Shutdown Sabotage is Secession

[bigtree]

Josh Marshall ?@joshtpm 9m
Let's Call The Shutdown What It Is: Secession By Another Means -from bill moyers http://talkingpointsmemo.com/cafe/let-s-call-the-shutdown-what-it-is-secession-by-another-means …


Republicans have now lost three successive elections to control the Senate, and they've lost the last two presidential elections. Nonetheless, they fought tooth and nail to kill President Obama's health care initiative. They lost that fight, but with the corporate wing of Democrats, they managed to bend it toward private interests.

. . . Despite what they say, Obamacare is only one of their targets. Before they will allow the government to reopen, they demand employers be enabled to deny birth control coverage to female employees; they demand Obama cave on the Keystone pipeline; they demand the watchdogs over corporate pollution be muzzled and the big bad regulators of Wall Street sent home. Their ransom list goes on and on. The debt ceiling is next. They would have the government default on its obligations and responsibilities.

When the president refused to buckle to this extortion, they threw their tantrum. Like the die-hards of the racist South a century and a half ago, who would destroy the union before giving up their slaves, so would these people burn down the place, sink the ship.

At least, let's name this for what it is: sabotage of the democratic process. Secession by another means.


read: http://talkingpointsmemo.com/cafe/let-s-call-the-shutdown-what-it-is-secession-by-another-means

[Skraxx]

1. Do You Mean "Secession"?

[blkmusclmachine]

2. The GOPee: America's Terror Organization.

And the DC DEMS still treat them like equals operating in good faith.

[Warren Stupidity]

3. Actually secession is secession and so far no states have done that.

Although some of the nullification legislation comes close.

[bigtree]

4. disunion; their aims are the same as state secessionists

. . . to disrupt the process of democracy - to separate themselves from the responsibility for the functioning of government - to achieve their political goals.

Whatever the intentions of the Founders, threats of secession and disunion were a constant in the political discourse of Americans preceding the Civil War. Historian Elizabeth Varon wrote:

... one word (disunion) contained, and stimulated, Americans fears of extreme political factionalism, tyranny, regionalism, economic decline, foreign intervention, class conflict, gender disorder, racial strife, widespread violence and anarchy, and civil war, all of which could be interpreted as God's retribution for America's moral failings. Disunion connoted the dissolution of the republic -- the failure of the Founders' efforts to establish a stable and lasting representative government. For many Americans in the North and the South, disunion was a nightmare, a tragic cataclysm that would reduce them to the kind of fear and misery that seemed to pervade the rest of the world. And yet, for many other Americans, disunion served as the main instrument by which they could achieve their political goals.


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Secession_in_the_United_States

[Warren Stupidity]

10. This form of argument is referred to as "equivocation".

I agree that Republicans are pushing "disunion", however that is not "secession". Secession has a specific and historically profound meaning, given that we had a real secession and a real civil war over it.

[bigtree]

11. just ignore the parallels

. . . sit back and wait for a war before calling them out.

This is war. Too many folks trying to lull us into ignoring the political coup attempt underway by allowing republicans the cover of technicalities and clipped rhetoric. Wake the fuck up.

[oldhippie]

12. "This is war."

Hot damn! Does that mean we get to go out and shoot people and blow stuff up? I can put my new suppressed 300 BLK SBR to use? (Oops, most of you won't know what that is.)

But,,,,, wait ,,,,,, I don't see anyone on the other side of the war doing any shooting or blowing stuff up yet. Is it OK for us to go first? That won't break any UN rules or anything will it? I don't want to be called before the International Criminal Court. It's OK, right? It IS war?

[bigtree]

16. rich folks talk like this about the shutdown and potential default

. . . most of us are already suffering from the deliberate attacks on the economy.

Maybe you should be doing more than nitpicking.

[oldhippie]

24. Nitpicking? ......

OK. Maybe I should engage in hyperbole. After all, this is WAR!

[bigtree]

26. hyperbole would be an improvement

. . . over whatever this effort of yours is worth here.

[oldhippie]

29. OK. I got it .....

I see where you are coming from. Have a nice day.

[oldhippie]

5. That is just silly, and I can't believe Bill Moyers wrote that ......

Jesus, some people are jumping the shark.

[onenote]

6. +1

[bigtree]

9. goodness knows

. . . we need to be careful in how we define republican obstruction.

Damn Moyers for making this analogy . . . republicans deserve better.

[Dash87]

7. Secession? Does he mean, "sedition?" This piece is hard to understand.

[Puzzledtraveller]

8. Can we get some DU Draino?

[Llewlladdwr]

13. Sedition, treason and secession.

No hyperbole on DU at all.....

[bigtree]

14. must be careful

. . . describing what these republican traitors are doing to America.

I imagine only folks who have the means to avoid being affected by this virtual government hijacking can be as sanguine and judgmental as you are here.

You're truly doing god's work in talking folks down.

[BluegrassStateBlues]

17. I haven't been here long,

but I've been surprised about the amount of Republicans I come across.

[Llewlladdwr]

18. I'm right in the middle of this.

As a DoD civilian employee I'm currently working with only a promise of payment sometime in the future. I'm deeply affected by this and want the shutdown over as much as anyone. But irresponsible, inflammitory rhetoric and magical thinking isn't what's going to do it.

[bigtree]

19. irresponsible?

Moyers made a very good analogy that apparently went right over your head. At any rate, nothing in this post even addresses the other charges and the rationale for those.

I think Moyers used the secession analogy to explain (as I tried to in post#4) that this republican effort shouldn't merely be viewed in the context that they're operating in; rather, it should be seen as a direct assault on our democracy. To argue endlessly about Obamacare misses their true motive, which is to stifle the democratic process and carve out a contrived procedure where they exact ransom in exchange for allowing their own obligations to be funded.

It makes no sense at all to describe their effort in such a benign way, as if to suggest that they're just operating under normal and accepted procedures.

The issues they're arguing to be addressed before they allow a debt-limit increase are just a grab from their bag of obstructive tricks they use to thwart progress. Their underlying intention is just short of a political coup. Ignoring the true nature of that republican effort and relying on (or, insisting on) the finer points of rhetoric to define that effort is just weak and accommodating.

There's absolutely nothing worthwhile in talking folks here (or elsewhere) down from calling republicans out in the strongest of terms, or ridiculing those who regard their efforts as akin to treason. In fact, it's downright mystifying to me why anyone here would bother to defend them in any manner at all.

[Samantha]

22. I agree with you

This is much bigger and much more dangerous to our way of life and government than many people are admitting.

Sam

[BluegrassStateBlues]

15. Republicans deserve every bit of strong rhetoric available thrown at them...

Threatening to economically nuke the global economy over ideological bullshit should not go without scorn.

They are a threat to the world and must be described as such.

Anyone that can expend even an ounce of energy defending them against any strong rhetoric should be viewed with suspicion, especially in an anonymous realm.

[bigtree]

20. agreed, BluegrassStateBlues

. . . ANY defense of republicans plays into their cynical and pernicious effort to disrupt and degrade our democratic processes.

As you say, they deserve every bit of scorn; in almost any form. This isn't tiddlywinks; it's a political war.

[Ganja Ninja]

21. It all boils down to the preservation of our Democracy.

Moyers is right in that this will never end and the demands will keep coming if it isn't stopped. Obamacare has nothing to do with it anymore. This is about people who can't live with the outcome of the democratic process and are willing to bring down the whole country because of it. And let's just stop mincing words. It's about a black man being elected as President. A fact that some people refuse to accept. Some people that need to have their arms twisted until they do accept it.

[mnhtnbb]

23. Obama himself has called it extortion. That's criminal behavior. I wonder

whether there is a behind the scenes play being developed to take
out these Republican thugs that are subverting the democratic process.
I certainly hope so.

Here's the video from yesterday's presser where Obama calls it extortion.

http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/DC-Decoder/2013/1008/Obama-to-Republicans-We-can-t-make-extortion-routine-video

[Fawke Em]

25. Why is it that the South is always the only place mentioned?

The mid-West is far more conservative.

And, the South is far closer to beginning to turn that purple corner because we have a lot of immigrants and people of color - far more than the mid-West.

Check out the real map:



Yes... there are still some deep red areas in the South, but there is also a lot of purple and a lot of blue. If DU and others are going to go on a "racism" tirade, their ire should be at the mid-West and not the South - or at least point out that the mid-West makes the South look positively progressive.

[bigtree]

28. the reference to the South Moyers made was just a historical one

. . . about the attempts at the dissolution of our Union at a pivotal time in our democracy.

It's almost impossible to speak of rights under the constitution without referencing that North-South struggle for 'states rights' and other expressions of resistance to the national legislature's determination of our collective will.

[redstatebluegirl]

27. How about giving the tea party nuts

Texas, Oklahoma Alabama, Mississippi and they can start their own country. We will remove all federal aid and military bases from those states (they are smart they can start their own with the help of the Koch Brothers money).

They can be a lilly white, male dominated crazy land. All the guns they want, Christianity the forced religion (better get to church every Sunday or the government may come get you), and women are used for breeding more male tea party members, doing dishes, cleaning you know, women's work.

One last thing, all schools will be transformed into Christian Schools, no math or science taught at any time. History books will be cleansed of any reference to Black or Brown people and conservative indoctrination class will be every other period of the day.

I live in one of those states and would gladly move north. A lot of people we know we would go too, not a problem, they could cleanse themselves of all of us liberal nut cases.

Civil war is in the offing folks, they didn't finish it the first time to their liking. As I have said before there is a sense this country is coming apart at the seams. The fires are being stoked by talk radio/television. The hatred and lies are so rampant I don't know how we could fight them.

[Emit]

30. K&R

just watched. Love Bill Moyers!