A Peaceful Solution

As I discussed in last week’s column we – as a nation – need to try something extreme to turn ourselves from the path of violence.

Marriage, sadly, is an appropriate analogy.

In this case the polygamist trailer park of America has descended into so much chaos, in-fighting, name calling, mud slinging and hatred for each other’s political views, we need to just part ways, cut our losses, seek divorce and move on in life. We don’t have to even leave the trailer park, we just need to stop spending anytime together and find the right trailer.

Foreclosures for the first quarter of 2010 will make the $8000 tax credit for many first time buyers the most expensive $8000 they receive in their lifetime. You don’t think a financial meltdown will set off some ugliness, you’re stoned, in which case, well executed strategy.

We have several ideologies at work; a division of the country into roughly a dozen sovereign governments would provide current U.S. citizens’ choices they currently do not have. Everyone will have the option to go elsewhere to find a government in line with their beliefs.

Each nation state will have the option to choose whether to become one monolithic government or maintain their state structures. If a new nation decides to go 100 percent socialist, have at thee, if they choose anarchy, such is life. The key to finding the right country for you is as simple as leaving the one that makes you miserable.

My suggested divisions are as follows:

West Coast states and Hawaii become the People’s Republic of Pacifica, destroy their former state governments outright and continue operating on their failed principles of direct democracy via the referendum system. Liberals, hippies, socialists, Raiders, Chargers and Lakers fans all in one place, this just feels right.

Arizona, New Mexico, Texas and Oklahoma become the Southwestern Republic of New Texahomazona. Filled with Texans and Oklahomans, sadly the sheep and cattle still have no escape. Their motto, “All God’s Children Got Guns.” (Google it if you don’t know)

Dakotas and Minnesota become Freedonia. I have no clue who would want to live in Freedonia, but considering Minnesota has elected both Al Franken and Michelle Bachmann, I say we avoid eye contact. Their motto, “Doncha know. Eh?”

Nebraska, Iowa, Missouri and Kansas combine into the Plains State Alliance. Theirs will be a conservative lifestyle, but all four states would govern independently and the economy would be agriculture-based. Their motto, “We do more before noon than you’ve done this month.”

Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia, Florida, Carolinas, Kentucky and Tennessee reform the Confederate States of America 150 years after disbanding.

Like the PSA, the CSA would be conservative in nature, requiring the individual states govern their citizens daily lives. Motto, “We told you we’d rise again.”

Wisconsin, Illinois, Indiana, Michigan and Ohio establish the Great Lakes Democratic Union, sponsored by the unions of course; the GLDU could then determine how they could revive their massive industrial economy without the intrusions of Fort Fumble. Motto, “Have you paid your due this month?”

Everything north and east of West Virginia would become part of the United States Socialist Republic. Like its sister-nation on the opposite coast, the USSR would provide the desired climate for those valuing equality of result over liberty or equality of condition.

Bonus for the rest of the nation, they get D.C. and New York City. Again, like Pacifica, they remove all internal borders and govern from a central location. Shunning such mundane concepts as mottoes, they adopt a creed, “Socialism failed before, but we’re smarter.”

Vermont, New Hampshire, Maine and Alaska are so isolated in views and practices we are better off leaving them independent unless the three former New England states decide they want to join the USSR or form their own corner of the former nation.

Nevada, Idaho, Wyoming, Montana, Utah and Colorado become the Free States Alliance. Their Constitution would allow no ambiguity as to the limits of central power and would establish only a common defense and foreign relations as services provided by the FSA. Any other government services would come from the individual states.

Utah and Idaho would likely ban recreational drug use, the rest would completely decriminalize and tax them instead. Similar events – I sincerely believe this – would take place in virtually every new nation.

Ultimately, what I’ve put together this week is fiction. It won’t happen peacefully. It just won’t.

For those of you who have claimed I advocate violence, let me clarify something.

I have seen the ugliness of war in the faces of wives become widows, of children become orphans and of friends become casualties. I served my country without question for over a decade, I took an oath to support and defend the Constitution and I meant every word of it.

So when I wrote last week that a large portion of the population feels ostracized and is becoming angry about it, of all of the writers at the Collegian, I understand where that anger could lead and it frankly frightens the hell out of me. War is as horrible an event as one can imagine and then some.

The events taking place in this nation politically and socio-economically will have an effect on all of us. Fort Collins is not immune from the negative events around the rest of the nation.

The second shoe in the housing bubble started dropping, things are going to get ugly. If the liberals, socialists and progressives in power do not find a method of dialogue with the center and right, we will be staring the bloodiest conflict in American – if not world – history dead in the face and it won’t matter who was wrong and who was right anymore.

It will only matter who wins and millions could die to determine the winner. Do you want that scenario? I sure as hell don’t.

I suggest this division of the nation to let the people vote with their feet. For individuals like my fellow columnists Kevin Hollinshead, Sam Lustgarten, Wayne McManus and Sarah Millard, three coastal progressive/liberal/socialist options would exist for likeminded individuals to come together and ponder why the rich left their nation leaving behind an increasingly destitute populace.

For agricultural folks seeking social conservatism such as Robyn Scherer, the PSA, CSA and NT would be there with arms wide open.

And for those who ultimately only wanted individual liberty above all else and to be left to their own devices, the FSA would gladly welcome those wired more like myself, Seth Anthony, my editor Ian Bezek and newly self-labeled Libertarian J. Phillips.

Therein lies the beauty of the system I’ve suggested. We cannot ensure the nation survives perpetually, but we can make major changes now for the long-term good of the people rather than continue with less than half the country accusing their opposite number of racism.

Here’s the rub, this is exactly the system of government the founders created. They wanted states to occupy the role of daily government and the federal government to only provide for the combined states that which the individual states could not. Read that again, could not, as opposed to would not.

The founders knew the only way the union would succeed was if the people could leave a socially conservative Utah for socially liberal Nevada. When polarized politics reached the federal level, the battle was lost.

One can no longer escape an oppressive government within the union, this is not what our founders intended. So let’s try something new. You can have yours, they can have theirs, we can have ours. At least then we would have the opportunity to be happy with our system of government and if not, we leave.

Please keep in mind, I have not included methods of dealing with questions of trade, existing nuclear weapons, air space, common defense or supply routes for lack of content space. Use your imaginations. D.C. sure as hell isn’t going to.