Gosh! I sure hate to bring this up, but...

You've got your red states, and you've got your blue states, and they tend not to be the same in some respects.

For instance: Your blue states -- you know, the states that voted Democratic in the last presidential election -- are mostly made up of residents who are better educated than the people in your red states -- you know, the states that voted Republican in the last presidential election.

Your red states also have higher rates of divorce, lower rates of high-school graduation, higher percentages of cigarette smokers, lower pay for teachers, higher rates of teenage pregnancies, higher infant-death rates, lower wages, higher birth rates among unmarried women, higher traffic-death rates, and on and on.

Illinois, if you don't know, is a blue state.