The right to secede was a condition of Texas’ statehood.
But if it’s canceled out by the supremecy clause then it’s canceled out, regardless of the semantics.
Politics is the art of balancing poles of power. Kosovo wasn’t supposed to be “allowed” to secede, but it was internationally recognized when it did. You have to be able to see the relacion between what is written and the powers involved. If Kosovo had still been a part of the USSR, sececion would have been a willfully signed pact of genocide.
The Ohio River is owned by the South though, save for like, twenty miles in Pennsylvania. Sucks to be U-sian Pav.
Umm, I just checked the map, and apparently there are other Mexicos underneath Mexico. Even this other big place labeled America with a bunch of smaller places, I thought it was odd, but if we got our name on it, it must be ours. So shit, I don’t see why these UnderMexicans are so pissed about America, they too are Americans, and just need to stop hating. Just because you can’t vote in elections like a Rican doesn’t mean we don’t value you. Shit, I just goggled it, and we provide you all with a free education as well to boot, The School of the Americas at Fort Benning, Georgia. We even have good trade relations, with the United Fruit Company, and something called a Cartel shipping stuff through mines and catapults and shit. I don’t understand this last part- I know farmers claim it’s hard as hell to get their product to the market if they live too far away from a port or tracks, but this is retarded. Probably why they are all so poor and stupid. They can’t even speak English, how stupid they are… speaking some mangled dialect of it that sounds nothing like it. One of the UnderMexicans called himself ‘Hey Zeus’, but he signed his name as Jesus! It’s like the musician Sting signing his name as ‘Mo Money’.
Goddamn you, that was funny as hell.
I’m hauling ass to Georgia.
i find this entire statement rather odd. It entails identity confusion.
As a child I asked the question, who is responsible for the way an individual responds to their environment? The answer is simple enough, The individual is. However, a great many people seem to think that person B is somehow suppose to respond to the imaginations of the minds of person A.
The first step in solving any social issue is to be able to clearly distinguish the unit of discourse within the universe of discourse.
If one cannot distinguish between real cause and effect from imagined cause and effect, I don’t think they can do anything of note what so ever.
One of the primary notions of sentient existence is that a sentient always has a choice on how to respond to their own environment. This means that the environment is not responsible for the actions of the individual. This is not true of an inanimate object. It has no choices, and it never reacts to the imaginations of a mind it does not have.
Texas doesn’t have any right to succeed, nor does other such as California, Oregon, Hawaii… the republican model doesn’t mean you have a right to leave the union, it was a condition for statehood prior to becoming a state- and Texas was a model for this- it was a bootleg sovereign nation, and is hardly unique in this respect.
Even if the supreme court all dropped a shitload of acid and ruled in favor of some phantom right of succession ONLY on Texas’ part, any local military officer would quickly point out that Texas got it’s ass whooped during the Civil War, like the rest of the Confederacy, and this issue is now mute.
Texas however does have the right to disintegrate into five separate states, a biproduct of the split of the slaves vs free states era… though slavery is now illegal, this aspect of the law stands independent of it’s original cause that put it into being. At any time, we can end up with 5 Texas with 10 senators. Now… I’ve always found this as odd as nothing prohibits any other state from doing this as well… they just need congressional recognition- which Texas got a long time ago.
Also, though NO state in the union can succeed, there is nothing prohibiting a state from getting voted out of the union involuntarily. Also, a state can ‘migrate’ moving it’s border on one side very close to the next, then moving the other, again and again, and just meander until it’s within a range of like, ten feet within the territorial borders of Washington, DC, with a P.O. Box sitting under it’s flagpole with 13,000 people signed up to claiming residency (if the Post Master General so chooses to allow this option for residency requirements in some states P.O. Box is all you need in the rural areas). The military does something similar, we like, next to never get rid of military divisions or whole regiments, the division is stripped of near all it’s men, they’re told what the traditions and standards and history are for it, and some other made up bullshit, and it’s headquarters staff, including some specialty lower ranking enlisted guys such as Artillery Forward Observers, are sometimes added- they then tend to bullshit flags that no one actually serves under, and receive a reduced pay and MTOW from Congress. The job is bullshit, but their always busy, as the pentagon taps them as slave labor- as they all have specialties or high rank, and quickly become bitches to random people.
Also, a state can technically ‘lose’ it’s statehood requirements if it’s population falls beneath it’s requirements to join. Some such as Alaska and North Dakota in the past, before their respective oil books, were facing the legal and deeply unwanted census listing of once occupied land becoming frontier again! They won’t give you shit for moving there now these days though just for the sake of keeping their population up, they both have too many people in relation to infrastructure, why rent exploded in both places.
Now… Alaska was bought from Russia (Clinton was offered to by the Chamchaka Peninsula from Russia and foolishly said no- just like Alaska)… Russia pissed off the natives there, and when the territory was bought over to US Sovereignty, it was made a military colony. You would think this would of made them resentful, but you gotta remember the nature of the average American of that era- mostly tough, independent frontiersmen… who liked to hunt and fish… which the locals liked to do in Alaska, and there was hardly any squabble over land, as what the Russians had built township wise was accepted by the locals, and largely populated by them. Anchorage was mostly useless land no one used- and it became it’s main city, so there isn’t any hurt feelings on this part. Living under military law was a blast back then… as the military just largely didn’t give a fuck about interfering when they could go skiing or hunting instead. Locals increasingly prospered, and became Americanized without much of a squabble. Not really much of a reason for a soldier to go hike out to a igloo and fuck around with it anyway, so it was a easy decision.
Now it’s a state, it also hosts two army infantry brigades, several airforce bases, several anti ballistic missile testing sites, and like 8 marines who don’t know how to swim. Most relations between the locals and the military is tight, and the military guys tend to date and marry the local girls, settle down, and add to the genepool- so many men in Alaska are either military or military descent.
The Marshall Islands succeeded from the US in 1986. We didn’t really care, as we had control of Wake Island long before them… and we never technically conquered them, just collateral from the war era. Marshall Islanders, known as Micronesians here in Hawaii, are the most hated Ethnicity period by the locals, and it’s odd in some ways, as they’re related to the hawaiian natives. Because we tested nuclear weapons on bikini atoll, the residents of the Marshall Islands are allowed 2000 per child every couple have, the right to move to the US, fast track to citizenship, and access to training schools. Many come here to Hawaii, and start a baby factory, and show up their first day and buy a Lexus. This causes a KKK mentality amongst the Chinese and Native population, raving about pregnant Micronesians fucking and making more babies… something you won’t here any other group say openly in any other part of the US, though I suspect every race has it’s pet peeves and thinks this in a majority sense from time to time… here it’s rife.
The US, I think gave up Palau as well… I can’t recall right now… they make decent tourist dollars due to Jellyfish lake. America Samoa might not be able to succeed because technically it’s not a territory. We never actually conquered them, rather, we scared a German ship off from conquering them, and stationed some guys there during WW2 to keep the Japs off… the locals learned how to fight form the GIs, and formed their own national guard unit. They have federal level representation and directives from the President such as in homeland security, but also are allowed 1 non-voting representative who acts within the capacity of a territorial representative… pretty much what he says goes in regards to what happens to America Samoa. America Samoa, unlike a territory, does not have a territorial governor appointed over it, they elect their own president, who appears to be fairly independent as a president of a country goes, and claims American Samoa is indeed independent… but this is also weird to say when there is a US flag outside, US military post manned (though almost exclusively by locals,) and several US Post Offices and federal buildings representing various branches of the federal government. In America Samoa, your not born with automatic American Citizenship, but it’s silly easy to get it if you want it. There is a seperatist movement not so much from the US but from America Samoa on one of it’s islands, but his shotgun is malfunctioning, so it’s not a heated issue at this moment.
We have some territories in the Caribbean, both have the right to leave the union. Diego Garcia in the Indian Ocean is legally England’s, though we’ll someday likely trade them something for it, as we have a history of doing that. Guantanamo Bay is by treaty legally part of Cuba, but it was signed with a legally different Cuba, and the treaty is technically not as a result in force anymore due to Fidel Castro killing off that Cuba. But none the less, due to a Supreme Court loophole in rejecting it’s jurisdiction over Guantanamo, it belongs to someone NOT America, and since we’re still abiding by our end of the treaty, we’re not in default… though it’s questionable legally who we can be in default to, as we’re not required by international law to recognize the new entity of Cuba as a continuation of the old Cuba anymore than Russia was required to recognize Napoleon’s France as a continuation of Monarchical France in which it had several alliances with.
We are able to freely give and sell off territories to whoever we want to. This includes Washington, DC… congress can decide to sell it off quite legally, or give it up in a treaty in a heartbeat without much legal fuss.
Dude, you must prefer philosophizing on a belly full of crank. I can’t fathom another explanation for the sheer length of your responses.
Yeah… I’m a pretty dedicated cynic, and my brain is always humming, 24 hours a day, awake or asleep. This is quite small in comparison to what I go through on a daily basis- I have good hemisphere to hemisphere communication, and am always in complex conversation with myself. I’ve knocked out 40 page tracts before, just manic writing hurting my fingers tips. Doesn’t mean it necessarily coherent though, and I hate editing my own stuff. Plotinus was the same way.
I’m actually pretty similar in terms of the mind always running. Sometimes even in what seems to be a looping sequence. Putting my thoughts in to words is the difficult part for me, so eloquence is something I kind of observe and practice in intelligent conversation, and places like ILP.
I consider myself something of a cynic. Certainly not to the extent people expect when they hear the word. But, to me, cynicism is more about living one’s philosophy. That is, the cynic’s ideology is best kept by what he doesn’t expressly say, or bother to entertain. The goal is indifference and comfort in simplicity rather than adopting an adversarial role or simply waxing indignant about everything under the sun. People tend scrutinize me because I don’t exactly go around mocking others or demanding reform, let alone spitting in faces or tugging my taffy in public. Perhaps I’m not a cynic at all, I don’t know. I don’t necessarily believe society, conventions, customs, etc. to be entirely detrimental or “wrong.” I think we do the best we can, but mistakenly consider ourselves as something separate from, and superior to, nature and ‘animal.’ We are too easily convinced of our own worth.
I used to do that a lot, now realise that if you start rambling too much, no one reads it anyway. I tend to save a long post for the OP, it has more chance of being read.
Now that is just a bit harsh though. 
CN, Pezer is correct–you are very funny!
Actually, though, the US has divested itself of most of its territories, giving them back to their inhabitants. Puerto Rico and the No. Marianna’s Islands are exceptions–as are American Samoa, the Virgin Islands, and Guam. All of these are dependent territories. Guantanamo is under perpetual lease from Cuba. Any or all of the US dependencies could relinquish US sovereignty if they wanted to, but they rely on trade agreements with the US to survive. I know Guam is nothing more that a big military base that’s losing that status because of the cut-back in defense spending–Hah! The military is being moved into the No. Marianna’s–at least for now. Spread the wealth?
Puerto Rico could become a state–if it wanted to. It doesn’t. Why should it?
Pezer, you mentioned United Fruit Company–at least, I think it was you–somewhere, sometime. The United Fruit Company was a despicable example of how the US tried to ‘take over’ countries back at the turn of the 19-20th century. It’s an example of the self-serving, American entrepreneurship of the time that did nothing for the ‘Banana Republics’ of Honduras or Guatemala. It still exists, under different names–but it still exploits natives. I think it’s now called Chiquita Banana Foods.
Dole Foods did the same in Hawaii with pineapples.
America wasn’t taking over.
Those were private businesses that ended of being attacked by the locals (for good reason) and they called on the U.S. to help them protect their assets (and their asses as well) and eventually they did (though not as recklessly as some anti-government/military would like you to believe).
Hell you can just look up Smedly Butler and learn all about those.
Agreed. But that is just the corporate side of the story. On the political side, the CIA was active in the toppling of democratic governments and the instating of brutal, military regimes. Sometimes to protect the interests of corporations and sometimes to solidify control over their slice of the post WW2 pie.
In those days, democracy was just as likely to lead to communism than democratic socialism or even right wing-ism. More likely, actually, which is why so many got toppled in favour of mass homicidal totalitarian autocrats who would play ball with the US.
Here is a fine example.
If you are an imperialist, you should see those as the US’s first forays into imperialism: sloppy but effective. Oh, yeah, and massively homicidal.
Agreed, we did that, and Vietnam, because of the Soviet’s Unions announced intention to someday conquer the US- the US and Russia were not natural enemies, historically allies in fact- but because of marxism, we suddenly got put on enemy number one listing from day one. It was the first system we ever confronted internationally that actually had a chance at actually eliminating and then enslaving us since the War of 1812. We were having nothing to do with that shit, it’s why outside of Machiavellian alliances with the soviets and a few month attempt at a post WW2 alliance with Stalin that Stalin wasn’t having shit with that decided we were gong to do everything we could to topple the fuckers who sought our own end. Soviets reacted similarly, though we didn’t seek their enslavement, as evidence the modern world, Kremlin free of a American Flag. Wouldn’t be the same the other way around, there would be a red banner on the white house right now if we had a soviet perestroika and collapsed. They never would of stopped funding guerilla groups to hunt down our best educated and experience, expropriating our wealth for whatever absurd project they had in mind, and being a general bullshit fascist nuisance. I say fuck you comrade, seen ‘Red Dawn’ too many times, and know I will hunt all you fuckers down and will kill you all.
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1_I4WgBfETc[/youtube]
Sick part is we had nothing to do with Marxism. Marx even wrote a letter to Abraham Lincoln, and he replied in return… Marx had a extensive collection of Civil War writings and commentaries on the US. We wanted nothing to do with that silly shit. South America got used, Che Guevera got used, by the Soviets as a base to attack the US. US never gave a honest fuck what happened in South America beyond the Monroe doctrine and making sure our own citizens and corporations were not getting fucked over- but EVERY other country does that. Soviets helped engineered that into a history of imperialism when a fruit company conquered a continent and a a half!
It’s easier to deal with 10 ruthless dictators who are self interested than 10 states under a nuclear armed communist international seeking the annihilation of democracy. South America voted to be loss when it began to side with the soviets, completely their leader’s own doing. You can’t blame ignorance, as Latin America has a western heritage and access to political works just as the US and Soviet Union did. They could of taken a neutral or independent route. Few did. What happened was inevitable. Not only was it inevitable, but it’s likely to happen again and again and again as ideology morphs through the ages, even if America is not a actor in it, or is as much a victim as a future banana republic itself someday down the road. It comes from laudable and incredulous fools who have no mutual loyalty or self respect to say no and do the right thing for themselves with a eye to the greater international community and the consequences of their actions. There is a very good reason why latin america is the second most backwards region on the planet, right after the congo and sub-sahara africa (sri lanka has since got it’s act together in 2009, so your promoted to no. 2 position UnderMexicans), it’s because your undable to think for yourselves, unwilling to do the right thing. You don’t start businesses unless it’s product is moved by a cartel, you don’t work unless some variant of marxist ideology is inserted as a mark of retarding tension, you won’t stop meddling in your neighbor’s affairs, laying claim to lands or support for movements because you can’t legitimize the right of your own powerbase and need a external antagonism to make you sound sane. There shouldn’t even be countries in south america other than the division perhaps between the old brazilian empire and the spanish one. It’s all silly nonsense. South America takes philosophical hand-me-downs from other half ass philosophers from countries that have sense rejected them, and critique them to no end. Your trapped in a thermadorian reaction looking for a sane beginning, and can’t find it, cause it was never there. It NEVER made sense, there was no Golden Age, just beaner diarrhea and oppression under a hot, unforgiving sun. And you blame us, the US, because the Soviets blamed us. But their dead now. But you don’t have the honesty to look to the real culprits. Yourselves. Every other industrialized region on the planet had to eventually… why should it be different in South America?
South America danced with the Marxist devil and lost, now it’s trapped in it’s tunnels of socialist despair, running around and chasing one another like a few too many college frat guys put into a room with too few beds, not knowing the way out of this maze save by the very means that entrapped them there. Even your own country Pezer invited a foreign occupation army from outside our hemisphere into your country out of a fear of a invasion that was never coming, once that if did come the Russians of today never would seriously care to fight beyond dropping a few cargos of small arms out of the back of their planes on the final flight back home. South America is a joke. But you guys can totally slide underneath the radar by pointing out how fucked up the Congo and Niger is. Not too bad being in second place, right? Means your not as fucked up as you could be, and must therefor be doing something right. So I give the Undermexicans that.
Great analysis, that is basically it. And I myself often use the “at least we’re not Africa” line, but it’s very missleading. We are the descendants of Europeans, Africans (the ones in the shit) are not.
We are basically the shittiest Europeans at this point. But most of us don’t care, because we live in a place where food always grows on trees and the weather is always perfect. Y’all had to become hardasses or die. Anyway, I am liking these northern lands… Maybe I’ll Simón Bolívar them some day!
Incidently, Bolívar was also a Free Mason, as well as Miranda and all the big wigs of the rebellion. As well as your (very cornily named) forefathers.
I don’t blame the US government for what they did back in the day, it is true that it was either but rape south and central America or get but raped by the soviets. I do blame them for being pussies about the truth. And I blame the citizens for thinking that they are part of the US government.
On the political side, the CIA has always had its nose in all kinds of sinister shit, all around the world. We aren’t talking a ‘lesser of evils’ approach here either – as in resorting to questionable tactics to prevent some larger threat. I’m talking about scouting resources and political/military systems around the world in the interest of buying them off as one might a business partner, or threatening them into submission. If that didn’t work, we’d… well, take the shit.
Crack was introduced to the United States by its own government – specifically by the CIA, down to law enforcement, then onto the streets. The CIA was involved in some “secret” conflict in Nicaragua over natural resources. To avoid any direct link between the U.S. and the war, the CIA enlisted native contras to fight on their behalf [rather than send our own military]. In order to fund the war, they’d essentially give the contras weaponry, training, etc. in exchange for mass amounts of cocaine. They’d bring the coke shipments back and use law enforcement to distribute the shit into the streets. It wasn’t as easy as they thought it might be because even desperate people know better than to fuck with crooked cops. So, they find a guy in California, who is already buying off law enforcement and managing to move serious weight, to use as the point man. The CIA would fly in the shit, law enforcement would pick it up, then get it to Freeway Ricky Ross, who was the drug dealer in the U.S. at the time. Law enforcement even showed him how to rock it up and sell as a different, more modern product; something to keep the money moving at a faster pace. Ricky Ross literally had dope houses set up all throughout the West coast - known by lower law enforcement, but protected by CIA - that he’d use to sell the coke\crack out of like a McDonald’s drive through. It went on for years, Rick got unfathomably rich and powerful, and his “dealing” escalated to become a franchise. When Ricky Ross’ operation started becoming increasingly autonomous, the police popped him. He’s still in prison now. And, thanks to him, the campaign he was unknowingly funding in Nicaragua was successful. The U.S. drug czar at the time was questioned specifically about government involvement in the crack epidemic in a public forum shortly afterward, based on information coming out of the streets. He denied it, of course, and refused to answer any other questions. 10 or so years later, a new president, new administration, new drug czar, etc. and they suddenly find a conscience. They admit, in full, everything that had been done regarding the secretive war effort, drug trafficking, government and law enforcement involvement, Ricky Ross’ setup, etc. What did it change? Absolutely nothing. Not. One. Thing.
Almost as homicidal as it is greed-fueled. Wars are little more than business opportunities to this country anymore.
I blame the citizens for thinking the U.S. government stood for, or was remotely a part of, ‘the people.’
It’s not Imperialism , it’s capitalistic meddling.
Imperialism is honest, it may not always be nice and it may be harsh at times. But imperialism doesn’t sneak around like that.
People just like to shout the word imperialism on any interventionist policy they don’t like, just like the way they shout Fascism at every domestic policy they don’t like.
Gives a shrill whistle–I’m talking about the start of the UFC back in the 1800’s not about the Eisenhower ‘preserve America from Marxism’ era of the 1950’s.
It’s been suggested that this was part of America’s neo-colonialism–i.e., take-over of Central American land. It certainly led to an American corp. becoming the largest banana plantation in Central America.
First Foreign War Americans were involved in was the British Invasion of Bogota… shit didn’t work out too well for us I am afraid. British thought we were stupid, ignorant cowards, and kept us in the rear. We proved them right, and decided upon a new rear, and went to valiantly hold it while the battle went on. We cheered the British forward to the walls, and rallied them back as they fled back towards us. We had refreshments and everything ready for them.
We were not used very often after that.