The exclusive charts and data on this site -- and others that we link to -- illustrate two very important points that need to be made about religion and politics in America today.  Most of the data for this first chart comes from the extremely thorough polling and research made during the 1996 election cycle by the highly regarded Pew Charitable Trust.          More recent research (2005) shows that little has changed since the charts below were created for this web page.  Http://wid.ap.org/polls/050606religion.html , for example, shows the results of an extensive poll comparing 10 major countries, in which the U.S. was found to be much more religious and more willing to mix religion and politics than any of the others.         The lack of interest in religion by the great majority of those in leadership positions in the Democratic Party has caused too many of them to underestimate its importance for a vast number of American voters.  The tendency of such Democrats to put their heads in the sand when it comes to religion is a recipe for political suicide.          The British empiricist philosopher, David Hume, once said,  " 'Tis impossible to refute a system, which has never been explained. In such a matter as fighting in the dark, a man loses his blows in the air, and often places them where the enemy is not present. "         Far from becoming less important to Americans, research shows that religion is more important than ever to them,  at least on a superficial level,   --  which is all it takes for it to have serious political consequences.--

We honestly believe this is the best web site on this topic on the entire www, at least in English. Whether you agree or want to contest that claim, we invite you to publish your views on our public LiberalsLikeChrist.Org/forum.

According to what people themselves say about their interest in religion, many more voters identify themselves with churches today than ever before in America.  But even when they don't go to any church, many Americans vote on what have come to be called "moral issues" as opposed to the so-called "economic issues" which motivate Liberal Democrats.  This fact was brought home to me on election day in 2000 when I took a break from campaigning at the local McDonald's in a heavily populated, working-class neighborhood.  When I noticed a bunch of old bulls like myself talking politics, I asked if I could join them, assuming that I would be among friends.  But the minute they found out I was working for the Democrats they all pounced on me with something like "How can you support those baby killers?"  They and their families and their country were getting screwed up one side and down the other, but for them, as for many other American voters, this religious view trumps everything else!  And as a minister, I assure you these weren't the kind of guys that I saw in church very often.          ( I say so-called "economic issues" because Democrats who think and refer to them only as economic are making a big mistake.  They could be having a much greater impact on people for whom morality decides their vote, if they stressed the moral dimension of who pays how much for government and who gets how much services from the government.  These people would respond if Democrats argued, as I do in many other pages of this web site, that what Republicans are all about is immoral, and contrary to the teaching of the Bible, while Democrats are all about doing exactly what the Bible says that people should do.         In 2002, a Pew Research Council survey found that 82 percent of the U.S. populace considered itself to be Christian, while 10 percent identified with no religious group.         When the Harris Poll did a study of the religious beliefs of today's U. S. electorate, they reported some very interesting findings at harrisinteractive.com/harris_poll/index.asp?PID=359, among them : The 90% of adults who believe in God include 93% of women, 96% of African-Americans and 93% of Republicans but only 86% of men, 85% of those with postgraduate degrees, and 87% of political independents. The 84% of those who believe in the survival of the soul after death include 89% of women but only 78% of men, 86% of those without a college degree but only 78% of those with postgraduate degrees. The 84% of the public who believe in miracles falls to 72% among those with postgraduate degrees, and rises to 90% among women and 90% among African-Americans. The 82% who believe in heaven includes 89% of women but only 75% of men and falls to 71% among people aged 25 to 29 and those with postgraduate degrees. The survey findings show that a large majority of Americans consider religion important in their personal lives and closely associate religion and morality. Furthermore, Pew Forum surveys over several years show that Americans are generally more comfortable (than Europeans) with religion playing a major role in public life.         The next graph is exclusive to this web site, as I myself created it, to illustrate the extremely valuable information collected by the Pew Trust.  This graph may explain why Liberals and Democrats went from practically owning every major public office in this country fifty years ago to being practically locked out of most of them now.  Younger people may not realize it, and older people may have forgotten, but Democrats did far more than just control Congress following the "Great Depression."  During the 36 years prior to Nixon's taking the White House in 1968, the only Republican to sit in the oval office was World War II hero, Gen. "Ike" Eisenhower.  And with control of the presidency came control of the Supreme Court.  And the Democratic Party not only controlled Congress during those years, but most of the state legislatures, the state houses and the leadership of the major cities throughout the country as well.         What has happened since 1968 to turn all of that on its head, so that between 1968 and 1992, Democrats were able to win the presidency for only the four Carter years?  Why have Democrats been denied majorities in both houses of Congress, and the state houses of several of our most populous states: New York, Texas, Illinois, Michigan, Pennsylvania, Ohio, New Jersey, Florida, Massachusetts, and until recently, even California?  Democrats have even been denied the leadership of several of our largest Democratic cities!         The reasons, to be sure, are numerous, but one of the principal ones, I would argue, is the brave, generous, very moral, but very costly stand which Democrats took under the leadership of Presidents Kennedy and Johnson, and Vice President Hubert Humphrey, to reverse America's racist past, for which L.B.J. rightly predicted the Democratic party would pay dearly, not just in the South, but nationwide.         But I believe another major reason is illustrated in this next graph, which shows why Liberals and/or Democrats   --  who seem to be courting the votes of the groups on the Left end of this chart (i.e. the non-religious 6% of the American electorate and the 2% of the voters who are Jewish)   --  are being trounced in the political arena by the Conservatives and/or Republicans   --  who are making no bones about courting the three groups on the Right end of this chart:  white evangelicals, mainline white protestants and Roman Catholics.   ---  Each of the three blocks the G.O.P. is courting represents close to ="25%" of the population, adding up to 75% .  The G.O.P. is quite content to let the Democrats have the rest.  But as wonderful as the Jews, Muslims, the minorities and non-believers may be,  all together they only add up to a quarter of the voting public!  (The percentages have changed some since 1996, but while Republicans work to make the most of the situation, Democrats continue to be oblivious to it.)         For the latest and most complete source of information about religious demographics, see www.adherents.com

So long as Democrats settle for that one quarter of the pie, it is no wonder that they keep losing ground.  But this is especially sad, considering what the polling reveals, i.e.   that despite the efforts of the G.O.P. and their allies of the Religious Right,  and the lethargy of the Democrats,  the only religious group that actually favored the G.O.P. in the summer leading up to the 1996 elections was the "white evangelicals" and only by a surprisingly small margin at that!   If only the Democratic Party had capitalized on this dramatic advantage, instead of ignoring it,   the outcome of those elections might have been Democratic control of Congress, along with the Presidency!         Click here for more recent, and very interesting statistics which show what portion of the electorate votes largely on the basis of moral values, and how that vote effected the outcome of the first election of this millennium: "Values Voters" in the 2000 election.         Those who assume that the G.O.P. "owns" the Christian vote are simply mistaken.  They may even be contributing to a self-fulfilling prophecy, by repelling Christians into the arms of the Republican Party.  We "Liberals Like Christ" are trying to help our fellow Christians see that in America today the Democratic Party is much closer to the teaching of Jesus and the other great prophets of the Bible than is today's Republican Party.         Conservatives, however, dominate to various degrees most of the white Christian churches in America today.  Even those that ARE sympathetic are so self-centered that they will do nothing to promote "Liberals Like Christ" because we do not promote their denomination.  So if word is going to get out about "Liberals Like Christ", it will only happen if Liberals and Democrats like yourselves do it.         See the parable of "the Stollen Inheritance"         See articles by others that make this or similar points: This one urges Democrats not to write off the "freestyle evangelicals" of America : .prospect.org/print-friendly/print/V15/4/mcgarvey-a.html

 

The chart below illustrates one of the principal reasons why the Democrats have lost so many offices to the Republican party, since their party embraced the rights of the few to be treated fairly by the many.         For the 36 years after the Depression, The Democratic Party completely dominated not only Congress, but most state houses and the Supreme Court.  And the public kept a Democrat in the White House for all but the eight Eisenhower years.  Then came the promotion and passage of the Civil Rights & Voting bills of 1964 & 1968.  And that is when everything changed, almost overnight!
Year :	1 9 6 8   Election				1 9 7 2   Election
Percentages for :	Nixon	Wallace	Humphrey		Nixon	McGovern
Alabama	14	67	19		74	26
Arkansas	31	39	30		69	31
Florida	41	29	31		72	28
Georgia	30	43	27		75	25
Louisiana	23	48	28		70	30
Mississippi	14	63	23		80	20
N. Carolina	40	31	29		71	29
S. Carolina	38	32	30		72	28
Tennessee	38	34	28		69	31
Texas	40	19	41		67	33
Virginia	44	24	33		69	31
Averages:	32 %	39 %	29 %		72 %	28 %
The profile of voters in the Deep South :	The Conservative 71% split their votes between Nixon and Wallace.		The Liberal 29% voted for the Liberal Democrat.		The same Conservative 72% went for Republican Nixon.	The same Liberal 28% voted for the Liberal Democrat.
Table designed by Ray Dubuque, using data extracted from the 1976 edition of "The Almanac of American Politics" ( one of the most respected reference books on the subject.)
The Bottom Line:        The South went from being solidly Democratic before the promotion and passage of the Civil Rights bills of '64 & '65 to voting 7 to 3 against the National Democratic Party thereafter.   And the vote for George Wallace shows exactly who moved from the pre-civil rights Democratic Party  to the post-civil rights Republican Party  and why.         Although the effect was less dramatic in other parts of the country, it was one of the most important factors in the country going in a few short years from almost complete Democratic control of the U.S. Congress, many state legislatures, and the governorships of most states, to almost complete Republican control of most of those bodies, including some of the most Democratic of our states..  And since 1968,  only Republicans and Democratic governors from the Deep South have won the presidency.

Conservatives are great at talking about morality but what the facts show is that contrary to what you would expect from all of their "holier than thou" speechifying, they are lousy when it comes to acting morally.  When you compare the way Conservative, vs. Liberal states act, you find that the more LIBERAL states are, the FEWER abortions, teen pregnancies, suicides and murders they have; and the more CONSERVATIVE states are, the MORE abortions, teen pregnancies, suicides and murders they have.

Abortion Rates by state (assuming that states that voted for Kerry in 2004 were more Liberal, and those which voted for Bush were more Conservative)
ALL but one of the ten states with the lowest rates of abortion are considered "LIBERAL" :	1 Massachusetts 2.4  2 Connecticut 2.8  3 New Jersey 3.0  4 Rhode Island 3.2  5 New York 3.3  6 Pennsylvania 3.3  7 Wisconsin 3.4  8 North Dakota 3.4  9 Maryland 3.5 10 Minnesota 3.6	Liberal Liberal Liberal Liberal Liberal Liberal Liberal Conservative Liberal Liberal
.  .  .
ALL but one of the Sixteen states with the highest rates of abortion are considered "CONSERVATIVE" :	35 Texas   5.4 36 Alaska   5.5 37 Washington   5.6 38 Mississippi   5.7 39 Kentucky   5.8 40 Arizona   5.8 41 Florida   5.9 42 New Mexico   6.0 43 Idaho   6.2 44 Alabama   6.2 45 Indiana   6.6 46 Wyoming   6.5 47 Tennessee   6.6 48 Oklahoma   6.7 49 Arkansas   7.1 50 Nevada   9.0	Conservative Conservative Liberal Conservative Conservative Conservative Conservative Conservative Conservative Conservative Conservative Conservative Conservative Conservative Conservative Conservative
Table designed by Ray Dubuque, with data from: Divorce statistics from Divorce Magazine, compiled from Center for Disease Control, National Center for Health Statistics. and Election Results from CNN.

When it comes to states with the highest vs. the lowest Divorce Rates ( i.e. per 1,000 for the year 2001 )
All ten states with the highest Divorce rates are considered "CONSERVATIVE" : Nevada   6.8 Arkansas   6.6 Wyoming   6.1 Idaho   5.6 Kentucky   5.5 Florida   5.4 Mississippi   5.4 Alabama   5.3 Tennessee   5.2 West Virginia   5.2	Of the eleven states with the lowest Divorce rates, seven are considered "LIBERAL" : Wisconsin   3.2 Pennsylvania   3.2 Kansas   3.2 (Conservative) Iowa   3.2 (Conservative) Illinois   3.2 New York   3.3 Maryland   3.0 Connecticut   2.9 North Dakota   2.7 (Conservative) Montana   2.6 (Conservative) Massachusetts   2.4
Sources:       Table designed by Ray Dubuque, using data extracted from U.S Census Bureau, Statistical Abstract, 2003, Table No. 126

Don't let homosexuals destroy the institution of marriage.     That's a job for "Christian" Republicans politicians: Ronald Reagan - divorced the mother of two of his children to marry Nancy Reagan who bore him a daughter only 7 months after the marriage. Gerald Ford - married to Betty (a divorcee). Sen. Bob Dole - divorced the mother of his child, who had nursed him through the long recovery from his war wounds. If you think George H.W. Bush was a model of virtue, check out en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jennifer_Fitzgerald Sen. Phil Gramm of Texas - divorced. Sen. Lauch Faircloth - divorced. Sen. Alfonse D'Amato of New York - divorced. Sen. John McCain of Arizona - divorced. Sen. John Warner of Virginia - twice divorced (once married to Liz Taylor.). Newt Gingrich - divorced his wife who was dying of cancer. Dick Armey - House Majority Leader - divorced. Rep. Bob Barr of Georgia - Barr, not yet 50 years old, has been married three times.  Barr had the audacity to author and push the "Defense of Marriage Act."  The current joke making the rounds on Capitol Hill is "Bob Barr. . .which marriage are you defending?!?. Rep. Helen Chenoweth of Idaho - divorced. ex-Rep. John Kasich of Ohio - divorced. Rep. Susan Molinari of New York - Republican National Convention Keynote Speaker - divorced. Henry Kissinger - divorced. Gov. George Allen of Virginia - divorced. ex-Gov. John Engler of Michigan - divorced. ex-Gov. Pete Wilson of California - divorced. ex-Gov. John Roland of Connecticut - divorced         (imprisoned for corruption after resigning in shame). George Will - divorced. Rush Limbaugh - Rush (30-pill a day drug addict) and his latest wife, Marta, have six marriages and six divorces between them. Dr. Laura Schlessinger, right wing conservative radio host. Promotes family values, estranged from her mother, opposes birth control, has had her tubes tied, espouses saving oneself for marriage, admits to having had sex before she was married, opposes adultery, has committed adultery while she was married, and has slept with a married man, opposes divorce, is divorced and remarried, has posed for nude photos which are available online. Although clearly the beneficiary of Affirmative Action himself, Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas has been one of its beneficiaries and a champion of the white Republican establishment.  And although he is an ultra-Conservative Catholic in most respects where others are concerned, he was uncharacteristically liberal when it came to his own marriages.  Two years after divorcing the mother of his one child, a Catholic woman whom he had married 13 years earlier, he took a second wife, which Conservative Catholics like judge Thomas would normally condemn, at least for those who don't have the prestige that Thomas enjoys.         Most leading Democrats, on the other hand, are still married to their original spouses. And here are some special examples : Senator Robert Byrd of W. Va. celebrated his 61st anniversary in 2006. Senator Harry Reid = 47 years in 2006. Actor Activist Alan Alda = 50 years in 2007.

Teen Pregnancy Rates by state :
Of the ten states with the highest rates of teen pregnancy, all but one are considered "CONSERVATIVE" :	Nevada 113 Arizona 104 New Mexico 103 Mississippi 103 Texas 101 Florida  97 California  96 Georgia  95 N. Carolina  95 Arkansas  93	Conservative Conservative Conservative Conservative Conservative Conservative Liberal Conservative Conservative Conservative
.  .  .
Four of the five states with the lowest rates are considered "LIBERAL" :	Maine 52 Minnesota 50 New Hampshire 47 Vermont 44 North Dakota 42	Liberal Liberal Liberal Liberal Conservative
Sources:       Table designed by Ray Dubuque, using data extracted from Teen pregnancy rates, ages 15-19, The Alan Guttmacher Institute.

Murder Rate, by State, (assuming that states that voted for Kerry in 2004 were more Liberal, and those which voted for Bush were more Conservative) Arranged from highest murder rate to lowest.
Of the 21 states with the highest Murder Rates All but four are considered "CONSERVATIVE" :	1 Louisiana 13.0  2 Maryland   9.5  3 Mississippi   9.3  4 Nevada   8.8  5 Arizona   7.9  6 Georgia   7.6  7 South Carolina   7.2  8 Illinois   7.1  9 California   6.8 10 Tennessee   6.8 11 Alabama   6.6 12 Arkansas   6.4 13 Texas   6.4 14 Michigan   6.1 15 North Carolina   6.1 16 Alaska   6.0 17 New Mexico   6.0 18 Oklahoma   5.9 19 Virginia   5.6 20 Indiana   5.5 21 Florida   5.4	Conservative Liberal Conservative Conservative Conservative Conservative Conservative Liberal Liberal Conservative Conservative Conservative Conservative Liberal Conservative Conservative Conservative Conservative Conservative Conservative Conservative
Sources:       Table designed by Ray Dubuque, using data extracted from Murder Rates: FBI Uniform Crime Statistics for 2003.

When it comes to states with the highest vs. the lowest Suicide rates ( i.e. per 100,000 for the year 2003 )
All eight of the states with the highest Suicide rates are considered "CONSERVATIVE" : Nevada   22.3 Wyoming   20.4 Montana   18.4 New Mexico   18.3 Arizona   16.0 Alaska   15.5 Oklahoma   14.7 Idaho   14.5	ALL EIGHT of the states with the lowest Suicide rates are considered "LIBERAL" : Rhode Island   9.7 California   9.3 Minnesota   9.2 Maryland   8.4 Illinois   8.4 Connecticut   8.3 Massachusetts   7.0 New Jersey   6.9 New York   6.6
Source :   U.S Census Bureau, Statistical Abstract, Table No. 119

"Looking at what might normally be considered "moral issues," the January 2005 issue of The American Prospect reported some startling comparative statistics on human behavior in red states and blue.         In red states in 2001, there were 572,000 divorces; in blue states, only 340,000.         That same year, in the red states of Louisiana, Mississippi, and New Mexico, 46.3 percent of all births were to unwed mothers; in blue states, the average was 31.7 percent. The per capita rate of violent crime today in red states is 421 per 100,000; in blue states, it's 372 per 100,000. As of 2000, the five states with the highest rates of alcohol abuse were red states. The five states with the highest rates of alcohol abuse among twelve- to seventeen-year-olds were also red states. In 2002, the per capita rate of gonorrhea in red states was 140 per 100,000; in blue states, it was 99 per 100,000. [ from Bill Press's outstanding book, How the Republicans Stole Religion, pp. 2-3 ]

Despite records like that, the Conservative Republican front organization, the "Christian Coalition" sees nothing but good in the Republican Party, and nothing but evil in the Democratic Party. : [ from http://pewforum.org/docs/?DocID=240 ]

The Federal minimum wage of $5.15 an hour was just fine ( from 1996 through 2006 elections ) in "Compassionate Conservative" "Christian", "Family Value" Republican states like : Alabama, Arizona, Arkansas, Colorado, Georgia, Idaho, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, New Mexico, North Carolina, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Virginia, West Virginia, Wyoming Fed. Min. Florida $6.40 Alaska, where the cost of living is much higher than in any other state : $7.15 Even before the 2006 elections, the Federal minimum wage of $5.15 an hour was not good enough in "Godless, Secular" Liberal Democratic states like : New Hampshire, Fed. Min. Pennsylvania, Wisconsin $5.70 Delaware, Maryland, Minnesota, Maine, New Jersey, Illinois, California, Massachusetts, New York, Hawaii between $6.15 & $6.75 District of Columbia, Michigan, Rhode Island about $7.00 Vermont, Connecticut, Oregon, Washington between $7.25 & $7.63

Pictures of the charts above are available in addition to the tables above: BlueMinWage.jpg vs . RedMinWage.jpg.  As of October, 2006 (prior to the 2006 elections, in which several progressive initiatives improved the situation in several of the Red states above, only two of the 33 Conservative states had seen fit to require minimum wage workers be paid more than the disgraceful 1997 national minimum wage, while only ONE of the 17 Liberal states had not seen fit to require higher minimum wages within their own borders.       Contrary to the claim by opponents to raises in the minimum wage that such increases result in job losses, states which have increased the minimum wage have seen job increases. Oregon likes minimum wage increase, claims job growth States with minimum wage increase have faster small business growth, Fiscal Policy Institute. (if this paper should cease to be available at this link, email me if you would like me to send you a copy.) Policy Matters Ohio, minimum wage increase, job growth New Mexico study: Minimum wage law hasn't hurt job growth       And contrary to unsupported claims that most minimum wage workers are teen-agers, the majority of such workers - according to official statistics - are over 20, and many have children to support. From an AP news item:         In last 2006, the House agreed to a $3,100 pay raise for Congress next year to $165,200 after defeating an effort to roll it back.         "It’s not a pay raise,” said House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, R-Texas. “It’s an adjustment so that they’re not losing their purchasing power.”         Federal minimum wage has been $5.15 since 1997. Loss of purchasing power: About 19.4%.         In 1997, Congressional salaries were $133,600. The congressmen have raised their salaries a whopping $31,600 since 1997, or 23.7%, but have failed to provide any adjustment of even one penny to enable the working poor to cope with the tremendous increase in the cost of living since 1997.

Sources:       Table designed by Ray Dubuque, using data extracted from Murder Rates: FBI Uniform Crime Statistics for 2003.

On March 1, 2005, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that children under age 18, who commit serious crimes such as murder, may not be executed, and stated that execution of children constitutes a violation of the Eighth Amendment ban on cruel and unusual punishment. It should be noted that more than half of the countries in the world have entirely eliminated the death penalty, and that there are four international human rights treaties that exclude child offenders from the death penalty. In a worldwide study of the execution of children between 1994 and 2002, two-thirds of the executions of children occurred in the United States.         While it has been said that Bush was elected by the "values voters", I have previously found that the states that voted for Bush in the November, 2004 election had higher divorce rates, higher murder rates, and higher teen pregnancy rates. So, when I heard that there were 19 states that had allowed execution of children, I wondered if the "values voters" states - those who voted for Bush - were more or less likely to allow the execution of children. Following is the list of states that allowed execution of children prior to the Supreme Court ruling, and how they voted in the recent presidential election.

Conservative States that believe in executing children : Alabama         Arizona         Arkansas         Florida Georgia                   Idaho                       Kentucky Louisiana                Mississippi                   Nevada North Carolina             Utah             South Carolina Oklahoma                     Texas                     Virginia

Liberal States that believe in executing children : Delaware             New Hampshire             Pennsylvania

Of the 19 states that did allow execution of children, sixteen are considered "Conservative".  So, not only do Conservative "values voters" have higher rates of divorce, murder, and teen pregnancy, they are also more likely to execute children. The notion that Conservative voters have higher moral standards is a myth, and is not supported by the facts.  If you find this information useful, feel free to pass it on to your friends.

For some great graphs comparing economic conditions under Democratic vs. Republican presidents, see my LiberalsLikeChrist.Org/about/busheconomy.html.         When people think of political corruption, they are probably aware of a few scandals involving Democrats, but ask them to point to significant scandals involving contemporary Liberal Democrats, as opposed to scandals dating back to the "good old days, when the Democratic Party was largely under the control of fat cat and/or Southern Conservatives.  They won't be able to come up with anything near the corruption that has been rampant through most of the history of the Republican Party, since the death of Abraham Lincoln, as I lay bare at JesusNoRepublican.Org/about/gopcorruption.html. For more great ideas to help Liberal Democrats win elections, see my LiberalsLikeChrist.Org/about/WinningStrategy.html Check out the many outstanding graphs regarding the U.S. economy at & academy computer service .

Correlation between level of education & Presidential vote ( in 2004 ) The overwhelming majority of states with more citizens with college degrees went for Kerry, while those with fewer citizens with college degrees went for Bush : `Maryland State : % 37.6 Colorado 35.7 Virginia 34.6 Massachusetts 34.3 Connecticut 32.6 New Jersey 31.4 Vermont 30.8 Minnesota 30.5 New Hampshire 30.1 Rhode Island 30.1 Delaware 29.5 Kansas 29.1 New York 28.8 Washington 28.3 California 27.9 Illinois 27.3 Montana 23.6 S. Dakota 23.6 S. Carolina 23.3 Iowa 23.1 Alabama 22.7 Michigan 22.5 N. Carolina 22.4 Louisiana 22.1 Nevada 22.1 Kentucky 21.6 Tennessee 21.5 Idaho 20.9 Mississippi 20.9 Oklahoma 20.4 Wyoming 19.6 Arkansas 18.3 W. Virginia 15.9 Nebraska 27.1 Oregon 27.1 Hawaii 26.8 Utah 26.8 Missouri 26.7 Arizona 26.3 Texas 26.2 Pennsylvania 26.1 Florida 25.7 Alaska 25.6 New Mexico 25.4 N. Dakota 25.3 Georgia 25.0 Wisconsin 24.7 Ohio 24.5 Maine 23.8 Indiana 23.7

Balance of Taxes Paid by States vs. Benefits Received from Federal Gvmt. by "Welfare States" (dollars in millions) for the year 2001 states which voted for Bush Taxes sent to Fed. Govt.   Benefits   Received Surplus vs. Deficit ( + vs. - ) Alabama 22,437 33,205 + 10,768 Alaska 4,200 6,685 + 2,485 Arizona 30,057 32,392 + 2,335 Arkansas 12,476 17,469  4,993 Colorado 33,898 26,618 - 7,280 Florida 110,294 107,395 - 2,899 Georgia 52,225 50,822 - 1,403 Idaho 6,683 7,977 + 1,294 Indiana 36,733 34,630 - 2,103 Kansas 16,503 17,806 + 1,303 Kentucky 20,509 27,210 + 6,701 Louisiana 21,371 29,249 + 7,878 Mississippi 12,094 21,023 + 8,929 Missouri 33,718 41,452 + 7,734 Montana 4,359 6,910 + 2,551 Nebraska 10,415 11,469 + 1,054 Nevada 15,014 10,631 - 4,383 North Carolina 47,579 47,748 + 169 North Dakota 3,288 6,169 + 2,881 Ohio 69,127 66,341 - 2,786 Oklahoma 16,667 23,790 + 7,123 South Carolina 20,799 26,070 + 5,271 South Dakota 4,293 6,095 + 1,802 Tennessee 33,225 38,986 + 5,761 Texas 134,809 121,571 - 13,238 Utah 11,358 12,139 + 781 Virginia 52,858 74,802 + 21,944 West Virginia 7,793 13,064 + 5,271 Wyoming 3,583 3,824 + 241 Net Welfare RECEIVED : + 71,868 Million $$$ by the red Conservative states which voted for Bush states which voted for Gore & Kerry Taxes sent to Fed. Govt.   Benefits   Received Surplus vs. Deficit ( + vs - ) California 264,344 206,245 - 58,099 Connecticut 36,416 25,351 - 11,065 Delaware 5,750 4,632 - 1,118 Hawaii 6,903 10,185 + 3,282 Illinois 96,686 71,520 - 25,166 Iowa 16,725 18,523 + 1,798 Maine 6,904 8,643 + 1,739 Maryland 41,779 50,966 + 9,187 Massachusetts 59,779 48,188 - 11,591 Michigan 67,886 56,185 - 11,701 Minnesota 36,519 27,384 - 9,135 New Hampshire 10,315 7,006 - 3,309 New Jersey 75,115 51,657 - 23,458 New Mexico 8,487 17,156 + 8,669 NEW YORK 166,554 126,990 - 39,564 Oregon 21,241 19,826 - 1,415 Pennsylvania 83,052 84,880 + 1,828 Rhode Island 6,990 7,458 + 468 Vermont 3,731 3,984 + 253 Washington 49,651 40,233 - 9,418 Wisconsin 34,609 28,966 - 5,643 Net Welfare CONTRIBUTED : -180,149 Million $$$ by the blue Liberal states which voted for Democrat Al Gore in 2000 ( & John Kerry in 2004)

If someone knows the precise source of the above, please email it to me at the address at bottom of this page.  Meanwhile the following are similar sources : taxprof.typepad.com/taxprof_blog/2004/09/red_states_feed.html & en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Welfare_state on what is normally meant by the expression "Welfare State". Also, check out Why the leadership of the G.O.P. wants to bankrupt your government.         If Conservative Republican politicians were as patriotic in reality as they are in their "professions" of patriotism, they wouldn't be content to promote our armed services for others, while consistently avoiding it themselves!  Their record is so deplorable that we devote an entire page to Conservative Republican "Chickenhawks".

For some fantastic graphs and data regarding Presidential elections and administrations see LiberalsLikeChrist.Org/about/PresidentialVote.html. See also International graphs : comparisons of the U.S. with Other Countries: National Rankings re: prosperity National Rankings re: health care         One of the best comparisons that I have found on the www of the major political philosophies in the U.S.A. is http://www.republicanliberty.org/libdex/li2005_over.htm , which views them all through the libertarian lens, but does so very objectively and intelligently. Here's the scorecard of the records of all the members of Congress regarding issues important to the GLBT community : www.hrc.org/documents/HRCscorecard2006.pdf

Contact   Ray@LiberalsLikeChrist.Org There is much more where this came from at See why you may already be one of us !