap.

The new governor has now eliminated the capital gains tax, causing an estimated $1 billion deficit in the state budget for 2026.

Guess who is going to bear the brunt of the impact of the program cuts that are inevitably going to follow? Yup. Them.