MTG — Marjorie Taylor Greene — is taking some heat for proposing a national divorce. She divorced three days before Christmas after 27 years of marriage. Her tweets on dividing the nation into red and blue have riled up the left, which is always riled up about something. They live to be displeased.
Don, we both live in red states that are losing population. It doesn’t bother me too much that escapees from NY, California, Illinois and Massachusetts are not considering Mississippi as their landing spot.
I wasn’t aware of the New England Federalists. Thanks for the history lesson. I’ll read more about this later today.
Few men may be armed in the blue states, but I believe that is not the case in most red states. Even with large numbers of citizens much like myself who, if they ever owned firearms, lost them in tragic boating accidents, I believe my small county has more weapons then all of the law abiding citizens in New York City.
I knew that "cohesive" was not a word that would describe the early republic, but I didn't know about that particular incident. Thank you for the history lesson.
MTG is a bit out there, but even being a bit out there, she has more integrity and more understanding of her constituency than most, so I cut her a lot of slack.
I don't know about secession, but I do know that if we're going to last as a republic, we're going to have to reduce the influence of the federal government on the states, both red and blue so that we don't have this icy-road-in-winter effect whenever one or the other party takes slim control of the government and the citizens of the country are being slammed from side to side in the backseat of Uncle Sam's car. The federal government's only role in the beginning was to present a united front to other countries, raise an army to secure our borders, and act as a referee between states. That's it. If we want to survive as a nation, that's what we need to take it back to and let states just be quasi-autonomous. If COVID showed us anything, it was that.
How about a Constitutional Amendment that limits the ability of the Federal government to do anything that isn't specifically spelled out or prohibited in the Constitution? Things not in Constitution would then be left up to the individual states and we could all vote accordingly with our feet... we could call this Amendment "10" because it so good it rates a 10 on a scale of 1 to 10. Let's see if we can get this passed
Feb 25, 2023·edited Feb 25, 2023Liked by Don Surber
Main thing re: reducing size and impact of U.S. FEDGOV is the bureaucracy and the millions of bureaucrats it employs. Exec Order #10988 was signed by JFK in 1962. That E.O. enabled federal civil service workers to bargain collectively. Since 1962 the communist lawfare lawyers & judges have trickled down the provisions and protections of #10988 to the local dogcatcher level. Government work is organized and unionized: city, county, state, federal. Getting rid of an incompetent bureaucrat can take weeks, months and years.
Richard Trumka, once the thugg communist leader of the United Mine Workers, quit that job and went to work as top thugg for AFSCME. Trumka knew that government work would be the go-go employment sector and boy was he ever right about that. The American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees is the biggest unionized constituency under the AFLCIO umbrella. Even the administrative law judges in FEDGOV are unionized.
So what happens to all those millions of "gainfully employed union workers" if there is a national divorce? Does the Federal Reserve Bank keep printing worthless paper to pay them?
p.s. Richard Trumka's son is the one who dreamed up the notion of doing away with gas-fueled stoves in homes across America. The communists are large and in charge when it comes to day-to-day government operations. They will not go quietly.
Thanks for another very informative column. And your closing picture of a perfectly horrible couple was perfect! While they deserve each other, we don’t deserve them, except for a laugh.
God is judging us; we cannot escape judgment. Either we accept the reproof and return to Him or the judgment continues. Our enemy is not flesh, but powers and principalities. Sowing division is the strategy of our enemy; we shouldn't do his work for him.
If you think 1860 was about a yes/no question, slavery vs freedom, you're missing the point. It was a brand competition between two types of employment. The northern sweatshop system was far more profitable and fun for the owner because he had NO OBLIGATIONS to the workers. The owner was FREE. He got cheap work, and only had to pay for the exact number of minutes the workers were on the machines. He could work them to death and toss the carcasses aside, so he did. The southern owner had a LIFETIME OBLIGATION to the workers. He provided housing and food, and took care of the elderly and children.
The preface to 1860 was carefully laid out by the sweatshop owners ini NYC and Mass. They sponsored colonies in Kansas to spread sweatshop employment. The colonies were armed and prepared to stir up trouble, which they did.
I wasn't going to comment because your national divorce doesn't include my country and I would be commenting on something not in my wheelhouse. But as I was doing some laundry (it can be clarifying), I realized that Canada has been through two divorce attempts in my lifetime involving my province of Quebec both through referendum, which had they been successful, would have given the Quebec government a mandate to negotiate with the federal government in Ottawa to leave Confederation. In 1980 and 1995, the citizens of Quebec voted No both times to remain in Canada. The votes were divisive for Quebec families and for Canadians. The 1995 referendum was won by less than a percentage point by those who wanted to stay in Canada. It was ugly as heck. Minorities were blamed for denying pure laine Quebecois their destiny. Emotions have calmed over time. Now, there is talk of Alberta (western province) wanting to leave Confederation. Many Canadians would now toss Quebec out of Confederation in a heart beat. Canada is a geographically big and unhappy family, too. I don't know what to make of a national divorce in the U.S. Given my experience in Quebec and Canada, a national divorce would be ugly and messy. But if that's what people want, that's the course you will be set upon.
Thanks for again providing us with the history lesson. It gives us a good perspective and reinforces the idea of history repeating/rhyming. Slow, then quickly is how I see this continuing to proceed. Voting with our feet is a good start. The primary culprit is the federal government and its overreach. Federalism is the answer, but DC won't give up without a fight. Bring back appointment of Senators by the state legislators so that the legislative branch once again represents the interest of the people (House of Reps) and the states (Senate). Repeal the 17th amendment!
Feb 25, 2023·edited Feb 25, 2023Liked by Don Surber
Learned something as usual, Donny Boy.
I still can't believe my Minny gained people; this will change over the next few years as even though we have robust manufacturing here... The cost of living is becoming unbearable and we have a communist government; the govt is only a few seats to the left but our governor loves the China model and our SecState is buds with Marc Elias - The governor will not be a republican anytime soon due to ballot harvesting in our metro areas.
Beware everyone, you are set to lose money again with the federal W-4 changes. I have claimed '0' status and have never paid in at the end of the year. Never. Until now. $3,000 wasn't in our budget. Fun.
Feb 25, 2023·edited Feb 25, 2023Liked by Don Surber
We have much the same dynamic playing out in NZ. The northern, eastern and central North Island Maori Tribes continually flirt with the idea of secession, home rule, separate government, whatever. Currently they are pushing for co governance as they hope to get it all. Heh. Then they would end up fighting each other as they did in the nineteenth century.
Meanwhile the rabid leftists and greenies in Wellington want centralised government. One set of bureaucrats to rule us all.
In the background we have rumbling from conservative voices that want a national divorce, South Island from the North Island.
Personally I moved to the South Island when I retired. Best decision I could have made.
Given freedom people will move to wherever they perceive their best interests lie.
The details may vary between countries but the dynamics remain the same.
Don, we both live in red states that are losing population. It doesn’t bother me too much that escapees from NY, California, Illinois and Massachusetts are not considering Mississippi as their landing spot.
I wasn’t aware of the New England Federalists. Thanks for the history lesson. I’ll read more about this later today.
Few men may be armed in the blue states, but I believe that is not the case in most red states. Even with large numbers of citizens much like myself who, if they ever owned firearms, lost them in tragic boating accidents, I believe my small county has more weapons then all of the law abiding citizens in New York City.
I knew that "cohesive" was not a word that would describe the early republic, but I didn't know about that particular incident. Thank you for the history lesson.
MTG is a bit out there, but even being a bit out there, she has more integrity and more understanding of her constituency than most, so I cut her a lot of slack.
I don't know about secession, but I do know that if we're going to last as a republic, we're going to have to reduce the influence of the federal government on the states, both red and blue so that we don't have this icy-road-in-winter effect whenever one or the other party takes slim control of the government and the citizens of the country are being slammed from side to side in the backseat of Uncle Sam's car. The federal government's only role in the beginning was to present a united front to other countries, raise an army to secure our borders, and act as a referee between states. That's it. If we want to survive as a nation, that's what we need to take it back to and let states just be quasi-autonomous. If COVID showed us anything, it was that.
How about a Constitutional Amendment that limits the ability of the Federal government to do anything that isn't specifically spelled out or prohibited in the Constitution? Things not in Constitution would then be left up to the individual states and we could all vote accordingly with our feet... we could call this Amendment "10" because it so good it rates a 10 on a scale of 1 to 10. Let's see if we can get this passed
Main thing re: reducing size and impact of U.S. FEDGOV is the bureaucracy and the millions of bureaucrats it employs. Exec Order #10988 was signed by JFK in 1962. That E.O. enabled federal civil service workers to bargain collectively. Since 1962 the communist lawfare lawyers & judges have trickled down the provisions and protections of #10988 to the local dogcatcher level. Government work is organized and unionized: city, county, state, federal. Getting rid of an incompetent bureaucrat can take weeks, months and years.
Richard Trumka, once the thugg communist leader of the United Mine Workers, quit that job and went to work as top thugg for AFSCME. Trumka knew that government work would be the go-go employment sector and boy was he ever right about that. The American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees is the biggest unionized constituency under the AFLCIO umbrella. Even the administrative law judges in FEDGOV are unionized.
So what happens to all those millions of "gainfully employed union workers" if there is a national divorce? Does the Federal Reserve Bank keep printing worthless paper to pay them?
p.s. Richard Trumka's son is the one who dreamed up the notion of doing away with gas-fueled stoves in homes across America. The communists are large and in charge when it comes to day-to-day government operations. They will not go quietly.
Thanks for another very informative column. And your closing picture of a perfectly horrible couple was perfect! While they deserve each other, we don’t deserve them, except for a laugh.
Like most divorces, this one would be far from peaceful.
God is judging us; we cannot escape judgment. Either we accept the reproof and return to Him or the judgment continues. Our enemy is not flesh, but powers and principalities. Sowing division is the strategy of our enemy; we shouldn't do his work for him.
If you think 1860 was about a yes/no question, slavery vs freedom, you're missing the point. It was a brand competition between two types of employment. The northern sweatshop system was far more profitable and fun for the owner because he had NO OBLIGATIONS to the workers. The owner was FREE. He got cheap work, and only had to pay for the exact number of minutes the workers were on the machines. He could work them to death and toss the carcasses aside, so he did. The southern owner had a LIFETIME OBLIGATION to the workers. He provided housing and food, and took care of the elderly and children.
The preface to 1860 was carefully laid out by the sweatshop owners ini NYC and Mass. They sponsored colonies in Kansas to spread sweatshop employment. The colonies were armed and prepared to stir up trouble, which they did.
http://polistrasmill.blogspot.com/2017/11/reprinting-andersons-manifesto.html
I wasn't going to comment because your national divorce doesn't include my country and I would be commenting on something not in my wheelhouse. But as I was doing some laundry (it can be clarifying), I realized that Canada has been through two divorce attempts in my lifetime involving my province of Quebec both through referendum, which had they been successful, would have given the Quebec government a mandate to negotiate with the federal government in Ottawa to leave Confederation. In 1980 and 1995, the citizens of Quebec voted No both times to remain in Canada. The votes were divisive for Quebec families and for Canadians. The 1995 referendum was won by less than a percentage point by those who wanted to stay in Canada. It was ugly as heck. Minorities were blamed for denying pure laine Quebecois their destiny. Emotions have calmed over time. Now, there is talk of Alberta (western province) wanting to leave Confederation. Many Canadians would now toss Quebec out of Confederation in a heart beat. Canada is a geographically big and unhappy family, too. I don't know what to make of a national divorce in the U.S. Given my experience in Quebec and Canada, a national divorce would be ugly and messy. But if that's what people want, that's the course you will be set upon.
I remember when all the liberals ran away to Canada to escape viet nam.
Thanks for again providing us with the history lesson. It gives us a good perspective and reinforces the idea of history repeating/rhyming. Slow, then quickly is how I see this continuing to proceed. Voting with our feet is a good start. The primary culprit is the federal government and its overreach. Federalism is the answer, but DC won't give up without a fight. Bring back appointment of Senators by the state legislators so that the legislative branch once again represents the interest of the people (House of Reps) and the states (Senate). Repeal the 17th amendment!
Learned something as usual, Donny Boy.
I still can't believe my Minny gained people; this will change over the next few years as even though we have robust manufacturing here... The cost of living is becoming unbearable and we have a communist government; the govt is only a few seats to the left but our governor loves the China model and our SecState is buds with Marc Elias - The governor will not be a republican anytime soon due to ballot harvesting in our metro areas.
Beware everyone, you are set to lose money again with the federal W-4 changes. I have claimed '0' status and have never paid in at the end of the year. Never. Until now. $3,000 wasn't in our budget. Fun.
I seem to recall a state that successfully succeeded
We have much the same dynamic playing out in NZ. The northern, eastern and central North Island Maori Tribes continually flirt with the idea of secession, home rule, separate government, whatever. Currently they are pushing for co governance as they hope to get it all. Heh. Then they would end up fighting each other as they did in the nineteenth century.
Meanwhile the rabid leftists and greenies in Wellington want centralised government. One set of bureaucrats to rule us all.
In the background we have rumbling from conservative voices that want a national divorce, South Island from the North Island.
Personally I moved to the South Island when I retired. Best decision I could have made.
Given freedom people will move to wherever they perceive their best interests lie.
The details may vary between countries but the dynamics remain the same.
Central government wants more and more power.
The regions want more independence.
Both need each other.
It will work out.
As a lifelong inmate of NYS, I’m not ready to leave.
How about a Trump - MTG ticket?