WE'RE SORTING OURSELVES INTO TWO AMERICAS, ONE OF WHICH (GUESS WHICH ONE) IS MORE TROUBLING

In The New York Times, Shawn Hubler and Jill Cowan tell us that polarization is sorting us into two nations, state by state.

As Republican activists aggressively pursue conservative social policies in state legislatures across the country, liberal states are taking defensive actions. Spurred by a U.S. Supreme Court that is expected to soon upend an array of longstanding rights, including the constitutional right to abortion, left-leaning lawmakers from Washington to Vermont have begun to expand access to abortion, bolster voting rights and denounce laws in conservative states targeting L.G.B.T.Q. minors.

The flurry of action, particularly in the West, is intensifying already marked differences between life in liberal- and conservative-led parts of the country. And it’s a sign of the consequences when state governments are controlled increasingly by single parties. Control of legislative chambers is split between parties now in two states — Minnesota and Virginia — compared with 15 states 30 years ago.

Hubler and Cowan fail to note that some of the "conservative-led" states they describe aren't truly conservative. Georgia and Arizona voted for Joe Biden and have two Democratic U.S. senators each -- but they have Republican governors and Republicans control their legislatures. Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin also voted for Biden, but they're all one gubernatorial election away from total GOP control. There's no state where Democrats have control despite a Republican-leaning electorate.

Republicans are doing some seriously partisan things, Hubler and Cowan tell us.

With some 30 legislatures in Republican hands, conservative lawmakers, working in many cases with shared legislative language, have begun to enact a tsunami of restrictions that for years were blocked by Democrats and moderate Republicans at the federal level. A recent wave of anti-abortion bills, for instance, has been the largest since the landmark 1973 decision in Roe v. Wade.

Similar moves have recently been aimed at L.G.B.T.Q. protections and voting rights. In Florida and Texas, teams of “election police” have been created to crack down on the rare crime of voter fraud, fallout from former President Donald J. Trump’s specious claims after he lost the 2020 presidential election.

Carrying concealed guns without a permit is now legal in nearly half of the country. “Bounty” laws — enforced not by governments, which can be sued in federal court, but by rewards to private citizens for filing lawsuits — have proliferated on issues from classroom speech to vaccination since the U.S. Supreme Court declined to strike down the legal tactic in Texas.

Sounds bad. But Hubler and Cowan assure us that a lot of this is probably theater, so I guess we should all just stop worrying.

The moves, in an election year, have raised questions about the extent to which they are performative, as opposed to substantial. Some Republican bills are bold at first glance but vaguely worded. Some appear designed largely to energize base voters.

The link on the phrase "vaguely worded" goes to a story about Florida's "Don't Say Gay" bill, which seems extremely dangerous to children, teachers, and counselors. The vague wording is part of the danger, because it's not clear what words or deeds that are supportive of LGBT youth could get a school in serious trouble. But the implication here is that the law is vague, so it can't be that bad.

Hubler and Cowan contrast Florida and other red states with California, which seeks to protect abortion and to use the threat of lawsuits to strengthen state bans on assault weapons and ghost guns. We're assured that this is also theater.

Dan Schnur, a former Republican strategist who teaches political science now at the University of Southern California and the University of California, Berkeley, said that without strong Republican opposition, [Governor Gavin] Newsom has been using the governors of Texas and Florida as straw men.

“It’s an effective way of strengthening himself at home and elevating his name in Democratic presidential conversations,” Mr. Schnur said.

And we're also told that Newsom is being unpleasantly non-centrist:

Conservatives in and outside California have criticized the governor for stoking division.

A spokeswoman for Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida, who is a Republican presidential contender, noted in an email that Disneyland was closed three times longer than Disney World during the pandemic, and that hundreds of thousands of Americans moved to Florida between April 2020 and July 2021 while hundreds of thousands left California. Mr. Newsom, she wrote, “is doing a better job as a U-Haul salesman.”

“Politicians in California do not have veto power over legislation passed in Florida,” the spokeswoman, Christina Pushaw, added. “Gov. Newsom should focus on solving the problems in his own state.”

The office of Gov. Greg Abbott of Texas — who, in 2018, ran on the slogan “Don’t California My Texas” — did not respond to emails and calls requesting comment.

(Newsom is quoted in the story criticizing right-wing policy in Texas and Florida, but no one is quoted accusing Florida or Texas officials of "stoking division," which, I guess, is a bad thing only Democrats do.)

Also, California has high housing costs, therefore what Newsom is doing is bad.

“In a world in which the federal government has abdicated some of its core responsibility, states like California have to figure out what their responsibilities are,” said [Jon] Michaels, [a] U.C.L.A. professor. “The hard question is: Where does it end?”

For example, he noted, the fallout could mean that federal rights that generations have taken for granted could become available only to those who can afford to uproot their lives and move to the states that guarantee them.

“It’s easy for Governor Newsom to tell struggling Alabamians, ‘I feel your pain,’ but then what? ‘Come rent a studio apartment in San Francisco for $4,000 a month?’”

So I guess if you're a governor and real estate prices surpass a certain level in your state, you're not allowed to take a position on cultural issues.

We end with the mother of a trans child from Dallas who raised $23,000 on GoFundMe to get her kid the hell out of Texas. She recently visited Los Angeles.

“The city itself just felt like a safe haven,” Ms. Augustine said. But, she added, her $60,000 salary, which allows her to rent a house in Texas, would scarcely cover a California apartment: “We’re going to have to downsize.”

The money aspect of this sucks. But it also sucks that she's terrified for her kid if she stays in Texas, even in a liberal city. Maybe that should be what's emphasized here?