That’s not a fair comparison. A lot of American English speakers lived in Long Island before 1947.

Is the ratio of the area of Taiwan to the area of mainland China comparable to the ratio of the area of Long Island to the area of the mainland U.S.? I would be simultaneously shocked and not at all surprised if it were.

Courtesy of Wikipedia, of course:

The PRC is 278x larger than Taiwan.
The USA is 2708x larger than Long Island.

There’s an order of magnitude of difference.

I thought this was hilarious last night. This morning, I think it’s the funniest thing I’ve seen in weeks. Thanks!

Re: relative land sizes… Alaska and Hawaii might not be part of this alternate history. And relative population size is probably a better comparison. Without those two, the U.S. is just 82% its published size, or only 2226*long island.

Actually, The USA is about 327x bigger than Hawaii, so that might be the best candidate.

The Pedants’ Republic of America is clearly a force to be reckoned with.

Why don’t I get this at all? Will someone explain it to me?