Whose side are YOU on?

Anyways, this map I found (alt reality does a bunch of them on his heresy.art account) kind of makes me want to play a game in it. A balance between all out post-apocalyptic american wastelands and "D.C. got wiped out in a terrorist attack during an emergency address to congress, suddenly everyone in the country is reduced to regional stereotypes". The surprise destruction of major metropolises by car-born nukes from a Russian facility compromised by American domestic terrorists in the first decade of the 21st century (and once again during a presidential address to Congress, this time regarding the amplification of the war on terror) causes a nation-wide chaos and confusion of the line of succession - during which a charismatic young senator with the backing of the nation's largest defense contractor (and several high up but non-succeeding federal officials in bed with said corporation) is able to consolidate the military forces in the Western US and launch "retaliatory" attacks on Iran and North Korea. This leads to UN peacekeepers (rather than simply aid missions from the international community as had been occurring) and a cold civil war as the legitimate successor to the presidency resurfaces in the East but is unable to shake most of those who have already picked sides out of their loyalties, at least until an actual full shooting war occurs.

Still, even though it looks like a reasonable enough extrapolation of the general idea from the tv show Jericho, it didn't come with much explanation so your guess as to how the free states got to be (besides being on the Mississippi and without any of the bombed cities in their borders) is as good as mine.