[quote=@ONL]
the lack of an agreed upon Point of Divergence AND non-existant rules of how to create an American nation. Not to mention that our GM is gone like the wind. 
[/quote]

I think this something to consider. For many countries, the point of divergence will be the eve of the Great Crash but for some countries, I assume they're following the historical order of things. For example, I've decided the Japanese point of divergence was sometime in 1935, in which the ROC invaded Taiwan/Korea and kicked off this universe's Second Sino-Japanese War ([@Doctoryzer], we should set a specific date for this).

As for the rules on American states, I think we shouldn't allow any more mega-states (encompassing 4 or more IRL states) to keep things open and more interesting. It might help if we made up some NPC nations in the remaining space and allow new players to join as them as opposed to allowing a big patch of empty land in the Midwest.