Okay, this one's good for a laugh, anyway. Here's John Tierney -- yes, that John Tierney, of Yale and the New York Times -- mocking the Democratic party for not paying due deference to the virtues and verities of Red State America:

For the mainly Democratic audience - this was a crowd of Washington journalists and luminaries from Hollywood and Manhattan - it was an evening of cognitive dissonance. How to reconcile this charming image on stage with the Bush they love to bash?...

The coverage of Mrs. Bush's comic debut may change some minds, but for devout Bush-bashers, it's much easier to stay the course. If you live in a blue-state stronghold, a coastal city where you can go 24 hours without meeting any Republicans, it's consoling to think of the red staters as an alien bunch of strait-laced Bible thumpers.

Otherwise, how do you explain why they're Republican? Or answer the question Democrats asked in astonishment when they saw Mr. Bush's vote totals: Who are these people?

Two points: First, he's right about one thing. Many people were astonished by Mr. Bush's vote totals -- by how low they were, that is. How in God's name did the hero of 9-11 wind up eking out a two-and-a-half point win against a TV-challenged stiff like John Kerry? That's an important, and rather puzzling, question -- and one that the GOP would do well to consider carefully between now and 2008.

Second, I really have to say that I might start taking all this "flyover country" stuff a little more seriously if Mr. Tierney -- or any of the other prominent, Ivy League, Blue State conservative types, for that matter -- packed up his family, moved down to my part of the world, took a job at the Wal Mart, and started sending his kids to the local public school. (Oops. There goes the legacy. Bummer, huh? But don't worry, Mr. Tierney -- we have any number of solid tech schools where the little'uns could learn a trade.) Until then, though, I'm afraid I'm going to have to assume that all these conservative paeans to the good life out here in Red America are precisely what they always sound like: unctuous, cynical, condescending horse manure.