In the 1860s, many thousands of our fellow countrymen died to defend the institution of slavery. Today, we gloss over that grotesque fact by calling the conflict in which they died "The Civil War" or "The War Between the States". It was a war against slavery by the North and a war in favor of slavery by the South.
Thank all that is just in the world for the victory of the North and the end of slavery. However, one should long have wondered why the unrepentant Southern states, in which African Americans would continue to be disgracefully abused for another hundred years, were allowed back into the Union.
Probably they should have been cut loose then. The United States would be a much stronger place now if they had been. And this is not to disparage the good people, and there are many, in the South. I am only making a political point, but one I believe in.
At the obvious risk of sounding insufferably elitist, can we just stop pretending that the Northeast and the Pacific Coast, as polities, have anything much in common with, say, Missouri or Kansas? Can we make a case for saying we've had enough of being held back by this increasingly uncomfortable union?
Where is it written that the United States must not have fewer states in it tomorrow than it does today? Who would be sorry if the Northeast joined the Pacific Coast to form another nation that adhered much more closely to the progressive ideals of these areas than the one we live in today? And this would also leave the so-called "flyover" states to create their own, much more conservative government (though one has no idea where they would find the tax revenue to run any government at all).
I am certain this post, if read by some, will be found offensive. Mind you, I do not disparage any individuals of merit in any state north, south or in the middle. I simply believe we have, as a nation, crossed (perhaps) a Rubicon of political discord.
I would like to know how much longer the engines of wealth in this country (the Northeast and the Pacific Coast) are going to continue supporting laggard, subsidized places like Mississippi and Wyoming while granting them enormous Senatorial and electoral power over our standards and requirements. How much longer are the regions where education is respected and concentrated going to carry economic water for the regions where many seem to believe education is contemptible and elitist? And while I am not against responsible gun ownership, I have to wonder how much longer Virginia guns need to be permitted into the state of New York only to wind up putting bullets into the heads of shopkeepers?
Personally I would prefer if we might find a civil manner in which to part ways. I am pretty sure the constituency for separation in the non-elitist states could be found without great difficulty. It may also be found in the elitists states of the Northeast and the Pacific.
It's the world's least likely political eventuality, I know. But we don't seem to like each other that much in this country anymore. Therefore, to me, some kind of separation beetwen the States sounds like an idea whose time may be upon us.
