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This is pretty common in a lot of blue states. It's been a thing in Illinois for years, and it's been getting louder for the last year and a half. The gist is the rural area's feel underrepresented compared to the metropolitan area's. So in Illinois case, the rural area's feel like the state puts more focus on Chicago.

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Why shouldn't the state put more focus on Chicago? The rural areas are a net drain on state finances and are kept afloat by the "liberal hellhole" that they hate.

I don't know... maybe because the rural areas grow their food?

Furthermore, I'm not sure your conjecture is even correct. Subsistence farming supported people for centuries before our megalopolises existed.

Rural IL would say that is only by design, pointing to better-run neighboring states that have implemented reforms, which are impossible to pass in IL, in addition to the financial benefits to the public of smaller, more transparent state and municipal governments.

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