Joke maps of the US are flying about the Internet with the blue States joined up with Canada as The United States of Canada, and the rest variously dubbed as "USA" or "Jesus Land" (take your pick - I know people who'll be offended by either or both). Like Dave over at Chicken or Beef I'm not averse to the notion of one or several states proposing to leave the USA. Four years ago people would have just joked about that and it would be termed "unthinkable". But as a matter of fact I think at the moment a majority of this country would probably find that idea very acceptable. Why not leave all those unpatriotic baby killing, queer loving, tree huggers behind and just get on with life?
Now a letter has surfaced on Boing Boing (which I located by chance after some Googling because I don't read Boing Boing). The letter entitled "My Modest Proposal" that proposes just that - albeit with a more quid-pro-quo settlement in mind. Less of an abandonment, or runaway, more of an amicable divorce, after all in this oh-so-Christian family loving country, divorce is still the American way right? How many have drawn the line from banning gay marriage, to repealing Roe Vs. Wade, to banning contraception, to banning pornography, to banning liquor (again), to outlawing teaching of Darwinism, to requiring school prayer - twice a day (and for the parents too), to banning skirts above the ankle, to banning divorce, to outlawing shopping at Wal-Mart on Sunday, to declaring the Earth flat again and having the sun revolving around the Earth again, and finally to incarcerating or executing the "possessed" i.e. anyone that begs to differ form the official American scriptures (oops, I meant to type "schoolbooks").
Well that's basically what "my modest proposal" suggests is the end game for the United Stated of America the Red. They can have it and love it and we'll just get on fine without such impositions thank you very much. The only problem become then, that California and other dissenting states would just become part of the problem. As Dave pointed out, in leaving the USA, as opposed to loving it, we'd all become victims of its own foreign policy - one that's notoriously intolerant and xenophobic. If you think the USA Mexico border is long, just think how long the USA-Red, USA-Blue border would be and more to the point think how popular it would be for the red staters to run, swim, sail, climb, fly and cross that border via any means they could. Pretty soon USA-Red would have to start building a giant wall or fence all around itself rather like a certain other country is busy doing. Once a wall was in place they'd have to make owning a shovel, spade, pickaxe or any other digging implement a felony too, and you forget about flying - not a chance, even feathers and wax would be banned.
Gentlepersons, the true definition of freedom is that which you don't have when your country creates walls of any kind to prevent you from leaving its brand of "freedom". Thom Hartmann and Howard Zinn have both made interesting studies of why the Union didn't want the Confederate States go and shed countless millions of lives to ensure they didn't. Let me assure you, they both conclude it had little if anything to do with the preservation of the freedom of the people, and especially the freedom of slaves. Be they black, brown, yellow, white or whatever race, creed or color the preservation of the United States wall all to do with maintenance of a system characterized by government of a vast underclass of slaves and working class people by a few very rich families (a plutocratic oligarchy).
You don't believe me? Well if the civil war brought freedom for the slaves of the south via the Fourteenth Amendment then why was it that between 1868 and 1896 of the 150 14th Amendment cases heard by the Supreme Court, 15 involved the rights of black Americans and the other 135 (90%) involved the rights of business entities? Wasn't the civil war and 14th Amendment supposed to be to emancipate all those slaves, just why were businesses lining up in court to use it? For a full answer you'll just have to head over to Reclaim Democracy" to find out. But trust me, like I said, it had more than a little to do with why the North didn't want the South to walk away with all the power brought to it by centuries of exploitation by slavery.
Strangely it was those rich peoples dislike for paying taxes to another set of wealthy entities - British corporations - that lead to them to split with Britain in the first place. So instead of seeing Californians, "flaming liberals" or "crunchy granola eating tree huggers" as the rogue individuals in society, it is more appropriate to see Republicans who don't want to pay taxes "to the man" as the rogue breakaway individuals in society. They are after all doing just exactly what their forefathers did and trying to evade their taxes in one form or another. But from the invent moral high-ground of the Republican platform, they paint the rest of us as the ones who are breaking away from their absolute truths of moral standards. We all assumed those were the same absolute truths that "we hold to be self-evident", but apparently they aren't.
So, if its to be reds on the right and blues on the left then so be it. At least I'm starting on the right side of the fence!
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