Yeah I wanted to do an aside about whether Delaware was the correct choice, but I felt it was a bit excessive for a meme community.
I think your picks of Wyoming and Nebraska are evocative of a coastal-centric perspective though. Nebraska is quite large and has Omaha, easily taking it out of the bottom 5. Whereas Wyoming has... a large and beautiful expanse. Despite the lack of population, that sheer amount of terrain provides significant value by itself, but maybe not enough to escape the bottom 5. My personal second choice was Vermont, but I feel like Mississippi is potentially also in the mix.
I want to throw Rhode Island in but I feel like the historical significance has to be respected, despite its miniscule size.
We can and should give the dakotas back. Not just for ethical reasons, but also because it’s a dick move to keep those states from the only people who want them.
Vermont is great. Does it matter? No. But it’s Appalachia without the coal nuts and oppressive laws.
And speaking as a Midwesterner, Nebraska is fine but you’re grading on a curve there. Sure it beats Iowa but still. And the best part of Kansas is halfway into Missouri a state so miserable it’s aptly named.
Yea Vermont is great, but if had just remained part of upstate New York this whole time, instead of becoming its own state, it seems like it would make very little difference.
Yeah but if that’s our metric Wyoming being part of Colorado would solve more problems than it fixes. It’s mostly a national park and there’s so few people you’re left asking why they get senators.
True, I can't disagree with that. It'd at least solve the problem of the legality of recreational cannabis, which is a pretty damn big one, if you ask me.
Speaking of cannabis, I almost didn't notice before I replied but I just realized you said it "would solve more problems than it fixes". Sounds like a win-win 😅
I need to not reply to comments before my Adderall kicks in lol.
And yeah my main issue is that their lack of population is so extreme that they hold an outsized influence on the federal government without having any good reason to not be part of other states. Alaska may be underpopulated but sticking it in Washington would be ridiculous. Wyoming could reasonably be represented by Colorado. There’s a city in fucking Ohio with more than twice the population of Wyoming. And they get two senators, a representative, and three electoral votes
That's fair and I considered it, but I feel like that's almost the most damning aspect of Delaware. The only trivia anyone knows about the state is it's a tax haven; otherwise it is entirely unremarkable, both in public awareness and in fact.
I do respect those percentages though, that's totally fucked.