Perhaps you’re one of the lucky ones who hasn’t heard about a bunch of sound and fury signifying nothing emanating from group of county commissioners who have proposed that a little chunk of Northern Colorado become the 51st state. If not, here’s what you need to know:
The pro-secession leaders say Denver ignores rural Colorado on issues like agriculture, oil and gas development and gun rights.
Which one of those things do you think these idiots really care about?
What gets me about these secession efforts is that there is no more privileged cohort than rural Americans. Rural states get far more federal money than they pay in. One recent example: federal subsidies that pay to run telecommunications miles into the country to serve a few subscribers are funded by universal taxes on long distance, which means poor people in urban areas are paying for rural telephone lines. There are hundreds of other federal programs tailored specifically to make sure that Americans in rural areas have all the accoutrements of civilization that city and suburb dwellers enjoy.
Yet there’s no fucking gratitude from these hicks, and by “hicks” I mean specifically the know-nothings who dream up idiot schemes like secession, not people like my relatives who live in rural areas and understand how lucky they are to be first in line at the federal trough. Instead of using the pie holes that Baby Jesus gave them to thank urban states for their clean water, well-maintained roads, electricity and telecommunication, they choose to forcefully eject verbal diarrhea like this secession talk. And the media laps it up mainly because it pisses off their urban/suburban audience, and pissed off people click on stories.
These fuckers either need to be ignored, laughed at, or told to secede from Colorado and attach themselves to Wyoming. Wyoming got $1.11 of every federal dollar they paid in at last accounting, which I will grant is nothing compared to the $2.03 that New Mexico soaked up, but it is a hell of a lot better than the $0.81 Colorado got. And I guarantee that nobody is going to do anything but venerate their precious fucking guns in Wyoming.
woozywinks
One reason they most likely won’t succeed in seceding is that would lose access to Colorado’s water rights. So maybe these truths will hit them in the face.
raven
delete
Ben Cisco (onboard the Defiant)
@woozywinks: Truths? NeoConfederates? Surely you jest.
Jerzy Russian
@woozywinks: This. Also, what happens when the natural gas runs out? What happens when they destroy the environment as they frack the crap out of the place getting at said natural gas?
Punchy
What would be the capital of Northern Colly? Greeley? Forty Collins?
PeakVT
Possibly relevant:
Even if they could secede, they wouldn’t be admitted to the union without full Repuke control of DC.
Apart from the lunacy of the Colorado teabaggers, I actually think most states should be redrawn (except HI and AK) because for the most part, the borders make no sense in the modern world. But that is something that could only be done right in a sane country. America is not a sane country.
ericblair
Yeah, well, if they want to create the Tribal Areas of Coloradostan, we get to turn Northern Virginia into North Virginia first.
japa21
Although this is about a portion of a state seceding from the rest of the state, but remaining part of the US, it is similar to all the other claims or threats of states seceding from the Union in response to the creeping Sharia law about to be imposed by the Kenyan usurper. Along with the UN, through Agenda 21, 22 or 30, taking away all our guns and foridating all the water, or some such.
What gets me about this, is that these same people are the ones who get upset the most when someone refuses to recite the Pledge of Allegiance and who focus the most on the words “under God” in the pledge. Aside from the fact that those words weren’t even in the pledge originally, they apparently ignore the next word in the pledge, “indivisible”, because they sure are intent on dividing the country.
PS and OT. I have avoided the intertubes for the past several days, so I am just now finding out about Tunch. John, my heart goes out to you. There is nothing moere I can say.
Belafon (formerly anonevent)
This is why I completely sympathize with the argument about having states receive in federal funds the same proportion as to what they send in taxes. I wouldn’t agree to do it, but it’s really hard to think of how to show some people how fucked up their thinking is without them being hurt by their decisions.
Librarian
The pro-secession leaders say Denver ignores rural Colorado on issues like agriculture, oil and gas development and gun rights.
Translation: The state government wants to to implement sane, rational, humane, intelligent policies! Help! We’re being oppressed!
rikyrah
America
love it or leave it, assholes.
we’ll take your passports on the way out
negative 1
Let’s start cancelling rural subsidies. Honestly. We don’t have to announce it, just start voting them down. It’s the one way that democrats can use gridlock to their advantage.
Pros: it makes sprawl too expensive to continue, fostering true smart growth. We cutoff one of the main corporate welfare tricks (agribusiness subsidies). We give most rural voters the ungoverned paradise they supposedly want, so their local reps actually have to defend their positions.
Cons: umm…. I got nothing. Anyone else?
Patricia Kayden
Have you ever heard of liberals demanding to secede from the US? It’s always conservative Republicans demanding to secede. Amazing that they are running around screaming patriotism and then wanting to leave the US whenever they’re not happy with a political decision/outcome.
smith
@woozywinks:
They’re probably too dumb to think that far ahead.
They just want to have their own “Wild Wild West” state, they rarely take things like water rights, property lines, commerce, and other stuff into effect.
Mr Stagger Lee
I remember when a group of yahoos in the Far Noth of California wanted to join with some counties of Oregon to form a new state(ironically called Lincoln) because they were sick of the “tyranny” of San Francisco and Los Angeles, plus the yahoos sick of the “tyranny” of Portland. Real reason back then is the same as now, they want their own White Christian Patriarchal Homeland.
cleek
@negative 1:
psst. i got a little secret for ya: not all democrats live in high-density urban centers.
some of us live, gasp, in the suburbs, or even in (OMGZ!) the country.
Shakezula
Um. I have been to many rural areas and if those people are getting a big boost by first shot at federal subsidies, everyone would be dead twice over without federal aid. There are people out there who still don’t have indoor plumbing. Roads? Ha.
This is all to say that I suspect the people roaring about this are a few rich fucks who have convinced a few more confused fucks that they’ll get rich if only they get the dang government out of their drinking water. Everyone else is just trying to survive.
JCT
The new and very reasonable gun laws in CO drove all of these idiots apeshit. Gunz before butter for these losers.
BGinCHI
The teenagers in the basement want to secede again. Please leave them alone and stop bossing them but also please keep the fridge full, the heat on, the lights on, the water on, the toilets working, and some gas in the car. Oh, and could we get that laundry done in the basket at the top of the stairs?
And about that allowance….
Linda Featheringill
I thought they were just wanted to secede from Colorado, not the US.
Not that much different from North Virginia and Baja Arizona.
And since political boundaries are man made, they should be amenable to alterations.
Another Halocene Human
How are those little rural countries entirely or almost entirely bordered by South Africa doing?
I understand Johannesburg to the west is one of the world’s richest cities, and the country in general has a GINI index to make Texas die of envy.
Forum Transmitted Disease
@Punchy: Greeley. Jesus, you ever been there? A literal shithole. If they could be allowed to do this, it would be oh so appropriate.
BTW, this isn’t about guns. It’s about weed.
@Patricia Kayden: The liberal equivalent was “emigrating to Canada” after Bush’s 2004 election.
Another Halocene Human
@BGinCHI: Lol, it’s like upstate NY wanting to be its own state. Oh, you mean you don’t want all that sweet sweet NYC tax dollars? You mean you’re going to take your hand out of the MTA fund? Gosh golly gee.
Or the occasional clown parade of Western Massachusetts pols suggesting they break up the state. They got one of their own in the governor’s office finally and she was a bigger joke than Parah Salin.
Another Halocene Human
@Forum Transmitted Disease: It’s about two senators and that sweet, sweet pork.
A Ghost To Most
Luckily, here in the ‘People’s Republic of Front Range’ , our water comes from the mountains, not the ground. Good thing, at the rate they are moving to frack up the ground water. Let the morans go, and terminate their water rights. Let them drink fracking fluid.
Chickamin Slam
Nothing new. In my state for a while in the late 1990s, the eastern halves of several counties threatened to secede and form their own government. They had the usual titles too: Freedom County, Liberty County, and the slightly more original Cedar County. “We want Liberty!” they’d chant from their beater vehicles parked alongside the roads. When that did not work they tried running for office thinking they’d be voted in with massive support of everyone. Ha.
Another Halocene Human
@Shakezula: Um. I have been to many rural areas and if those people are getting a big boost by first shot at federal subsidies, everyone would be dead twice over without federal aid. There are people out there who still don’t have indoor plumbing.
Uh yeah… food stamps, bro. Despite all the bravado online, “The gummints about to collapse! Imma go to ground and grow my own food!” aside from some really dedicated hippies and some rednecks with guns who hunt their own food, but work 3-9mo.s in construction per year to PAY for the guns, bullets, license, fridges, electricity, pickup trucks, etc, rural America is full of SNAP recipients.
A lot of them want to move into settled areas to get a job but they can’t scrape together the rent. Low wages + no affordable housing (+ high gas in the face of policies that assume cheap gas) has trapped them.
MattF
Oh, go ahead, take your ball and go home. Please.
Another Halocene Human
@negative 1:
http://www.quickmeme.com/meme/eb6/
dmsilev
So we’re supposed to accept a ‘state’ with 300,000 people that will get two Senators and a Congressman? I don’t think so.
Narcissus
What is White Nationalism for two hundred, Alex
Gex
Listen, everyone knows that all those wonderful things that you claim are subsidized by DFH’s and *urban* people are really the gifts bestowed upon real Americans by God. Therefore they can cut of ties with the areas that subsidize them or provide vital amenities. They know their God will provide.
And if not, they will try to have the guns and ammo necessary to try to come take what we no longer give them after they leave.
BGinCHI
@dmsilev: Why can’t they all apply for asylum like that Snowden dude?
Another Halocene Human
@Belafon (formerly anonevent): I’m guessing the Marshall Plan worked because Germany was too far away for easily offended liberals to get worked up about the outrageous political opinions of the people we were ostensibly helping (and the rightwingers who did know thought they were making the world safe for traditional, upperclass–not lumpenproletariat-dog-hitler–rightwingism).
It’s called economic development. We should be doing more of it. Hmm, I think our President made a few comments about that at one point.
Gex
@Forum Transmitted Disease: Notice how liberals just threaten to move, they don’t threaten to break up the country. Only real patriots threaten to break up the country.
JoyfulA
Rural areas couldn’t get a UPS or FedEx package delivered to them if USPS didn’t take the handoff at the nearest town of any size. Meaning, without the semipublic USPS subsidizing rural areas, nothing would be delivered, except with an immense price.
Lurking Canadian
@dmsilev:
With the current rules, you need…what 10% of the nationwide popular vote to get enough Senators to filibuster every damn thing in sight? That’s obviously too high, permitting tyranny of the majority.
Until each household with two Republicans living in it is a state unto itself, they really haven’t fully leveraged their potential in the Senate.
A Ghost To Most
@dmsilev: They oughta call it South Wyoming. Same demographics, without the redeeming features of Yellowstone and Jackson.
Another Halocene Human
@japa21: Aside from the fact that those words weren’t even in the pledge originally, they apparently ignore the next word in the pledge, “indivisible”, because they sure are intent on dividing the country.
That is the #1 reason I refuse to say “under God”. Because fuck the traitors. The #2 reason is church and state, bitchez. I don’t care what, if, or how you believe. The whole point of a Constitution is to have a secular government. Se. Cu. Lar. Leave that higher power shit to 12-step meetings and constitutional monarchies.
How can you pledge allegiance to a flag which stands for something YOU DON’T FUCKING EVEN GET or believe in.
Hands off my flag, traitor jingoistic confused scum. You’re the reason angry young people in other countries keep setting fire to it, btw, whether you realize it or not. You’re not welcome.
RoryBellows
@A Ghost To Most:
I was just describing this scenario to an out of towner last week. How the sides in the fracking debate here in CO is so amazing from a poli sci front. The people most concerned about fracking (DFH’s in places like Boulder, the ski towns) all get their water directly from the snowmelt and don’t really have much flat land to even frack , whereas the places where the fracking is actually happening and where people should be most concerned (wingnut places like Weld Co and out on the western slope) are the ones all up in arms about the new fracking oversight.
It’s such an empathy gap and perfectly describes alot of the divide in politics. The DFH’s are concerned about other people’s water, and the Wingnuts assume putting 5 nat gas rigs on their ranch outside of Greeley can’t possibly affect their own water well because of Jeebus or something. And if it affects any of their neighbors well, free market, and Tragedy of the Commons must be a Shakespeare play or something.
Another Halocene Human
@PeakVT: Apart from the lunacy of the Colorado teabaggers, I actually think most states should be redrawn (except HI and AK) because for the most part, the borders make no sense in the modern world. But that is something that could only be done right in a sane country. America is not a sane country.
The incentives are wrong. You’d need a strong(er) central government for that. Actually, more and more has been pushed to states (like Medicaid!?!?!). And as long as the state leges are that powerful there is no effing way state lines get redrawn. Unless you’re talking about swapping a few little districts here and there, like those proposals to change the DC/MD border that never actually went anywhere.
A Ghost To Most
@Another Halocene Human:
I replace ‘under god’ with ‘fuck your god’. I think Frances Bellamy would forgive me.
Another Halocene Human
@RoryBellows: They’re being paid not to care. Money washes away all sins. Smells like money and they’ll buy bottled water or drink natural gas every day if necessary.
The smart rural towns are trying to stop fracking before it even starts.
Omnes Omnibus
@BGinCHI: Bingo.
Chickamin Slam
@Mr Stagger Lee: I recall a movement from history books about Southern Oregon and Northern California counties forming the State of Jefferson. Capitol supposed to be at Yreka. This happened prior to the events of December 7, 1941. It quickly fell by the wayside but has been resurrected lately solely for tourism purposes.
The Lincoln state I see on Wikipedia refers to a proposed state of Eastern Washington and Northern Idaho. They always want to secede. They blame the liberals in Seattle, Olympia, and Boise (!) for their problems. The names for their breakaway state vary.
catclub
@PeakVT: Re: splitting up states and redrawing borders: Read “Midnight’s Children”, partition does not have many happy returns.
A Ghost To Most
@Another Halocene Human:
As they say here, “whiskey’s for drinkin’, water’s for fightin’ over”.
Chris
So, same as the last secession crisis, then. The people who’re getting the most out of the system decide to secede because they’re not getting enough hugs.
Gex
@A Ghost To Most: Ever since the war on gays really took off in 2003, I’ve been using “under God (‘s thumb) with liberty and justice for some.”
smith
I just want to pipe in and say you guys are truly the best. Seriously. Some of the comments on here have actually brought a chuckle to my face for the first time in days.
I say let these morons secede. They’ll be running back with their tails between their legs in no time because they are morons who don’t know how to govern. What are they going to do when their problems don’t go away and are made even worse by their inept judgments? Since they won’t be able to blame it on “liberals” there will be massive infighting between the secessionists.
Another Halocene Human
@Chickamin Slam: Eastern Washington just slays me. Maybe if they got their heads out of their asses they’d realize they could get services from the state, sweet, sweet cash if the state weren’t so busy throwing billions into social re-engineering road projects of doom that nobody but some outer exurb jackholes and road contractor lobbyists could love.
But that’s right, they voted GOP because gay people are icky.
catclub
@Gex: I was in Vermont when a group of folks were talking up secession and the Fourth (?) Third(?) Vermont Republic. I am pretty sure they were NOT neoconfederates, or conservatives in the Republicans, sense. Unlike the Alaska Independence Party.
A Ghost To Most
@Gex: That has a nice ring to it, and still has the potential to piss off ‘the chosen’.
ericblair
@Another Halocene Human:
All the Canuckistanis remember the fun and games with Quebec separation. Quebec came within a pubic hair of voting for separation in 1995, and none of the basic financial issues had been worked out, like international agreements and who’s going to pay out federal pensions. Of course, they figured they’d just use the Canadian dollar, and figured they’d still have representation in the Canadian parliament. And you had geniuses waving around their paystubs, crowing how they wouldn’t have to pay the federal taxes anymore, when Quebec was getting more from the feds than they were paying in. Oh, and when western Quebec then made noise about seceding from an independent Quebec if it ever happened, the Quebec nationalists decreed that totally impossible because shut up.
These guys aren’t trying to secede from the country, but I’m pretty sure that few people realize that all sorts of state compacts and treaties would be null and void, they’re going to have to take on a whole bunch of financial responsibilities they haven’t thought of, and their new neighbor isn’t going to feel real charitable and will screw them over at every opportunity.
Norbrook
@Another Halocene Human: Actually, the original “secede” plan was from NYC. Yes, they decided that they’d had enough of the state government pandering to the rural upstate interests, and wanted to be their own state. (stomp, pout!)
The actual “sweet NYC tax dollars” are more to the benefit of NYC. Where exactly do you think NYC’s water and electricity come from? Oh, and if you’re busily advocating adding land to the Adirondack and Catskill parks, just remember: The property taxes end up being picked up by the state.
RoryBellows
@Another Halocene Human:
Exactly. The funny thing is it will be the EPA that comes in with tanks of drinking water. Socialize risk and damage control, privatize profits, and move onto the next scam.
Another Halocene Human
@smith: I don’t think these people ever catch on. I’ve watched it here in rural plantationstan. Vote in some Contract With America winger who believes in “term limits”. Leave him there for years while he does a very shitty job, embarrasses the district, and is rude to voters. Finally vote him out with glee only to replace him with another of the same! Grumble about how “Washington doesn’t work”.
How about stop voting for maniacs! A sane person was running against that dude… oh, that’s right… he was black. Oh. Oh…
The Other Bob
“No, Teabillies, You Can’t Secede”
Speak for yourself. I will hold the door for them as long as we can lock it behind them.
catclub
@Patricia Kayden: See the Vermont Republic Secession Movement. I don’t think they are Republicans – in the GOP sense.
SatanicPanic
I had to listen to a bunch of this when I visited Spokane last week. My favorite story was an admiring one about some guy who lives out in the sticks in Oregon, wanted on gun crimes. As the story goes, he’s built a compound that produces his own electricity and food and he’s home schooling his kids. He’s got buddies with guns and “The Feds” are “scared” to go arrest him. My thoughts- GREAT! He’s jailed himself at his own expense. If every teabagger decides to go live in the hills and drop out of society we’ll all be better for it. These people are more and more like the worst stereotypes of the hippies every day.
Llelldorin
The New York Times had the population of this proposed state: 333,741.
Seriously. These guys are dwarfed by the Great State of Fresno.
I really don’t think we need to create even more rotten boroughs—we have plenty as it is.
Chris
@SatanicPanic:
… Riiiiight…
David
Someone remind those northern Coloradans that there is a rather hefty fee for living under OUR nuclear umbrella.
Redshirt
There’s still plenty of openings at The Citadel. Tell ’em to move their cracker asses there and serf away for the Corporate Overlords they love so dearly.
catclub
@SatanicPanic: I think there was a fellow named something Jeff, who did that. The government did not leave him alone. Something about underage wives and
statutory rape.
Seanly
The answer to your question depends on who you’re looking at. The upset teabaggers are probably mostly angry about the slight restriction on guns. The people pulling the strings & writing the checks are interested in fracking & LNG development.
Another Halocene Human
@Norbrook: The actual “sweet NYC tax dollars” are more to the benefit of NYC. Where exactly do you think NYC’s water and electricity come from? Oh, and if you’re busily advocating adding land to the Adirondack and Catskill parks, just remember: The property taxes end up being picked up by the state.
The water and electricity come from privately-owned, publicly regulated utilities that rate-payers pay for?
How are the tax dollars to the benefit from NYC when Albany steals them and diverts them upstate? How anyone could say this after following NYS politics for the last decade is truly astounding.
I feel bad for the rust belt folks who were left behind and farmers struggling upstate (or not, in some cases) but I don’t feel a drop of sympathy for rich people with their summer homes who want the state to make up for what their local property taxes can’t provide. You went out there, suck it up. Why should NY metro residents be stuck with a fare increase AND a massive service cut after dumping so many millions into the MTA fund over the years. Where’s that IOU, Westchester? Scranton? Albany? Oh, Albany has a fancy new train station and tons of state-supported Amtrak trains run at a massive loss? Fuck them. MTA had to mortgage their rail cars just to keep running.
It’s like those rich people who build a house on the beach and then want the rest of us to rebuild their uninsurable public-beach-access-blocker when the hurricane takes it away. Fuck. No.
If you’re going to be selfish, at least own it. Fuck this fantasy talk.
SatanicPanic
@Chris: Oh I’m sure there’s a good chance it’s teabagger legend (or worse, some sort of Pitcairn Island style molester colony) but as an instructive lesson in how to live free it’s got some obvious logical problems.
catclub
@David: I disagree. We seem to be paying Israel to live under it. Plus they have their own!
Napoleon
@ericblair:
The favorite one of the consequences I read at the time that they claimed would not happen is that they would completely loose their favorablele trade status with the US, and someone from the US Gov side of things pointed that out, which sent the separatistst into a tizzy.
Bill
Please let this be the start of a secession movement that allows conservatives to form Godlovesgunsastan.
I will gladly move to whatever part of the current United States become the new Progressive US, should my state be unlucky enough to be part of the new teabagger nation.
I’m sick of dealing with these people. Let’s just accept that the American experiment has failed and move on. Sometimes it’s just best to get out of a bad relationship.
maya
Oh way out here they have a name for wind….. um, wrong intro. Here in NorCal there have been weak tea efforts to split Ca in two mainly because of SoCal’s need for NorCal water. Always a fruitless venture.
So, instead, a mainly Liberal drive that pops up every so often is to create their own county in compensation – Sequoia County! Isn’t that special?
Small problem: It includes the area I live in along with around 500 others and when they, the instigators, did/do their canvassing they never come around to speak to us about it. Yet, we’re included in the plan. Even made it to a ballot initiative once, but failed miserably.
Again, this is Liberal bullshit that never goes anywhere because even their pot-growing liberal/libertarian constituency doesn’t want to fund it with, dog forbid, taxes. They like keeping pot growing profits tax-free.
So, yeah, both sides do it.
SatanicPanic
@catclub: I figured as much (I didn’t see your comment until I was done typing my reply to Chris)
Epicurus
I’m just spitballing here, but didn’t we fight a rather long war about this some time ago? And didn’t the “secessionist” side lose? Perhaps it’s just my faulty memory…or perhaps these ignorant rednecks don’t really know ’bout history?
beltane
@Another Halocene Human: And if these people were truly reduced to hunting for their own food, the population of prey animals would go extinct in a matter of months, leaving them with nothing at all to fall back on.
RSA
As a fallback, the article says this:
I checked out some online documentation, out of curiosity, and discovered that the Colorado Senate has 35 members, each representing a different district. Each district represents about 145,000 people, with a maximum difference of no more than plus or minus 2.5%. In other words, right now the Colorado Senate is organized to have representation roughly proportional to population. Phillips county, above, wants to bump the number of senators from 35 to 64, with almost all of the new members coming from subdividing current rural districts with low-populated counties. (Eyeballing a map, it looks like District 35 would change from having one representative to having about 15.)
It’s all pretty damn stupid. I’m reminded of those mostly red maps that appear every Presidential election, with counties colored by whether they went Democratic or Republican. Yeah, that would be informative if land actually voted, rather than people.
Petorado
@woozywinks:
Exactly. Northern Colorado benefits tremendously from a socialist water project called the Colorado-Big Thompson project, taking Colorado River Basin water and dumping it into the South Platte. Per the Colorado River Compact (an interstate treaty ratified by Congress), no water from the Colorado River can be transferred to states outside the Compact. Since Las Vegas has already been advocated for this part of Colorado to pump water from the Mississippi so it can free up additional water for them, and since CA and AZ are always looking for more water, I don’t see Congress ratifying a new compact to let in the state of Northern Colorado .
@RoryBellows: Boulder was a former oil town about 100 years ago, because it sits on the Denver-Julesberg oil basin that extends north up into Weld County secession country. Fracking is taking place just to the east of Boulder and in neighboring communities like Longmont and Erie. Lots of rural folks in Boulder county may irrigate with ditch water from the mountains, but drink local well water. Boulder DFH’s have a dog in the fight.
Woodrowfan
@ericblair:
With Falls Church the capital? YES!!!
ericblair
@Napoleon:
Yep. Separatists really liked Americans at that time, since NAFTA was supposed to fix all the economic issues. When the US pointed out that that agreement was with Mexico and Canada, not this place called Quebec, I believe the official response was LALALA I CAN’T HEAR YOU. (OK, well, LALALA ON NE PEUT PAS T’ENTENDRE.)
The vote for sovereignty happened and there was no serious plan for what was supposed to happen the next morning if it passed. If shit had gone down, I predicted about six months of economic chaos for both Canada and Quebec and then a panicked return to the status quo when nothing could be resolved.
negative 1
@cleek: But you should. Or, you shouldn’t expect the rest of us to subsidize the least efficient lifestyle possible. Before we get into the noble small farmer, I think that all farm subsidies should be limited by size. There is no way those farm-pork bills should go to ConAgra, Smithfield, or Monsanto so that they can drive small farmers out of business. We don’t trust-bust anymore, I guess, but barring that do we have to assist them in becoming monopolies?
@Another Halocene Human: I’m just stupid, I guess. So explain it to me? If, as you stated in your comment directly above your insult to me, that the subsidy system has trapped people in dying areas with no options, why are we continuing with it? I’m definitely too dumb to figure that one out.
Roger Moore
@Punchy:
Greeley. No way are they going to allow Fort Collins into their new state. Larimer County would have as much population as the rest of the state combined, and they’re predominantly city dwellers. They’d throw off the whole idea of creating a state that caters to farm and oil interests.
Napoleon
@ericblair:
That is effectively exactly the response from them at the time.
PurpleGirl
@Patricia Kayden: It was usually liberal-ish people who wanted Long Island counties (Nausau and Suffolk) to join with New York City in new state.
ericblair
@Woodrowfan:
Admit it, it would probably be the Tyson’s Corner Center shopping mall. The National Guard headquarters will be next to the Cinnabon.
Mnemosyne
There was a recent California secession movement where some of the high desert counties (San Diego area) wanted to form their own state. It kind of faded away when people pointed out that those areas don’t have any means of support now that aerospace is pretty much dead in California.
Jay C
Leaving aside the usual dumfuckery of the Northern Cloderado “secessionists”, these flaps always remind me of the best method I have heard of to deal with this sort of nonsense: and it was floated by none other than our former Mayor here in NYC, the Hon. Rudolph (9/11) Giuliani. Early in his Admin, the usual morans out on Staten Island were ginning up another round of their secession talks (basically to separate melanin-challenged Richmond from its duskier “mother city”), and Rudy! got up at a presser and said he didn’t like the idea much, but he would go along with it: as long as any separation deal included a provision to pay the City of New York – in full, in cash – for the value of all the urban improvements the City had made in the borough. IIRC, he had an estimate close to hand: it ran into numerous billions of dollars for a start – SI’s “secession” plans kind of faded away after that…
Cacti
@Mnemosyne:
They could make El Centro their new capital.
LoL
SuperHrefna
If anyone’s going to get to secede it should be Long Island. People here are always talking about it, and from the last discussion I followed I think if we were our own state there would be sixteen states with lower populations than ours. Plus, we have our new state motto all picked out, “Delays to exit 53”. Sometimes I really wish it would happen just because our county government is hopelessly corrupt, managing large populations and lots of money with rules designed for managing much smaller numbers. Being a state would ( hopefully) mean that they had to be more accountable. But maybe I’m just dreaming…
SuperHrefna
@PurpleGirl: True. The problem is that if we did it, we’d be creating a new (up) state with Maine or Mississippi levels of poverty. We’d be fine without them, I don’t think they could manage without us.
schrodinger's cat
Kitteh tries to understand percentages because econ professor with an op-ed in NYT doesn’t (no, not Krugman, some Berkeley prof whose last name is Bardhan.)
Summer
I was born a fourth-generation Coloradoan in a northeastern Colorado town that will no doubt be a crown jewel in the new state. When I was growing up and going back to visit my grandmother, it was a prosperous place. But not any more; the global economy has changed everything. Now a prison drives most of the local economy. Walmart has emptied out the downtown. It’s a sad, sad little place.
Roger Moore
@RSA:
It’s actually worse than that. The big Front Range counties are large enough to have multiple state senators, so they’d be losing Senators to provide them to backwater counties with only a handful of residents. There’s a nearly 1000:1 ratio between the population of the most and least populated counties in the state, but these assholes think they should have the same representation in the state Senate. Put another way, the 10 most populous counties in the state- all in the front range corridor- currently have about 80% of the population and hence about 80% of the votes in the senate. The rural people think that’s unfair, and that they should have only 15% of the votes in the state senate and the remaining 20% of the state should have 85%.
Cacti
No more tiny ass States with about 10 people getting 2 Senate seats. The rural population is already grossly over-represented in the national government.
Gex
@catclub: Well, that’s good then. It feels pretty false equivalency to me. Where we have people on the right actually seceding and starting WARS over these things in the past and we have sitting governors on the right advocating these things now, but the equivalent of a few blog comments can be found so one could say “both sides do it.”
eemom
@ericblair:
Fuck yeah.
I could be misrememberating, but wasn’t that an actual thing at some point?
PeakVT
@Roger Moore: They want to recreate the structural imbalance of the US Senate, IOW. I think people in rural areas want to do that for every state legislature. I remember reading an article in the Burlington Free Press, and some commenter from Essex County said that the people in Chittenden County have too many votes. Funny how that is.
piratedan
@Patricia Kayden: not exactly true, remember when the AZ lege was going batshit insane with the SB1070 stuff, we had a not completely tongue in cheek movement here called Baja Arizona. Citing the political issues as well as the historic ones (i..e. Southern AZ being a separate entity until the Gadsden Purchase) and the economic ones, where most of the state revenue stays in Maricopa County, which has the best roads and the best schools and the remainder of the state is told to piss off, people actually introduced a bill, where it was tabled into oblivion.
RSA
@Roger Moore:
Holy crap. I was thinking it was something like California versus Wyoming, where a U.S. Senator represents about 70 times more people. A thousand? Wow.
cleek
@negative 1:
well, i don’t, and i never said i did. so, again, you might want to check your assumptions.
but, as far as efficiency: my water comes from a hole in my back yard, does its thing in the house, then goes out into a hole in my front yard. nobody paid for that but me. my electricity comes from the nuke plant 5 miles down the road, which means i’m 20 miles closer to it than the fine citizens of the closest urban center. we have a propane tank in the back yard that we pay to fill. we don’t have land-line phone. we pay for garbage and recycling pick up ourselves. and we live off a private road (that is, we pay to maintain it ourselves). i pay tolls on half of my commute. so, all that tax money i pay? i hope it’s being put to good use, but it’s not really helping me live in the country. i know my situation is not universal.
and, yes, we should end farm subsidies. today.
crack
No, moron, what you need to know is they reconsidered a week ago. Thanks for all the high dudgeon though.
Link
Roger Moore
@PeakVT:
No, they actually want to make something worse than the structural imbalance in the US Senate. As much as we complain about the US Senate, the ratio between the populations of the most and least populous states is still “only” about 65:1, and California is a big enough outlier that the ratio between the second most and second least populous states is about 40:1. The ratio between the most and least populous counties in Colorado is closer to 900:1, and that only drops to 315:1 if you look at the 5th most and least populous counties. “Much less representative than the US Senate” is a very low bar, but this plan comfortably slithers under it.
Roger Moore
@RSA:
Yeah, it’s crazy. Not as crazy as it would be if somebody suggested the same thing here in California, where the ratio would be >8000:1.
handy
@crack:
Hmm, I wonder how they are feeling disenfranchised by those mean city folk?
Golly. That sounds downright authoritarian.
Move out of the sticks, gentlemen.
chrome agnomen
you so-called liberals sure do like to beat up on the rurals. i guess you don’t have to take care of ‘them’, if you don’t think of them as poor, or minority. obviously we’re all takers. sure, a lot of the rurals whine about stuff; so do a lot of urban dwellers. one point of fact is that it costs a lot more to live in the country. it’s 80 miles to the grocery store where i live, on 40 miles of dirt road, maintained once a year. mail comes 3 times a week, or i can drive 40 miles to pick it up. water comes out of a well, internet from a satellite. we raise cattle, but i suppose a lot of you urbanites have a cow or two in your backyard, so that’s moot.
i fully realize that i paint with a broad brush here, but nothing like the one that mix is plying. wingnuts are going to complain no matter what, but we’re not all wingnuts out here. and i note that hippie punching is a favorite pastime still. guess there is something wrong with peace, love, and understanding, eh?
ok, flame away pseudo-libs. you know who you are. but check yourself first.
handy
@chrome agnomen:
Democracy’s a bitch, ain’t it?
Redshirt
Me and my unicorn are gonna secede and form the Bestest Most Progressive Pony Country the world haz ever seen!
ericblair
@eemom:
I seem to remember reading about an actual NoVA separatist movement a couple of decades ago, but can’t imagine it was terribly serious.
I’d hazard a guess that a majority of NoVA inhabitants are here 100% because of DC and the federal gummint and 0% because of Richmond, so the whole area is much, much more Metro DC than it is suburban/urban Virginia. Add that to the fact that we’ve been shelling out state taxes for decades and haven’t even got the courtesy of a grudging movie theater tugjob by the state capitol and there’s not a lot of historical affection there. I don’t know if the political dynamics are similar at all in places like KC MO or Newark NJ.
Ted & Hellen
This post cause me to spontaneously achieve completion.
catclub
@chrome agnomen: “one point of fact is that it costs a lot more to live in the country.”
One correction is that it costs a lot more to CHOOSE to live in the country.
” sure, a lot of the rurals whine about stuff; so do a lot of urban dwellers”
The difference being that rural dwellers are over-represented in congress. A small amount in the House and a large amount in the Senate.
Villago Delenda Est
The only thing these little sacks of infantile shit care about is their fucking toys.
Take the toys away from them, then make them sit in the corner.
For a couple of months or so.
PeakVT
@chrome agnomen: Liberals only like to beat up on rural whiners who don’t realize how much they are subsidized by the taxes they hate to pay.. If you’re not one of those people, what’s with all the butthurt in your comment?
Gustopher
In Washington state, the eastern counties are a blight on us all, voting for stupid referendums, and always whining about the Democratic governors and senators. I’ve always thought they would be happier joining up with Idaho. They would get the government they want, without the interference from Seattle.
I’d be happier if they joined Idaho.
ericblair
@catclub:
And that’s not the issue. I’ll stick my neck out and guess that most urban liberals don’t have a problem subsidizing rural infrastructure and social programs. It’s the rural conservatives’ complete refusal to believe or admit that this exists, much less is a good thing, and the constant “Real Americans versus decadent elites/urban thugs” bloviating can get on your fucking nerves after a decade or six.
Bill
@chrome agnomen:
“one point of fact is that it costs a lot more to live in the country.” I’ve lived in both, and living in a major urban center was about 100 times more expensive than living in the sticks. Everything from real estate to food is waaaaaaay more expnsive in the city. I have no idea where you get this idea from?
Also, I don’t think people are picking on the “rurals” here. People are angry with a group that fails to realize it gets enormous benefits from the tax base its urban neighbors provide. Those people aren’t all “rurals.”
Villago Delenda Est
@Gustopher:
In the 2008 senate race in Oregon, the map was all red.
Except for a bunch of counties in western Oregon that were the deepest blue.
And where the vast majority of the population live.
Very similar to the situation with y’all in our northern neighbor (go Mariners, go Seahawks, CRUSH the Huskies!)
Redshirt
I live on top of a mountain, in about a rural as area as you can get in the lower 48, and I am 110% Obot and love Socialism and Redistribution! Also, I own zero guns.
Villago Delenda Est
@ericblair:
THIS THIS THIS
They are remarkably obtuse.
karen
@ericblair:
I’m not 100 percent positive but the saying here is that NoVa stops after Prince William county (for example, where Potomac Mills is). If people want to secede, let them. Let them go to some new place they call Dumbfuckistan. Let the people who don’t want to secede remain where they are. Since Dumbfuckistan would not be part of the US, they have to build their own roads, get their own water, etc. This way the rural people who don’t want to secede stay where they are and don’t have to suffer for the new population moving to Dumbfuckistan. Everyone wins.
A Ghost To Most
I’m sick of people conflating square miles per people (or is that miles per square people?) with people per square mile.
Dirt doesn’t get a vote.
I’m also disappointed that the shitstain came in his pants in this thread.
RSA
@Bill:
Check out the first two maps on this page, per-county information scraped from City-Data. The first is population density, the second cost of living. The correlation is pretty obvious. In general, more densely populated counties are more expensive to live in.
Mike G
Rural states get far more federal money than they pay in.
And within the states, rural areas are heavily subsidized by urban/suburban areas.
Rancher/teabagger douchebags in my area keep “threatening” to secede (good riddance) into their own county over their butthurt about ag regulations. But the sentient among them took a look at their prospective financial situation and decided they’d rather be welfare ranchers who take the suburbs’ money and bitch about it, even if it means they can’t clear-cut and strip-mine with impunity.
Mnemosyne
@chrome agnomen:
It’s not so much the “taking” as the whining about other (aka urban) people “taking” from rural people.
If the people talking about secession were talking about broken-down rural schools, or safety issues on farms, and complaining that those issues weren’t being addressed, I don’t think anyone here would have a problem with it. But the burning “rural” issues they’re complaining about are legalizing gay marriage and Obamacare.
Kyle
@chrome agnomen:
one point of fact is that it costs a lot more to live in the country.
Highly questionable. Have you priced real estate lately?
What is unquestionable is that it would cost a LOT more to live in rural areas if we abolished farm subsidies and “unleashed market forces” like the Tealiban are always demanding, and rural areas had to pay their real cost on electricity, telecoms and mail delivery, for starters.
I can see valid reasons for subsidizing various aspects of rural living, but I’m sick of them taking the money and then whing about what awesome Galtian superhoeroes they would be without the ‘libruls’ holding them back.
Matt McIrvin
@catclub: The Vermont secessionists aren’t neo-Confederates, but they do sometimes go to secessionist gatherings also attended by neo-Confederates, and make common cause with them in creepy ways.
It hasn’t done much to allay my suspicion that the northern white liberals who want to secede from the South have decided that standing up for civil rights for black people was a mistake that cost them the country, and they want a do-over.
catclub
@RSA: Neat maps. I could almost make my own map, which would be median income/cost of living
crosspalms
They should just call it Deep South Dakota.
Pogonip
I’m firmly against this. If these assholes do secede, you and I will be taxed to send them foreign aid.
Snarki, child of Loki
@dmsilev: “So we’re supposed to accept a ‘state’ with 300,000 people that will get two Senators and a Congressman? I don’t think so.”
Then they don’t get to be a new state.
Let ’em leave Colorado and become a new TERRITORY.
RoryBellows
@Petorado:
Yes, I was referring specifically to Boulder proper, but yeah, you don’t have to drive east very far before you’re in Fracking World. Seems like Longmont is putting up a fight but that drive out to DIA or up to Greeley or even out i-70 towards GJ is all you need to know about how many wells have already been drilled. Every flat bit of land in the state seems to be dotted with those beige tanks.
What Have the Romans Ever Done for Us?
I say let them secede but don’t give them statehood. Let them be a fucking territory forever, with no representation in the US government. Basically, turn them into the District of Columbia without the advantages of being in close proximity to the seat of national government. See how that works out for them.
But on the Other Hand
To be fair, small farmers and ag laborers are shafted harder than most by federally-fostered monopolies like railroads, water utilities, Monsanto, fertilizer/pesticide cartels, etc. So they end up perenially in debt up to their eyeballs and in great need of those gummint dollars (aka bread & circuses). The resentment makes perfect sense. Only thing is, though, as a demographic/voting group, their response to the problem has been incredibly stupid and self-defeating. Building ties with blue collar workers, feminists, and other people who don’t like pro-big-biz governance would make a lot more sense than kulturkampf. For people so into guns, they sure do seem unable to spot the right target.
Mike Haubrich
@Patricia Kayden: I have noticed that. It is also the conservatives, even in the North, who still celebrate the “spirit” of the Confederacy. They love Patriotism, but they celebrate Treason.
Go figure.