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The truth about government benefits distribution as illustrated by the NYTimes highlighting the conginitive dissonance in American culture and American political parties.  

The commonly held assumptions about political allegiance and affiliation are that Democrats are supported by a large voting block of poor people dependent upon Government assistance and Republicans are supported by a powerful group of business elite that are over-taxed and subsidizing lives of government-dependent citizens.  But as this map shows us, the opposite is in fact true.  

Here's the punchline: Most Americans are voting against their own economic self interests.  Liberals are caught in a "values" trap, wherein their desire to help the poor and preserve upward social mobility in their communities are undermined by "donor states" that soak up the majority of government assistance. And, Conservatives wish to improve the economics of their constituents by cutting government dependency, but they're constituents have the highest rates of government assistance, not even mentioning corporate welfare and farm subsidies. 

Take a look at this telling map, and you'll see how assistance programs have grown over time and shifted from urban to rural in focus.