it is interesting, having lived for a while in LA among a huge Persian expat/immigrant community that was normal modern-worlders like anyone, who would fly back for holidays and roll their eyes like ::oh yeah, the gOvErNmEnT:: the same way as anyone in California was already re:Washington,

to look back and realize the rest of the country is still really going off the continuation-forward of late-70s narratives about an area we had a quarter-ass romanticized grasp of in the 19th century and then halfheartedly updated our sense of in the World Wars