NAIL IN THE COFFIN #104

As with a lot of the “minor” reasons the Republican Party is about to plunge over a cliff of their own, the current ripple of secessionists petitioning the White House is one of the most telling. Leading the pack, to no one's surprise, is the great state (soon to be an independent nation?) of Texas. As I write this, a petition to the government to “Peacefully grant the State of Texas to withdraw from the United States of America and create its own NEW government” leads the pack with some 111,000 signatures. That's almost twice the number of the third most popular petition, legalizing marijuana (58,000). What's that tell you?

Also in the mix are Louisiana (28,446), Florida (21,270), Georgia (20,026), Alabama (19,862), and a bunch more, including New York with 11,217 signatures. When a petition hits 25,000 signatures within 30 days it is supposed to generate a response from the White House.

The governor of Texas ( and former candidate for the Republican presidential nomination), Rick Perry, has (through a spokesperson) come out and said he no has interest in succeeding despite what he may have indicated in the past. Ah, good old Conservative Republicans. They never actually “say that” and yet, thousands of people “heard” that. No wonder they have such a hard time communicating their message.

Just before election day I thought I heard Rush Limbaugh suggest that on the day after the election, if Obama won, that perhaps the country should divide itself between red and blue states and see how each half does. Of course, he didn't suggest that himself, he was just sharing an e-mail he had gotten from “a friend”. Hell, he didn't actually mean it.

The whole secession concept is absurd. It's stupid. And everyone knows it. Probably most of the signers of such petitions understand that, too. But they want to send a message. And just what is their message? They think they're telling the country “We don't like the direction our nation is headed and we want our country back!”. What they're actually saying is “We have no idea what America is all about and refuse to accept the will of the people expressed through the process our country was founded on. So there!”.

The threat of secession isn't new. It was called the “Civil War”. Of course various groups roll out the whole secession thing in a more subtle manner now. Remember Sarah Palin? Her husband, Skeeter (or something like that), was part of a group aspiring independence for Alaska. Now Conservatives are petitioning the White House (one of the freedoms I believe they'll put in their own Constitutions) to “Peacefully grant the State of (put your state here) to withdraw from the United States of America and create its own NEW government”. SPOILER ALERT! It's not going to happen.

Right now, the topic is a joke. It hardly rated comment from John Stewart. Sean Hannity tried to jump start it, Rush Limbaugh won't touch it, and the general consensus is “let 'em”. And that's too bad. It's not Liberal Democrats petitioning the White House for independence. They have better things to do...like getting marijuana legal. And a better chance. No, while I'm sure all six members of the Libertarian Party are involved, it's pretty obvious this whole thing has been set in motion by Conservative Republicans. You know, the guys that lost the last election (again)? The guys claiming they love America, they love the Constitution and all that, but don't want to recognize the will of the people. The country's headed in the wrong direction and now they want to jump off the train. Patriots.

The Republican Party should be glad the main stream media is letting this one die and just treating it as a novelty item. The message they think they're sending has been coming out of Fox News for years. What the growing majority is hearing is a bunch of spoiled whiners who don't want to play by the rules. The real message here is how the Republican Party is slowly working it's way to irrelevancy. If the whole secession idea had (or maybe it still can) caught on any real Republican would have to distance themselves from it. And that would piss off the base. That “base”, anyway. And there's always a whacky third party advocating that particular issue. And they can't afford to lose even that little voting block.

But most importantly, whether this concept gains any real traction or not, it would seem Republicans tend to forget this is the “United States”. We all work together. What exactly would the country of Florida do if a couple of hurricanes hit? Heck, what would the country of New New York do after hurricane Sandy? Seems like we're all in this together. And that's the whole idea.

Remember Republicans, in 2016 how many people do you think are going to want to vote for the guy that advocating separating their state from the rest of the country? Somebody's going to bring it up. I know I will. This alone won't sink you (though I don't know why) but it is another of the hundreds of nails you've put in to your coffin.