A Second Civil War — Aidan Simardone

The article is really about the economic "war" underway in the US between rural and urban areas rather than mostly political differences. So was the Civil War, which was about the abolition slavery, a political matter, but emancipation resulted in huge loss of capital. The Civil War was also about the urban-rurual divide, with the urban North dominated by factories and the rural South dominated by agriculture, chiefly cotton production.

According to Bouie, slavery’s abolition was an existential threat to White slaveowners, whereas he’s “not sure there’s anything in American society right now that plays the same role”.

Bouie is right. Ideas and beliefs are important, but without an economic basis, they cannot generate war. However, he is wrong that post-1991 polarization has no economic basis. There are real economic interests that divide Democrats and Republicans. In the 1860s it was between North and South. Today it is between rural and urban capitalists....