http://www.city-data.com/forum/texas/146689-how...

Floor yielded for now.

It's one place I haven't lived, but I've had the chance to visit it a number of times. Yes, many Texans consider their land to be the greatest place on earth.

“Texas would make 220 States the size of Rhode Island, 54 the size of Connecticut, six the size of New York. Texas is four times bigger than the combined New England States.”

“But as clearly as anyone else Leader Garner saw that Texas itself will object to five Texases. The bigness of Texas is the supreme boast of every Texan. To hack the State up into five Arkansases would, to most of its citizens, be dismembering an empire.”

http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,917...

Yes, Texas can become multiple (at one time, slave) states, which is (and was) effective (particularly in the Senate). Of course, other states like California could and even should be made into multiple states (the same is true with Oregon and Washington; their wet western and dry eastern sides are different worlds altogether).

And if the nation were sane, we'd see in some instances (on the Great Plains, for one thing) something that needs to be desperately done in places like Upstate New York, but isn't there because of bureaucratic culture and tradition — consolidation.

California is first and foremost, and it's more often proposed by lefties than by righties. As popular or more so is the almost-100%-lefty “Cascadia” dream for the Pacific Northwest.

I had a friend once (not a lefty) advocate creating another Chile on our west coast by uniting California, Oregon, and Washington (I'd draw a new boundary along the Pacific Crest, though, where OR and WA should be divided into two states each, anyway) with BC and the Alaska Panhandle. We might offer to buy Baja California from Mexico while we were at it, too.

Welcome to the real world.

In that real world, the concept of a contemporary secession introduces the set of conditions which would make a secession not only successful, but beyond that, logical. That in turn leads to consideration of just what people want states in this century to be, and possibilities (unlikely as they are) for reorganization and rationalization. (To be brief, first and foremost the seceding territory should be viable on its own, the same criterion that would change our set of states today from what were created in the days before “destruction of distance” by modern transport and communications, as well as the colonialist arbitrary creation of straight-line state boundaries in the case of much of the West. To answer Pacatrue's issue, the basis for secession would be utility and practicality as well as logic and notion of community.)

* * *

“This may sound silly and dated, but I really believe there's a group in Texas that is wealthy, tied with oil and never really got over not being allowed to break away. “

They learned to accept an ocean of Yankee money since the 1930s.

Plus some of them have located their businesses offshore so at least they can avoid taxes.

No, what I said was that their argument was rooted in moral principles. You quote the opening lines of the Declaration. It goes on to flesh that out by enumerating a set of moral principles which the Founders believed Great Britain had violated, legitimizing the break.

Mark Daniels

This may sound silly and dated, but I really believe there's a group in Texas that is wealthy, tied with oil and never really got over not being allowed to break away.

Of all the states that make noise about secession, Texas is the first one to pop into my mind. Oh, and that is HQ for most of the oil tycoons, including Bush.

Must just be a coincidence.

As it relates to the Russian invasion of Georgia? Well, Georgian independance was respected until the US became a problem over there for Russian intelligence. And they ARE intelligent people folks. I wonder how we would feel if arabs were found to have close and unnerving ties with Texan Oil tycoons? What if they were even tight with our President.

Oh, wait a minute…they are. Salem Bin Laden and Bush were old business partners from back in the day..

And so on…

“Hypocrisy” will be the word historians use to describe WWIII most often.

The South had the right to leave the Union if it wanted. It lost to a much stronger power motivated by Manifest Destiny. We were a growing nation — no way would we tolerate the loss of _existing_ territory!

What dims the the South's secession in addition to the perpetuation of slavery was that it was not merely dispassionate self-interest, but because it was _selfish._ As Trollope (the younger) wrote, the South was happy to stay in the Union so long as it remained the more or most powerful part of it and would get its way. (It was New Englanders who first had considered secession, during the War of 1812, while Southerners like Calhoun who were Unionists of the early 1800s. Those who already know their history well enough also can recall the “Virginia Dynasty” as well as Southern influence in the location of the federal government.) In earlier years, the South had its way, and it chose to stay in the Union. Once it saw its power and influence permanently diminished and held by the “Roundheads,” they, the “Cavaliers,” chose (finally) to leave.

An earlier secession, in 1848 (merely coincidental with European strife), may well have been successful for the South. But by the 1860s, it was dwarfed by the North's power. (Had the Confederates chosen to fight guerrilla-style rather than conventionally and romantically, and been more bold — invading the Midwest and hauling away the harvest, say, in addition to conducting a larger attack on the Northeast, such as at Baltimore or at Philadelphia, cutting off the capital –they might have held out longer or even succeeded in the 1860s.)

They were at the start of all this. Russia never would've threatened Georgia's new found independance if it didn't think the US was overstepping it's bounds (as it has been) by allowing BigOil to convince (read: lie to) Congress to expand its empire into Iraq and get Georgian troops to help.

The fact that the Georgian president smells like a puppet, given that he was schooled in the US (now how did the Russians come to THAT conclusion…lol…) was just another slap in the face with a brick-lined glove.

In other words, no matter what McCain and the GOP BigOil cronies sing to you about how bad bad Russia is so mean and nasty and wrong, they are really just preventing further US/GOP/BigOil expansion in their Hemisphere. And expansion that WE and not they, initiated by “our” invasion of Iraq for purposes of oil.

Period.

They never would be in Georgia right now if it wasn't for “us”.

Sending battleships in with “aide” to the Georgian's in what Russia now considers its terrorial protectorate (again, thanks to “our” intial actions) is yet another glove-slap with a brick inside.

And it may be our last. Prepare your boys and girls to be drafted soon. If American troops die in this clearly orchestrated setup, we will “have” to retaliate..

And you know what that means. Forget cold war, this one's going to be hot…

Radioactive maybe..

You know Congress, it's really really time for you to cut your vacation short. I really really really think you need to come back and rein this thing in before they finish us off for good.