If the Walking Dead was set in a Blue state instead of a Red state,

[NewJeffCT]

3. In the World War Z book

All hidden spoilers below if you want to read the book and have not:

[font color=white]
After the intial botched responses by the governments and media, the entire world was almost completely overrun. However, the US put a stop on the zombie onslaught in California and started rebuilding from there. (the Rocky Mountains stopped many zombie herds from passing through, so left the west coast isolated from the rest of the US.) But, one thing they did was assess everybody's ability and put them to work where they were needed most for the war effort - i.e. service professions like accountants, lawyers, salespersons, etc, were often assigned to menial tasks, assembly lines, or cleanup, etc. From California, the reformed and retooled military then went step by step across the country, killing zombies and trying to save what remained of the living.
[/font]