I hate the word “meme” pretty bad for anything but the Internet sense, but it’s the best way to describe census-hate as a phenomenon - partially because it’s purely political. It occasionally gets vectored by your Dave Barry / Penn Gillette style politics-as-team-sport guys, but other than that there is just no way to come by this meme outside of direct contact with political operatives; its thesis is not ideological but electoral, and it serves no purpose but to provide cover for Republican legislatures’ creative redistricting.

It’s one of those beautiful examples of a purely top-down idea, and because the GOP’s increasing obsession with itself as a Leninist vanguard has been their only solace as they shrink into irrelevance, it’s something we’re going to be seeing a lot more of. UHAUBHAHUBHGUHBHH COLOR TV NEVER FORGET