“…GOP candidates ran on a platform of overturning Obama’s overreach on health care, immigration, and general weakening of the USA on the international stage.”
Overreach on immigration- something the Constitution doesn’t allow government to regulate? Tell me more “conservative” fantasies. LOL.
Sure, Obama overreached on healthcare, but those trying to regulate “immigration” (no such thing) while also screaming that Obama is violating the Constitution by not doing what they want are making fools of themselves. If they want to have the “authority” to ration “immigration” they need to rally for a Constitutional amendment. It would still be wrong- as is every government endeavor- but at least then they wouldn’t be hypocrites. (Well, not on that issue, anyway.)
And the surest way to weaken the USA on the international stage is to spread it thin while building a brutal empire. Something “conservatives” are also enthusiastic about doing. Personally, I don’t care how weak the USA is- it’s the worst threat America ever faced. “America” is the people, ideals, natural resources, etc.; “the USA” is the State, the “laws”, the politicians, and the rot which oozes from DC. America will be in much better shape if the USA dies.
jedMarch 20, 2015 5:05 pm
Well, the whole question of whether seccesion is consitutional is moot anyway, since any seccession movement is necessarily abandoning that contitution. At which point, it comes down to “you and what army?”.
I think that seccesion will never happen in the USA, because it won’t have to. The Union will break up when the financial system goes to pot. I suppose there’ll be multiple secessions, in technical terms, but it won’t be a big political fight or movement as such; it’ll just be various regions banding together and getting on with it, ignoring whatever’s left of the feds. Could well be some territorial wars for a while, as the dust settles.
Matt, anotherMarch 20, 2015 8:10 pm
There was a previous successful secession prior to the civil war fiasco. It was the original seccession from the British Empire. Took lives, warfare and time, but it worked. Then like always, it was about money, the businessmen and,politicians in the colonies wanted a bigger piece of the pie and were rebelling against the landed gentry and royal system that tended to rig the game in their own favor.
I do agree that the next round of secession will be more of a whimper than a bang. As the economy continues to die ther won’t be anything left to fight over, just a need to move away and start over no matter how hard it may seem.
LarryAMarch 20, 2015 8:27 pm
Echoing jed:
Secession is always governed by the “Winners make the Rules” law.
The United States is a sovereign nation because Cornwallis surrendered to Washington at Yorktown.
The Confederacy is not a sovereign nation because Lee surrendered to Grant at Appomattox.
The Constitution is the supreme law of the land only as long as it can be enforced.
PatMarch 21, 2015 7:35 am
jed said (and I agree): “Well, the whole question of whether seccesion is consitutional is moot anyway, since any seccession movement is necessarily abandoning that contitution. At which point, it comes down to “you and what army?”.”
The thing that bothers me about an article like Borepatch’s is the attempt to justify the reasoning behind it. It sounds too much like asking for permission to “break a law” — but no justification is needed.
While we’re still living with (the assumption that) the Constitution is our Rule of Law, fedgov is not and has already broken the contract (assuming there was one). Secession is the end of the line and, as such, secessionists make their own rules.
I do think those “rules” should be based on a foundation of ethical behavior, however. Collateral damage and unintended consequences should be taken into account, responsibility for one’s actions, and restitution to innocent victims should all be supported when the action is over.
(But I’m waiting to see what else he has to say.)
JackMarch 21, 2015 9:51 am
Borepatch is dreaming: “This time, it’s hard to see a politician willing and able to sacrifice 10% of the military age population in a War of Secession.”
It can’t happen. They (the administration) have the ability to turn off the Internet–or any particular sites–cell phone towers–whatever needs to happen to stop organization of this kind. And willingness to sacrifice lives to protect their power towers? They would sacrifice any number of American lives. With their electronic powers, travel tracking technologies, drones, night vision even from drones or satellites, and disregard for anyone outside their elitist cabals, they can stop any movement before it gets started.
Their control of the media makes it impossible for any grassroots movement to get beyond “radical extremist” or “terrorists” perception by the general public.
Anyone who believes the U.S. military would not attack and destroy any Americans who are dubbed terrorists, is deluded. The military follows orders. Period. Besides that, our government has agreements with other nation’s militaries who are more than willing to come onto American soil to squash citizen uprisings.
Secession, with its necessary civil war, or Revolution are both dreams based in wistfulness not in reality. We have a better chance of being assisted by Iran dropping a nuke on DC than we do of anything originating at the citizen level.
R.L. WurdackMarch 21, 2015 10:21 am
Interesting defeatist comment crowd. Maybe we should just give up.
LairdMarch 22, 2015 10:14 am
With respect to Pat’s comment about Borepatch “asking for permission to break a law”, I would note that our own Declaration of Independence (a secessionist document, as Matt points out) did precisely that when Jefferson wrote “a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.” Not “permission” precisely, but a legal-ish justification for the action (the Confederacy also did that in their “Declarations of the Immediate Causes”). Borepatch’s argument is of the same nature.
I suspect that Jed is correct that there likely won’t be one large secession action, as with our Civil War (or whatever name you prefer for that unpleasantness), but rather a sequential fracturing as our irretrievably damaged monetary system collapses and the whole federal house of cards comes tumbling down. We’ll see. But if it should happen, I very much disagree with Jack and others who think that the US military would simply “follow orders” and slaughter the rebels. A large percentage of the military today consists of southerners who have a racial memory of the Civil War, and for whom the oath to “protect and defend the Constitution” is not mere words. In such case I think we would see wholesale defections and even “fragging” of superior officers as occurred during the Viet Nam war. Something similar happened during the Civil War; Robert E. Lee himself was a West Point graduate who resigned his commission in the US Army to lead the Confederate army, and there were many others who followed his lead (most of the officer corps on both sides knew each other). That scenario would be even more pronounced today. The only “troops” Washington could really count on are the internal police force being developed by Obama et al (BATFE, FBI, a few militarized local police forces, etc.) And they are relatively few in number.
I await Part 2.
Paul BonneauMarch 23, 2015 9:32 am
[Tell me more “conservative” fantasies. LOL.]
“Conservatives” are as good at cherry-picking the Constitution as “liberals” are. 🙂
I think jed is on target. There may not be de jure secessions, but there will be de facto ones. We’ll just have autonomous regions like (I think) the Soviets had.
[Secession, with its necessary civil war, or Revolution are both dreams based in wistfulness not in reality.]
So, you’re saying secessions don’t happen?
[With respect to Pat’s comment about Borepatch “asking for permission to break a law”, I would note that our own Declaration of Independence (a secessionist document, as Matt points out) did precisely that…]
Uh, no it didn’t. Sure, justification was desired, but they sure didn’t beg Parliament any more (they had previously, but the Declaration was the very thing that negated all that). Clearly, they needed to get the people behind the idea – enough of them anyway – to make secession work. That will still be the case.
“…GOP candidates ran on a platform of overturning Obama’s overreach on health care, immigration, and general weakening of the USA on the international stage.”
Overreach on immigration- something the Constitution doesn’t allow government to regulate? Tell me more “conservative” fantasies. LOL.
Sure, Obama overreached on healthcare, but those trying to regulate “immigration” (no such thing) while also screaming that Obama is violating the Constitution by not doing what they want are making fools of themselves. If they want to have the “authority” to ration “immigration” they need to rally for a Constitutional amendment. It would still be wrong- as is every government endeavor- but at least then they wouldn’t be hypocrites. (Well, not on that issue, anyway.)
And the surest way to weaken the USA on the international stage is to spread it thin while building a brutal empire. Something “conservatives” are also enthusiastic about doing. Personally, I don’t care how weak the USA is- it’s the worst threat America ever faced. “America” is the people, ideals, natural resources, etc.; “the USA” is the State, the “laws”, the politicians, and the rot which oozes from DC. America will be in much better shape if the USA dies.
Well, the whole question of whether seccesion is consitutional is moot anyway, since any seccession movement is necessarily abandoning that contitution. At which point, it comes down to “you and what army?”.
I think that seccesion will never happen in the USA, because it won’t have to. The Union will break up when the financial system goes to pot. I suppose there’ll be multiple secessions, in technical terms, but it won’t be a big political fight or movement as such; it’ll just be various regions banding together and getting on with it, ignoring whatever’s left of the feds. Could well be some territorial wars for a while, as the dust settles.
There was a previous successful secession prior to the civil war fiasco. It was the original seccession from the British Empire. Took lives, warfare and time, but it worked. Then like always, it was about money, the businessmen and,politicians in the colonies wanted a bigger piece of the pie and were rebelling against the landed gentry and royal system that tended to rig the game in their own favor.
I do agree that the next round of secession will be more of a whimper than a bang. As the economy continues to die ther won’t be anything left to fight over, just a need to move away and start over no matter how hard it may seem.
Echoing jed:
Secession is always governed by the “Winners make the Rules” law.
The United States is a sovereign nation because Cornwallis surrendered to Washington at Yorktown.
The Confederacy is not a sovereign nation because Lee surrendered to Grant at Appomattox.
The Constitution is the supreme law of the land only as long as it can be enforced.
jed said (and I agree): “Well, the whole question of whether seccesion is consitutional is moot anyway, since any seccession movement is necessarily abandoning that contitution. At which point, it comes down to “you and what army?”.”
The thing that bothers me about an article like Borepatch’s is the attempt to justify the reasoning behind it. It sounds too much like asking for permission to “break a law” — but no justification is needed.
While we’re still living with (the assumption that) the Constitution is our Rule of Law, fedgov is not and has already broken the contract (assuming there was one). Secession is the end of the line and, as such, secessionists make their own rules.
I do think those “rules” should be based on a foundation of ethical behavior, however. Collateral damage and unintended consequences should be taken into account, responsibility for one’s actions, and restitution to innocent victims should all be supported when the action is over.
(But I’m waiting to see what else he has to say.)
Borepatch is dreaming: “This time, it’s hard to see a politician willing and able to sacrifice 10% of the military age population in a War of Secession.”
It can’t happen. They (the administration) have the ability to turn off the Internet–or any particular sites–cell phone towers–whatever needs to happen to stop organization of this kind. And willingness to sacrifice lives to protect their power towers? They would sacrifice any number of American lives. With their electronic powers, travel tracking technologies, drones, night vision even from drones or satellites, and disregard for anyone outside their elitist cabals, they can stop any movement before it gets started.
Their control of the media makes it impossible for any grassroots movement to get beyond “radical extremist” or “terrorists” perception by the general public.
Anyone who believes the U.S. military would not attack and destroy any Americans who are dubbed terrorists, is deluded. The military follows orders. Period. Besides that, our government has agreements with other nation’s militaries who are more than willing to come onto American soil to squash citizen uprisings.
Secession, with its necessary civil war, or Revolution are both dreams based in wistfulness not in reality. We have a better chance of being assisted by Iran dropping a nuke on DC than we do of anything originating at the citizen level.
Interesting defeatist comment crowd. Maybe we should just give up.
With respect to Pat’s comment about Borepatch “asking for permission to break a law”, I would note that our own Declaration of Independence (a secessionist document, as Matt points out) did precisely that when Jefferson wrote “a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.” Not “permission” precisely, but a legal-ish justification for the action (the Confederacy also did that in their “Declarations of the Immediate Causes”). Borepatch’s argument is of the same nature.
I suspect that Jed is correct that there likely won’t be one large secession action, as with our Civil War (or whatever name you prefer for that unpleasantness), but rather a sequential fracturing as our irretrievably damaged monetary system collapses and the whole federal house of cards comes tumbling down. We’ll see. But if it should happen, I very much disagree with Jack and others who think that the US military would simply “follow orders” and slaughter the rebels. A large percentage of the military today consists of southerners who have a racial memory of the Civil War, and for whom the oath to “protect and defend the Constitution” is not mere words. In such case I think we would see wholesale defections and even “fragging” of superior officers as occurred during the Viet Nam war. Something similar happened during the Civil War; Robert E. Lee himself was a West Point graduate who resigned his commission in the US Army to lead the Confederate army, and there were many others who followed his lead (most of the officer corps on both sides knew each other). That scenario would be even more pronounced today. The only “troops” Washington could really count on are the internal police force being developed by Obama et al (BATFE, FBI, a few militarized local police forces, etc.) And they are relatively few in number.
I await Part 2.
[Tell me more “conservative” fantasies. LOL.]
“Conservatives” are as good at cherry-picking the Constitution as “liberals” are. 🙂
I think jed is on target. There may not be de jure secessions, but there will be de facto ones. We’ll just have autonomous regions like (I think) the Soviets had.
[Secession, with its necessary civil war, or Revolution are both dreams based in wistfulness not in reality.]
So, you’re saying secessions don’t happen?
[With respect to Pat’s comment about Borepatch “asking for permission to break a law”, I would note that our own Declaration of Independence (a secessionist document, as Matt points out) did precisely that…]
Uh, no it didn’t. Sure, justification was desired, but they sure didn’t beg Parliament any more (they had previously, but the Declaration was the very thing that negated all that). Clearly, they needed to get the people behind the idea – enough of them anyway – to make secession work. That will still be the case.