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Comment by throwaway9980 | Hacker News Reader

Really? If Florida wants to leave, who’s objecting to that? Half the remaining states would be on the side of “good riddance to bad rubbish” and the other half would support it because “let’s go Brandon!”

I don’t think the hard part is getting people on board with it. The hard part is just getting a vote on it.

EDIT to address your point: I think if enough people want it, it will happen. The Civil War was about slavery, no matter what some folks will say. The current direction isn’t towards war, it’s towards an indifference followed by dissolution. There’s no energy to keep Florida or Texas or California from leaving if that’s what a large majority want.

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The energy is the federal government itself. It owns the tanks and the bombs should your state decide to withdraw 'by force'. Never happening. The only valid option right now is to Amend the constitution which requires 38/50 states to ratify it. That is 76% of states. (e.g. never happening). The union is kind of a done deal until or unless the federal government somehow fails.

There’s no scenario where a state leaves by force. There is a point at which apathy leads to dissolution. If no one cares, then it’s inevitable. It’s entropy.

Those tanks and bombs and jets and nukes are kept in states though. A secessionist state with a federal arsenal could opt to hold onto it.

Ukraine gave Russia the nukes it held within its border. Looking back probably not a great idea.

> tanks and bombs and jets and nukes are kept in states though

We're talking about a military coup in the United States, which is a big topic, but technically, very few tanks and bombs or jets or nukes are in states. In part, for this reason. They're on federal property. States have militias; the U.S. has aircraft carriers and cruise missiles. If a secessionist government tried to invade federal territory, I would be wholly in favor of a decisive (if compassionate) military response.

That federal property, though, is usually surrounded by states. The states could easily declare that it has seized that property.

The bigger challenge, as it always is, is the people.

> states could easily declare that it has seized that property

Anyone can declare anything. What matters is who the troops and missile launchers listen to. That’s the Pentagon.

That depends entirely upon the circumstances. It's unclear to me what would actually happen if that loyalty was put to the test.

Would soldiers who live in these states obey DC's order to kill their neighbors and friends?

They certainly might, depending on the circumstances. But it is unclear to me that the outcome would be simple.

If the situation is such that a mass of state residents is physically attempting to overwhelm a military base like at the end of "V for Vendetta", then the political situation will have long been obvious and preparations will have been made. Things will have gone way past some 60%/40%, gerrymandered state government making a declaration.

>Ukraine gave Russia the nukes it held within its border. Looking back probably not a great idea.

This is a popular factoid, but it often leaves out the fact that Russia had the codes to use the nukes, the ability to maintain them, and that other countries (like the US) wanted the nukes out of Ukraine.

If they had kept them, it is far from clear that they would be a nuclear power today.

I think you grossly over estimate how willing people would be to leave the Union.

Eastern Washington and Oregon have been talking about seceding from their respective states for /years/ and absolutely nothing has come of it because—surprise—most people don’t want to leave.

The number of people who are intensely political (who dislike Florida because politics or who are “Let’s go, Brandon!”) are a very small part of the population. They’re just very loud.

> “good riddance to bad rubbish”

As someone who lives in California, I thought you were talking about us. I wish I could move to Florida. Seems like a better place to live in almost all regards.

There's nothing stopping you from moving?

Unless of course, Florida's hurricanes, mosquitos, sinking land, horrible people, and lackluster economy are keeping you from moving there?

As if earthquakes, wildfires, and mudslides are something people look forward to.

Notably, because CA has the nation's strongest building codes, we can handle Richter 6.0 earthquakes with essentially no damage except to the oldest buildings.

OTOH, Florida begs for federal handouts every time there's a big storm because somehow they never get around to requiring developers to build flood-resistant structures.

> horrible people

When someone calls an entire population of a state, nation, or region as "horrible people"; we call them bigots. It is time for introspection and reflection when you get to a point where everyone you don't agree with are horrible people. And it is not even true, most cities in Florida are democrats, but IMO that shouldn't matter.

Usually this would be flagged, but it goes with the party lines I suppose so it is allowed.

Considering that the Florida governor's approval rating has gone up the more he picks on minorities and LGBTQ individuals, it's pretty clear that the governor's stance is shared by the overwhelming majority of Floridians, and I'm within my rights to think that the people who overwhelmingly think that my nephew is a freak are all horrible people.

And it is not even true, most cities in Florida are democrats, but IMO that shouldn't matter.

That is objectively false. Only the Miami-Dade metropolitan area in Florida leans blue.

Yes that is my immediate gut reaction. Florida passed the don’t say gay bill and has a hard on for going after trans people that doesn’t appear to be going away.

They didn’t even say all of Florida is awful people. You have a bad faith reading of their comment and then think up a bad faith conspiracy about why it is not flagged.

The funniest thing of all is talking about generalizing all people when talking about a state that passed laws to demonize all lgbtqia people.

I suspect that if the states from Florida to Texas all wanted to secede, a vote on that would be forthcoming nearly immediately.

So, Texas, Florida, Louisiana, Mississippi, and Alabama?

If they raised this sort of thing to a vote, I would strongly hope that we let them build their own Republican utopia.

They'll never raise this to a vote, though, because the last thing they want is for that wish to be granted. Complaining about the federal government when you've mismanaged your state is easy, actually having to manage it without relying on handouts is not.

I disagree. The value of river access through the Gulf of Mexico would give the seceding states a stranglehold on our ag and oil exports.

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