Petitions from 20 States Requesting to Secede from the United States

That sounds a confused statement of the state of affairs in a country that is in transition and not yet fully stable and settled in policy and development path. Until the situation settles, we can make no judgement about 'good ol days' or 'bad nu days' etc etc. The outcome will become apparent over the next decade or two once the global 'Arab Spring' and other tail-end coldwar/old ideologies/states get themselves sorted out as democratic social states joining the global community AS part of that community and not as 'piecemeal' rogue/failed/problem states which they have been.

The trend is that we all know what FAILED in the past: Extremism of one sort or another; and the 'divide and conquer' mentality/policy of old nations. The new global community is even as we speak forming around a moderate centre of reason and science and humanity/co-operation rather than confrontation and dog-eat-dog 'law of the jungle' approach to policy internationally and nationally.

Give it a few decades of further social reforms and anti-criminal/exploiter policies, and then let's see what needs to be further improved. Meantime, extremism and unfettered 'anything' was tried and failed. Reason and reasonable middle-way approaches to everything is needed now. Science, education, ethics and humanity will triumph in the end: it HAS to or all is lost anyway! Failure is not an option; especially as we are faced with global warming as well as global re-adjustments in economies and power/fuel etc etc.

Cheers and good luck and good thinking, everyone!

 

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*Gasp*...are you implying that your new state would have a central govt as opposed to individual/private groups running/planning things for centralised response to statewide emergencies/needs?

If so, you just described a 'smaller country' with a central govt commensurate with its size; and taxation and policies which over-ride individual powers where necessary. Sound familiar? Only the 'size' is changed, not the principle/system of social compact and central authority/taxation/system as appropriate.

Let's face it, there's nothing seriously wrong in principle with social democratic govt 'model' today, it is the crooks and scammers and crazies we put INTO govt that is the real problem (China has even bigger problems with govt/private corruption etc than US!). Let's solve that before we try to needlessly create many small countries where the 'states' had been, hey? Don't throw out the social baby with the criminal bathwater. Cheers!

 

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If you're told yes...do you have a cunning plan?

I mean seriously. What if? And who is "We"? And what about all the other people that are going to vastly outnumber you, what about them?

An example: when atheists speak out their own mind, often I hear from right wing groups that the majority rules, that if they don't like it, then leave. What about this majority, that disagree with you, and mostly think "you" are all crazy? I guess it only counts when you think you have the greater number.

This is just silly. Back to my question. What's the grand plan, when you're told "you" are now on your own? Whoever that is.

 

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This doesn't really explain why Communism failed. I wouldn't say Communism was 'Extreme'. That'd be like saying Chocolate is 'Extreme'. No it's not, it's a flavor. And Communism is a social economic policy.

Why is it the Communism resulted in a very inefficient poor society? That's not just in Mandarin China, but in Spanish Cuba, Vietnam, North Korea, Russia, Belarus... everywhere.

Why?

 

It's not likely we'll go from Federal to nothing. So, I was thinking Federal to State. State to local. Local to private

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Of course a 'smaller' country would be better managed than a big country.

See, I think there actually IS something wrong. It's not ethical to force people to labor for the State. Even if one were to think "You use the roads". It's still not the right way of going about doing things. Yes, we all need to use the roads. Roads need paid for. We can come up with ways of paying for them (example: gas tax) that isn't coercive.

I don't think Communism was started to purposely crush human rights nor to rob people of prosperity. But, for that level of centralization to have any chance of being even remotely effective the variables (civil liberties) must be reduced as much as is possible. And even then, it still didn't work. It was doomed to fail. Not due to greed. But there was fundamental flaws in the system itself.


The USA may have lasted for as long as it did because we had so little centralized government. Each local area pretty much managed its own affairs. Not so now. And I don't think we really know how we developed the culture and institutions that made us so prosperous. But, I'm pretty sure that as the government crowds out space for private community based organization - those institutions are going to disappear. And, scarily enough, no one really knows how to get them back once their gone.

 

I'd agree and like to add that without the media hiding all the facts about what was really going on and reporting traffic problems, who's screwing who and other such nonsense the people will remain in the dark about anything that really needs to be known. The media has turned against truth as we need it and only given us their ideas of what they want us to know the truth is. The people will never again be able to understand who's the real bad guys for they are the ones running the presses today.

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I understand some states have multiple petitions. At this rate, it won't be long before these 9 million dittoheads have a billion signatures, which would be quite a feat given we only have 311 million residents.

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Is this a record? Have this many states ever filed to secede before?

 

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Not everywhere. It seemed to work to some extent in East Germany. To such a degree that many Germans in the East are nostalgic for those times.

 

Lets be clear here this is an internet petition with unlimited number of votes possible for any individual to cast... this is the most irrelevant thing ever! It will need to be added to the definition of "irrelevance": 'to petition over the internet for ones state to secede from the union because of rectal pain due to the re-election of a president.'

 

The rectal pain experience by a minority that likes to delude itself and others into thinking they are a majority. If they were a majority they wouldn't have lost the election nor would they need to actively suppress votes, nor would there be a need for this incessant drama. This is just the latest right wing stunt that began with "death squads" a few years ago when Democrats were trying to pass the Patient Protection & Affordable Healthcare Act.

 

Hogwash Michael, we have been through all this nonsense a million times. Austrianism is a relic of a by gone era, just like bleeding used to be a medical remedy for every malady. And Austrians made no such warnings about The Great Recession. In fact if you had taken their investment advice you would have lost a fortune before, during and after The Great Recession. You are immune to fact and reason. You just keep preaching your Libertariansim ignoring fact and reason.

 

Note what is happening in China today and you will see where and why 'communism' failed. It is now a 'communism' with 'private enterprise' component.

And what does that remind you of? Right. A sort of balance between state power/planning/responsibilities and private enterprise/individual-rights.

When neither unfettered/extreme 'communism' NOR 'capitalism' hold sway, we have the natural/proper balance between them. In other words, social democracies like the USA is trying to get back to after the repubs/conserves tried to make it their religious/capitalist haven where crooks/scammers had a free hand and when the losses could be passed onto 'the state' but the profits kept to themselves and offshored etc. Hence the GFC and religious intolerance and ignorance and hate, all of which only saps the strength of a nation.

We know that communism and capitalism unfettered and extreme did not work. Let's do it right. Let Obama get on with reforms which will strengthen the national ethos and social compacts which are crucial if we are all to work together to solve the looming problems on a global scale.

 

But you evade the point that standardized systems/infrastructure and common policies at home and internationally and economies of scale and bargaining and worker/expertise/emergency mobility etc etc across the states of a federation like US is something that makes the US strong enough to absorb all that it has done over the last few years of pain left to us by the failed capitalists and small govt and secessionists etc scammers and crooks.

You don't "labor for the state". You labor as part of a social community wherein every individual has rights and responsibilities which confer on the individual certain overall benefits/services impossible to attain any other way. If you fall ill, it is the state that should take care of you according to your self-help capability. If a criminal threatens/injures you, it is the state that should come to your aid and punish the perpetrator. These things and other things in that vein cannot be done by individuals alone when you have MILLIONS of people cheek-by-jowl. It would soon descend into chaos and individual horrors which would make your current vision of society a paradise by comparison.

Try to bear in mind that individuals have no longer the luxury of limitless space and resources. They are a global species now, and must live in constrained natural/social circumstances which they cannot avoid. The choice is between failed approaches to social living, or the only approach: social living!

A middle path social democratic state, with all its checks and balances and rights and responsibilities and benefits paid for via taxation on people and commerce is the only fair and equitable way. It is a BALANCE between the individual and the state; between nature's dog-eat-dog law of the jungle and society's rule of common law. The only problem arises when we put CROOKS and SCAMMERS into govt. Let's attack THAT problem instead of attacking what is the only way forward: social democratic states.......crooks hopefully NOT included in future. Reforms and safeguards are needed to fine-tune this middle way of global social living. Anything else is a recipe for repeating the disastrous mistakes we have made over historical and recent times. Let's learn. We are homo sapiens, we CAN learn. Let's not waste our mental as well as our natural resources in the name of anarchy, hatred (personal, religious and political) and sheer bloody-minded ignorance and laziness.

We all have a part to play according to our natures and abilities and opportunities. Let's make the best of these and not the worst, hey? No further comment as I have run out of time. Good luck, Michael, everyone. Cheers all!

 

Oh yes. It worked so well that they had to build a giant wall and patrol it with armed guards to prevent people from leaving. It worked so well that they had to put bars in all the windows of the buildings along the border to keep people from jumping out even from floors so high that to jump was to risk death.

 

East Germany was a mess. It costs the West Germans $1 Trillion dollars and 14 years of stagnant wages to bring them close to West Germany... but they're still not there. And that's the scary part - Communism crowded out the private community institutions, and they'e gone. No one really knows how to get them to come back as they develop slowly and organically. Once gone, that's it - gone.

I know some E. Germans and they do have a funny nostalgia. They lost their culture. The government crowed out all the private institutions that made Germans, German. I also know some Chinese who also have a nostalgia. I know some Americans who have a nostalgia for the 'good ole days'. I think this nostalgia is a wish to return to childhood when life was taken care of us by our care givers. For the old they dream of back to the good memories when they were healthy and young. The truth is E. Germany was a mess and a lot of resources were stolen from other satalite states in the soviet empire to prop up the German life style as part of a Russian propaganda campaign - and it was still a mess.

Communism simply can't work.

For the same reason, as our nation centralizes, we will lose prosperity and follow the classic example of all nations in all of history. And, it's happening right here in front of our eyes.

 

This is how much of Europe was run for a thousand years...with loosely affiliated City States.

Even today, Italians think of their allegiance being to a city rather than to a nation...which was only established in recent history.

Aristotle used to say that an 'ideal' government could only govern all the land seen from a hilltop...and no more.

 

The world has got a lot more complicated and crowded since then.

Transportation, communication, information, military/police reach, education, aspirations, opportunities, safety net, social/commercial interactions/treaties/responsibilities on global scale, problems facing humanity as a whole not just a 'city state' since pollution, terrorism, criminality, global warming, overpopulation, resource depletion etc etc etc do not 'stop at the city gates'.

The old world is gone. Live in the new world instead of looking to something which was a product of its time which will never come again unless something truly apocalyptic happens to the globe/humanity.

Learn from the past mistakes. Resolve real present/imminent problems and leave the past to history. Science and humanity is what counts most now, not politics and old divide and conquer, fear, ignorance etc etc.

Gotta go. Good luck. Cheers!

 

The point, that overreaching past what you can handle, is a valid one, and growth past that point has broken many empires. But "all the land seen from a hilltop" isn't a literal thing, it's more, don't try to do more than you can control. And that is one reason why much of the localized government should and is done by the states and towns, and the Federal government should only involve themselves with things that all the states tend to have in common.