In June, I noted that interest in #CalExit, a #Brexit inspired movement in which California would secede from the union, was growing.
National Review now reports on #CalExit, #OrgExit, #WasExit, and other secession campaigns coalescing within deep blue states where progressives are bemoaning the fact that billionaire businessman Donald Trump is now President Elect.
“Yes California,” a political action committee fighting for California’s independence from the union, is campaigning to qualify a secession initiative for the 2018 ballot, which in turn would force a special-election referendum on the question. The group had gained little traction since its founding in 2015, but received an outpouring of support for their movement in the aftermath of Trump’s victory.…Democrats from California, Oregon, and Washington state created hashtags to promote the idea of a secession comprising all three states. While red states such as Texas are constantly mocked for their secession movements, it seems that Democrats in blue states are following an identical playbook. And it’s not just on the west coast. Vermont’s secession movement, the Second Vermont Republic, is one of the largest in the country; they’ve elected multiple officials to the state capital.
Here is a sampling of some of the Tweets:
As Professor Jacobson reminds us, this is not the first time that progressives have whined about presidential election results. In 2004, MSNBC’s Lawrence O’ Donnell appeared on a panel hosted by the McLaughlin Group and said a “serious discussion on secession” would begin shortly after President Bush’s re-election and last for 20 years.
On the other hand, the moment the Huffington Post used a click-baiting headline to imply former Texas Governor Rick Perry was threatening to secede after Obama’s election, the Left was screaming treason.
Legal Insurrection readers may have reason to cheer-on #CalExit. Even infamously conservative Orange County went blue this November.
Hillary Clinton has beaten Donald Trump in Orange County, the first time since the Great Depression the county has gone blue in a presidential election.Clinton, the Democratic nominee who lost the presidential race to Republican Donald Trump Tuesday, has received nearly 50 percent of the Orange County vote with all precincts reporting and 795,000 votes counted as of Wednesday morning, according to the Orange County registrar of voters. Trump had 44.9 percent of the vote.
Ultimately, as Glenn Reynolds notes, secession is for losers.
But the key point is that secession is for losers, because under today’s federal government, losing is intolerable. If you think that you can’t win nationally, you want to secede locally. If we had a more tolerable federal government, even losers wouldn’t want to secede. Maybe, even after this year’s election, we should give that a shot.
Working for a more tolerable federal government is hard…as I know from having been a citizen activist since 2009.
But whining on Twitter is easy. So, if at first you don’t secede, whine, whine again.
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