America Needs To Cut 10 States
Comedian and writer Hari Kondabolu boards the subway with a brutal take: America has too many states. Why do we need both Dakotas? What is Idaho doing? And does anyone actually live in Connecticut? Hari proposes merging the Carolinas, selling Alaska to Canada, and letting Hawaii go entirely. Along the way, he breaks down “nice whites,” Toronto envy, and why he’d rather live in a state with good coffee than patriotic slogans. It’s time to fix the map. Host: Kareem Rahma Guest: Hari Kondabolu Creators: Kareem Rahma & Andrew Kuo Camera: Anthony DiMieri & Tian Sippel Editor: Tyler Christie Associate Producer: Ramy Shafi Artwork: Andrew Lawandus
Summary
Comedian Hari Kondabolu has a radical proposal: America needs to cut ten states. He and Kareem rip through the map, combining the Dakotas into one, absorbing Rhode Island back into Massachusetts, and merging Idaho, Montana, and Wyoming because "even if you combine all the people, they're still not enough for a state." Hari wants to sell Alaska to Canada in exchange for British Columbia and a chunk of Ontario with Toronto. Why? "Drake for oil," he explains. Connecticut might become "just one big highway." Hawaii gets to choose independence. The whole scheme is part efficiency argument (too much power in small states with two senators), part aesthetic judgment (Idaho's shape "looks stupid"). A random subway rider wanders over and suggests three senators per state instead of two, instantly winning Hari back over to his own plan.
Full Transcript
So, what's your take? Too many states in America. We need to cut ten. 100% agree. Which ones are going?
All right. We start out with Dakota. We don't need two Dakotas. Redundancy. One Dakota. One Dakota. Wait, can we just combine them?
Yeah, one Dakota. South and North Dakota or one Dakota now. And and still, that's me being nice. Okay, that's still barely a state. We're fine. Redundancies an issue. One Carolina. So, all of the—so, one Virginia. Okay. So, that's three gone. Three gone right there. Number four, Rhode Island. We need the charade to end. Look, man, it's a vestigial organ off of Massachusetts. You're going to cut it off. It has to go back to Massachusetts. Oh, it's—go, it's being absorbed.
Yep. You know what? Coffee milk is their state drink. They have to pretend coffee milk is a drink and that a state drink is a real thing just to stand out. But Rhode Island's so cute. It's like the smallest one in the nation. Like, don't—done. Alabama, Mississippi, one state. They deserve each other. You can't combine those two. Why not?
Because they're two distinct places. Since what? I'm afraid to go to either of them. So, no. Not Bill Clinton's from Alabama. No, he's from Arkansas.
Same thing. So, Mississippi and Alabama, one one state. So, how many have we got?
We've we've taken out five. Five. Idaho, uh, Montana, Wyoming, one state. Cuz there's even if you combine all the people, they're still not enough for a state. But fine, if we can't just evaporate them, then they're one state. I don't like how Idaho looks either. I don't like how it has its little—I think that's a nice shape. It's like it's trying to make a point. What point you got to make? Idaho never made a point.
Okay, that's six. Let me go through this. Uh, Vermont, New Hampshire, one state. I don't know why they're two states. It's one piece of land. We're not in a Hispaniola situation. It's not like the Dominican and Haiti, right? We're talking about whites who disagree about taxes, you know? That's one state. Okay. One state.
Washington and Oregon. One state. Okay. One state. One state. Because you know what do we got? We got trees, coffee, nice whites. That's one state. I love nice whites.
Okay, this gets a little tricky now. We sell Alaska to Canada in exchange for British Columbia, which expands the Northwest, right? And then we get a little bit of Ontario that has Toronto in it. Considering Toronto already has American sports teams, we're conquering all of a sudden. We're not—we're trading. We're giving them—it's Drake for oil. That's what we're doing right now. Drake for oil.
Now we're up to 41 states. We still got one more to go. Which one?
Well, there's two options here. We let Hawaii choose whether it wants to be independent or not. They're going to say we want to be independent. If they choose to stay in the union, then we make Connecticut a highway. Just one big highway. It's already a big highway. Connecticut's beautiful.
Yeah, it's great in the car when you're driving through on your way to Vermont/New Hampshire. It needs a new state name. I have a question.
Yeah. Why are we reducing the states?
One, too much power in these small states that have 12 people in them. That's unfair. Two senators in Wyoming. That's a lot of power when there's not that many people, right? 20 senators. Redundancy. It's just ridiculous to have two of a thing. There's only one New York where there's there's two Dakotas. Get out of here. That's ridiculous. And some of it is uh to be honest uh arbitrary from a madman. You just think that it it should be like that. Idaho looks stupid, man. There's no—the shape of it looks ridiculous. I don't understand. You're like, you notice how I didn't screw—think if you think Idaho looks stupid, wait till you see Nebraska.
Oh, brother. Dumb old square in the middle of nowhere. Look, I realize that that the Northwest being huge now with British Columbia add it is going to be a bit odd, right? Why do you want British Columbia just for land purposes?
Coffee? Oh, you realize the amount of good coffee you get from Oregon all the way through BC?
Oh, you're a West Coast guy now. Well, I mean, no, I'm a New Yorker born and raised, but I'm just saying it's nice to have a a place where you can get good coffee. What about Wisconsin?
No, Wisconsin. Why don't—why do we want to put Minnesota, Wisconsin, and Iowa together? How many states do we got to cut? You know, I'm willing to make a trade. Okay, Iowa, Nebraska become one thing. I like trading them to other people. Like I I like the idea of like trading like like Vermont to the French in exchange for something over there cuz then we could expand the United States onto another continent, which I think we could use.
That's not consolidation. We need consolidation. What are you talking about? Oh, now we got to stay. Oh, I got—I got to go to my my another American city in France and spend like—what are you talking about? That's what embassies are. Embassies are little cities in different countries.
Already have that. Ah, this makes complete sense. I'm having a tough time. You were all aboard on the idea initially.
I know, but now I kind of want them back. Well, they're still there. They're just in a different form that makes more sense. What about California? They want to chop it up.
I mean, if we're going to chop up California, that's not a terrible idea. Then we're going to have to combine some other states. Florida, I sell to Cuba. We need Florida. Why do we need Florida?
You can't sell Florida to Cuba. You could—you could buy Cuba. Excuse me. Can you buy Cuba? I can't help but—over here are you guys. So, this is what you're a couple of suggestions. Delaware and Maryland, Virginia, West Virginia. Oo, good, good, good. Forgot about these little guys. I did forget about Delaware. Delaware is very good. One more idea. So, uh, if when you combine all these states, you're going to reduce the size of the Senate.
Yes. Correct. Okay. That's going to make all those each of those senators much more powerful.
That's true. Why not make three senators from each of these states?
That's brilliant. Thank you. Yeah. Three senators. Three senators. I'm getting it off now. That's why I came over to speak. I appreciate it. That's good. All right. Now, I'm back in cuz of this guy.
Yeah. Yeah. Why are you talking to your metro card?
Oh, cuz this camera's over there. Cuz what? This camera's over there and there's there's microphones. Oh, you thought we were just Italian? I thought it was just you two guys talking.