I'd don't know a whole lot on politics in ND. I hail from Sidney. I don't know ND's political history but they've had Republican governors and Democratic Congressmen for several years. I'm not really sure why. Maybe you could ask residents of Wyoming who recently elected a Democratic governor of all parties. I think part of the reason is Dems and GOPs get elected everywhere is that they all just shift their viewpoints accordingly. Our here in Eastern MT we still have democrats, they can sometimes be more conservative than Republicans back east. People tend to just gravitate to two opposing sides.
I'll tell you one thing though, ND is probebly one of the least known, least appreciated states in the Union and they feel it. The nation has an attitude of who cares about ND. That could play in our favor.
ND also has the same problem as most non-mountain rural states, too few young people. When they graduate, the kids tend to leave the state. The end result is that the population is aging. Not a very very promising future as far as a tax base, or communitee is concerned. That is why they went so far as to pass that initiative to pay people several thousand dollers to stay in state (a despirate move, but one that pays off in the long run). I would say that ND might just welcome us with wide open arms.
ND is also very rural-ag. This means the people are independent minded. It also means they are sympathetic to issues like industrial hemp, which would be a serious boom to ND's farmers. I do beleive the legislature passed a bill a while back supporting IH. (you would have to look it up for the details)
One of ND's main industries is agriculture (like SD, MT & WY). For those of you who arn't familier with ag; agriculture(nationwide) has been in a depression for the last decade, and in a continual downslide since the mid 70's. This is due to a lot of factors, but mainly corporate monopolies, environmentalism, and unfair trade (support fair trade not 'free' trade). Prices for wheat and cattle havn't increased at all since the 60's, while all the expenses for farming have increased with inflation. Right now 2 & 3 dollars per bushel for wheat is common. In the 60's we had 5 & 6 dollar wheat. In the Great Depression we had $2 wheat. I've read that if you figure for inflation we should have 28 dollar wheat today. I havn't heard figures lately but one year in the mid 90's it was so bad they were figuring in ND that 40% of all the farmers were in danger of folding. Things are so bad that the vast majority of the farmers I know have encouraged their kids not to continue farming. I can really only think of two family farms where the kids are continuing the farm. The average age of a farmer is in the 50's or 60's.
What does all that mean. Well, rural western states are in a crunch. They're looking for any economic help they can get (including us). Also if things don't turn around in the ag economy things are going to start changing. An entire culture is threatening to disappear. The enviros would love it. They want to turn the Great Plains in to one big animal preserve with no humans. They are doing everything they can through litigation, laws, terrorism and wolves to wipe out farming and ranching. Now for those of you who live in the cities you might not care. But what will happen if the same thing happens to food that happened to oil? Do you really want a repeat of the situation in the middle east, but this time over food. It's one thing if you can't gas your car, its an entire different matter if you can't put food on your childrens plate. But those in Washington could care less and are doing nothing. There are laws on the books to deal with the harmfull monopolies who are intentionally working to enslave the farmers of America. But they refuse to enforce them. Free Trade of the Americas is looming on the horizon and South America would love nothing more than to export their cheap food to the U.S. , driving out of business our farms and ranches. GWB is happy to accomodate their wishes. Oh, and by the way, China and communism are rapidly growing influences in SA. Just what we need.
