50 replies to this topic

[Fin]

I'm calling it now. The butt-hurt over this election is officially preposterous.

I don't know, everyone I've read has been incredibly reasonable.

[Sir Deimos]

I don't know if I should laugh or cry. Dat link.

[Kisseena]

I read that link. Just... What? That guy couldn't be more of a crybaby.

People are so dumb.

Edited by Kisseena, 14 November 2012 - 02:53 PM.

[MikePetersSucks]

Like Wolf pointed out, the states don't want to secede, just loud-mouthed individuals within those states. Not even full percentage scores of said countries.

And as funny as it would be to imagine, you guys probably shouldn't be rooting for a Secession given how many people would inevitably die in the process. We're talking economic collapse, food shortages, possibly Texas getting overrun by mexican drug lords seeing a golden oppurtunity...

If these states secede, they won't have any FDA, no imports from the blue states (hope you don't miss oranges), no federal funding which these states are actually heavily reliant on, ironically. And if any Civil War does happen, there's no way the seceding states would get any sort of appreciable victory. They'd be demolished.

[Kisseena]

If these states secede, they won't have any FDA, no imports from the blue states (hope you don't miss oranges), no federal funding which these states are actually heavily reliant on, ironically. And if any Civil War does happen, there's no way the seceding states would get any sort of appreciable victory. They'd be demolished.

Which is why we ask why they didn't learn the first time around. XD

[Oberon Storm]

Didn't the South wipe the floor with the North for most of the Civil War?

[SteveT]

I'm not sure about that, and I'm having trouble thinking of a useful metric.

In terms of raw number of battles won over the course of the war, it was Confederacy: 148, Union: 239

That was done by taking this page: http://en.wikipedia....vil_War_battles and using find and replace for "Confederate victory" and "Union Victory." No guarantee that's even an accurate count within the article.

The Confederacy had a better start, partially because the Union didn't take the war seriously for a while.

EDIT: Here's a metric that favors the Confederacy. The Union had higher casualties: http://www.civilwarh.../casualties.htm

Edited by SteveT, 14 November 2012 - 05:13 PM.

[Veteran]

Better dust off those giant mechanical spiders.

[SOAP]

If Texas does secede, I say we build a fence around it. Just because.

LET ME OUT FIRST D:

Yeah guys! Some of us are still here. D:

I figured we could have some sort of trade before hand. The sensible people of Texas for the rest of the crazy right wingers elsewhere. Then we build a fence, and replace Texas with Puerto Rico.

Everyone wins, I think.

Can we at least airlift the entire city of Austin too? It's pretty progressive. It's like an island of Liberals amongst a sea of Conservatives.

[Ikiosho]

I'm calling it now. The butt-hurt over this election is officially preposterous.

I don't know, everyone I've read has been incredibly reasonable.

Seat Belt laws? Come on! Please. Even you have to admit that forcing individuals to wear seat belts IN THEIR OWN FUCKING VEHICLES THAT THEY BOUGHT WITH THEIR OWN GODDAMNED HARD-EARNED DOLLARS, is utterly and completely absurd.

You keep wanting to deny that America is now a fascist state. Prove it to me. Please.

I side with this man 100%.

[/sarcasm]

[Fin]

Seat belts are pretty much like manacles when you think about it.

[DarkJuno]

Can we at least airlift the entire city of Austin too? It's pretty progressive. It's like an island of Liberals amongst a sea of Conservatives.

Hey, not all of us are out of our damn minds. Despite being militantly Texan I'm taking off in the slim margin of chance something comes of this.

Anyway, I don't poke my nose in here all that often because I like being happy, but I figured I should put in my thought as the only resident of the state on the board who doesn't hate it here.

As people already pointed out, 80,000 people is a slim margin of the population - even if you were to only look at the deranged extreme right who hate Obama, even amongst them most think this is a horrendous idea, it's pretty much just the psychopaths who aren't thinking clearly who want this. The State seccession idiots have also been around for years now, they don't amount to much anything and at this point this is just the typical bubbling up of the outcry after every handful of years where the rest of us, regardless of ideology just roll our eyes and wait for them to shut up again. That whole "15th biggest economy in the world!" thing they keep bringing up is also very much a result of being a state in a larger nation, and while all ya'll joke, it would be an economic disaster for both sides if it moves away, even with an economy that's not already currently ailing. The whole idea about how Texas has the right to secede if it wants to is also absolutely false, despite our lovely governer's misspoken comment about it. Perry for the record is also not a supporter of it despite what they say, his "hint" about it was regarding his failed bid for the Presidency, and even if he were, he can't just go to Ft. Hood or any other base and commandeer the army in the name of Texas. He is technically the Commander-in-Chief of the Texas National Guard (and the Texas Rangers) but the president can override that without much trouble.

It's just posturing and yelling, it's the way of the internet - the lunatic fringe yells the loudest and seems more pervasive then it really is. It's aggravating those people exist, but freedom to believe what you want means those are going to be around on both ends, unfortuantely. To put it in a more clear yet also an extremely depressing and disappointing way, twice the amount of Texans support same sex unions then those who legitimately support seccession - and even more believe in UFO's then the two put together by a wide margin. What is interesting is that Texas can legally divide itself up into 5 states if it so wishes, and while that's also incredibly unlikely, there's more of a chance of that then the state leaving.

What I find more interesting and more likely to come to blows are the individual states legalizing pot, since those are still illegal by the Federal government. That's where I'd keep an eye on the Feds and the states getting in a fight on whose say is more important and powerful and all it'll take is one stoner to get caught by the Feds and complain it's legal for the state to get it started.

And that's all. You may resume your Conservative bashing. I'll be over here throat punching seccessionists.

[SteveT]

Guys! All 50 States! Perfect Score!

http://www.huffingto..._n_2131447.html

So here's my plan: the whole country secedes and reforms a new country. The same country. All elected officials keep their jobs, but we totally all seceded.

[Kisseena]

That plan is perfect.

[Hana-Nezumi]

[arunma]

Didn't the South wipe the floor with the North for most of the Civil War?

They did in the sense that they put up more of a fight than the Union would have thought. But the South ultimately suffered a lot more than the North did. Case in point: General Sherman's march basically destroyed Georgia, and I don't know that there were too many equivalent campaigns by the South against the North.

Anyway, as to this whole secession business. Philosophically I'd take to the idea that state sovereignty is important. America should be viewed as more a collection of states than a single state, and federalism has gone a bit farther than what even the Constitution envisioned (see the 10th amendment, and then look up why we have an effective national drinking age of 21). But here's the problem: the term "states' rights" is almost always code for "we hate blacks" (or some other form of minority oppression). Historically, states' rights has been used to justify slavery, Jim Crow, and most recently stopping possible US citizens in Arizona because they look Mexican. Please note that in that last example I specifically did not mention immigration reform, because any citizen should object to possibly being stopped by the police due to his appearance, regardless of what that citizen's view is on states enforcing federal immigration law. So yeah, states' rights are important, as long as the other nine amendments in the bill of rights are enforced.

As far as secession goes, I believe the constitution of Texas allows for it since they were a sovereign entity before joining the US. That said, they sided with the Confederacy during the Civil War and lost, and a few years later the Supreme Court ruled that the Confederacy had never legally existed. I suppose that part of the constitution should be amended.

Seriously though, if these guys really want to secede, I suggest they attempt more peaceful means than a war. Believe it or not, serious talk of secession has occured more recently. Check out the Northwest Angle (http://en.wikipedia....Northwest_Angle), the northern tip of my home state of Minnesota. They actually wanted to secede back in 1997 and join Canada, mostly because they fished in Canadian waters and, as Americans, couldn't legally keep the fish they caught. Their congressman tried to introduce a Constitutional amendment to this effect. Of course it didn't happen, but if someone has serious reason for wanting to secede besides "we hate Obama," it goes to show that Congress will at least listen to them.

Edited by arunma, 17 November 2012 - 03:27 PM.

[Hero of Slime]

I don't think anything will come of all this secession stuff but if it does, I'll fight for the Union.

[Egann]

*KICK* So apparently America isn't the only place with this going on.

Separatists winning in Catalonia

[Veteran]

The Scots vote in 2014. Ungrateful skirt-wearers.

[Sir Deimos]

They DO know how to make some damn fine spirits though.

[Veteran]

You'd think they'd be happy we got rid of Mel Gibson, but noooooooo.