The US isn't a giant monolith although the rest of the world likes to treat it as such. Life on the coasts is very different than life everywhere else. It's one of the reasons the country is so polarized. We literally live in two different countries. Wealthy coastal cities and poverty stricken rural decay in the middle of the country.

There's plenty of decay on the coasts and cities doing great in middle America. You never hear about them on HN because they're not ideologically convenient in the little filter bubble we've got going on here.

The "coasts rich and good, middle America poor and backwards" narrative that we get plenty of here, on Reddit, etc. is an over-simplification at best.

Yes. Think of all the different cultures you encounter on a long auto drive from Madrid to Moscow. Now drive from LA to Bangor, similarly long, if not longer.

Is it no wonder, then, we might feel like there are "different" Americas in the broad expanse of the US? And "different" Americans?

While I agree with you in part, another argument might ascribe many aspects of a perceived "polarization" to mere geography.

> Wealthy coastal cities and poverty stricken rural decay in the middle of the country.

San Francisco and LA are infamous for large homeless populations. The inland South and West are flourishing.

I live outside Raleigh, NC, which is booming. In my exurb, I can drive less than ten minutes to find empty storefronts. I've seen those empty storefronts in every rural area I've been in on the Eastern seaboard. Cities may be booming, there are still people being left behind.

Have a listen to "We Can't Make It Here Anymore", by James McMurtry