WILL COUNTRY MUSIC EVER MAKE IT BIG IN BLUE-STATE AMERICA?
No.
That being said, it's hipper in some places than others (slightly more fashionable in Ann Arbor, as you might be surprised to hear--this weekend's highlight is Emmylou Harris coming to town, and my boss, latte-sipping, NYT-home-delivery-receiving, fire-branded liberal that he is, loves her before all else musically), though that's generally true of any kind of music. It was big a few years ago as part of the O Brother Where Art Thou? 'old-timey' music craze, but I'd brake out Hank or, say, The Anthology of American Folk Music ("John Hardy" by the Carter Family being my favorite), and they couldn't ever really take it.
But I think the bigger explanation is the good country music is about life experiences--loss of love, depression, and existential grappling with the toughness of life--and the willingness to hear about them correlates nicely, I'd imagine, with age and the time to be pensive enough to really think about these things. When we talk about Blue-Staters, we generally mean 20- and 30-somethings in major metropolitan areas, right? They're generally the people with lifestyles least disposed to being able to get country music.
Which is better, because I kind of like the feeling of having Hank and Patsy to myself.
"Thou shalt not extinguish thine anger, but shall master it,
that thy conscience may not be blunted by adjustment
to wrong causes."
-The Dutch Ten Commandments to Foil the Nazis
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