Look what Phil sent me.
Click for larger picture.
And this ties right into what's coming next. My sister, who lives in the San Francisco Bay Area quit getting the San Francisco Chronicle because it was too much like reading Pravda. This op-ed confirms it.
Secession!
Why stick around? The Bay Area is already a nation unto itself
G. Pascal Zachary Sunday, April 20, 2003
The German computer scientists were talking heatedly about the war in the lobby of a University of California research lab where I was a visitor. I listened to them with curiosity because the government of Germany has condemned the U.S. campaign against Iraq, earning it the enmity of official Washington.
The German geeks casually told one another (in English) how friends back home kept phoning them, nervously asking about their safety, as if they expected a German to be lynched every day on Main Street for disloyalty to the American cause.
"I tell my friends I'm safe in the Bay Area," one German said. "People here even apologize to me for what Americans are doing in Iraq. They say they are sorry."
That's because there are so many fucking anti-American communists in the Bay Area. That's one of the reasons my sister is moving to Asheville, NC in June.
"Berkeley isn't America, and neither is San Francisco or Oakland," a second German added. A third interjected, "I don't think I would live anywhere else."
No shit, Sherlock. Lots of bastards out there were rooting for Saddam.
The views of these Germans -- and my own views of official American power -- are heretical in America, highlighting the wide gulf between the iconoclastic Bay Area and the rest of the United States. This gulf, always present, seems more intensely felt now. There are no American flags waving on my street, or any of the streets I pass each morning when I bring my children to school.
Can you believe this asshole? He's definitely anti-American. Hey buddy! If the flag in the picture above offends you, you're welcome to leave any time. Howza 'bout Cuba? They could use some help with the sugar cane harvest.
A recent Field Poll notwithstanding, the people of the Bay Area seem more deeply opposed to the war on Iraq than anywhere else in the United States. Elsewhere in the country -- say, in New York City or Washington, D.C. -- critics of our government strive to be viewed as "responsible." In the Bay Area, dissenters are idealistic, stubborn, unpredictable -- and often seem irresponsible to the rest of the nation. Remember the vomit protest earlier this month? In Bay Area terms, it was an example of inspired street theater, but the rest of the country saw it as completely weird.
You're also a bunch of fucking communists, like a whole big bunch of other people in Kalifornia. Why do you think your economy is imploding and you have a budget deficit larger than most states' budgets? It's because you're communists. Communism was an abject failure in the Soviet Union. Why do you think it's gonna work in Kalifornia? Oh yeah, the right people weren't in charge in the Soviet Union. Y'all got Grayout Davis and Willie Brown. There's one hell of a fucking management team.
Of course, San Francisco, Oakland and Berkeley are cities full of weirdos --
Now that's a real big fucking shock! Whoda thunk it?
misfits who relish turning respectable behavior upside down. Not surprisingly, the anti-war movement is fractious in the Bay Area.
They're also a bunch of fucking idiots.
Rather than presenting a "responsible" alternative to Bush's war
They don't have any. Their platform is "I hate America. America bad. Everyone else good." Let's go stage a vomit in.
-- say, for instance, by calling for hard sanctions, but no invasion of Iraq -- dissenters here are more likely to question the entire project of decapitating Saddam Hussein, pointing out that some of our closest allies (Pakistan, Israel) already have secretly acquired nuclear weapons and that the United States helped build Iraq's military arsenal in the 1980s when the country went to war against our archenemy Iran.
So let's just be like France and do nothing and wait for a city to be nuked. I nominate Berkeley. We wouldn't even miss it.
Bay Area people are more willing to accuse Bush of rank disloyalty, for selfishly trying to improve his re-election chances by going to war with Iraq in order to distract attention from the government's failure to smash al Qaeda.
These are the same people who thought it was all right to kill goats in Afghanistan and bomb an aspirin factory to distract us from Bill's blowjobs. And Monica Lewinsky has a television program? Jesus! I thought her 15 minutes of fame was up.
Dissenters here see the illogic of capitalism at play in the world, the drive for oil and profits coloring the government's behavior rather than Bush's self- professed obsession with bringing freedom and democracy to the Arab world.
These people see the "illogic of capitalism" that has made the United States the wealthiest and most powerful nation in the history of this planet and I guess they don't see the logic of socialism that has failed everywhere it has been tried. Prime example: the Soviet Union.
By raising uncomfortable questions about the "American empire,"
There is no fucking American Empire! Godammit! Where are our fucking provinces paying us tribute? We don't do a very good job of this empire shit when we're giving money away rather than taking it from the rest of the world.
Bay Area people guarantee their marginalization in what passes for the national conversation.
That's because they don't have a fucking clue as to what the national conversation is. They're too busy saying how much they hate America.
Being ignored hurts.
Get used to it.
One of my closest friends, a veteran Democratic activist,
And probably a fucking communist.
badly wants to engage the body politic on the issue of Bush's failed diplomacy, but he gets nowhere.
I thought Bush's diplomacy worked pretty well. I think the Arabs might be afraid to fuck with us now.
"I've never felt more out of step with the rest of America," he tells me.
You have a firm grasp on the obvious, dipshit!
Join the club. No one is listening to people in the Bay Area.
That's because a whole big bunch of people in the Bay Area are full of shit!
No one ever listens, actually. The Bay Area is out of sync with the United States on every political metric.
Once again he displays his firm grasp on the obvious.
Indeed, the people of the Bay have more in common politically and culturally with the geeks from Germany.
And the assholes from France. Congratulations!
Bay Area politicos would fit comfortably under the rubric of European "social democrats,"
Communists.
favoring a humane welfare state,
Communism.
multilateralism and a ban on offensive military force.
Be like France. Surrender early and often.
Yet in the skewed political structure of America -- where minority political parties are effectively silenced at the national level by the country's winner-take-all system -- the distinctive voice of the Bay Area vanishes into thin air.
And that's a good thing.
Unlike Germany, where the minority Green Party has a stake in the ruling administration, there is no left-liberal party on the national scene. Ralph Nader may have grabbed enough votes to tilt the last presidential election in Bush's favor, yet he has no role in national government -- not in Congress, the administration or even in a federal agency.
And that would be bad because...?
I wish to propose an immodest remedy for this sorry situation: We, the people of the Bay Area, need to leave the United States. We are held prisoner by a foreign power, colonized by an alien civilization. We require cultural and social self-determination. We demand, in short, a declaration of independence -- and our own nation.
Be still my beating heart! I agree! I agree! I'd vote for this in a minute. Take the rest of Kalifornia with you. No Nancy Pelosi. No Barbara Boxer. No Diane Feinstein. No Maxine Waters. No Henry Waxman.
I realize that my suggestion is a delicious fantasy.
Ahhhhh! But what a fantasy! Imagine no more commies. It's easy if you try.
Americans since Jefferson have been attracted to the myth of the sturdy individual, the self- reliant small town.
Oh man! I want some of what this guy is smoking. Does he think San Francisco values the individual and self reliance? Hello! Wefare state.
For alternative thinkers, "small is beautiful" remains a rallying cry. While American pluralism allows for experimentation on the state and local level, for some more radical autonomy is desirable. The historian Arthur Schlesinger bemoaned in the 1990s "the disuniting of America," but radicals see the United States as too big, too unified, too homogeneous. Independence is a rational response to a loss of identity.
I would like to see San Francisco try to succeed on its own with no money coming in from the federal gummint. Now there's a fantasy.
Of course, hard-headed "realists" scoff at independence movements, saying they would create unsustainable small nations. Yet look around the world; there are many prosperous small nations: Singapore, the sophisticated city- state, in Asia.
But Singapore practices the "illogic of capitalism" If it adopted the socialist policies of San Francisco it would be a disaster in about ten years. Probably less.
None of these nations is home to more than 5 million people. Some successful nations are even smaller. Ireland, which boasted Europe's fastest growing economy during the 1990s, has fewer than 4 million people.
Did you know that Ireland has the lowest tax rate of any nation in the European Union? It also has less regulations against business. That's why it's thriving.
OK. He's about to really get wacko now.
Indeed, small countries are increasingly economically secure because of the power of world trade.
Most of them are capitalist with free trade economies and they actually produce sumpin' other than bullshit. All right. If he's including all the Bay Area they actually do produce stuff, but if they seceded, all the defense contractors and the military would leave. For the productive cities to support San Francisco the taxes would have to be raised so high that Oracle and the rest of the high tech industries would be movin' to Arizona. Have fun in your socialist utopia.
Does anyone doubt that the Bay Area, if an independent nation, would be economically viable?
I doubt it and probably any rational thinking person would agree. See above.
On its own, the Bay Area would have a diversified economy, strong universities and the kind of scenic beauty that assures a steady stream of tourists.
I forgot about tourism. As an independent entity you would really have to soak the tourists, especially after all the high tech businesses left due to the high taxation. And you could be just like the French in Paris and be rude to the tourists.
Of course, an independent Bay Area would have to reach some kind of military treaty with the United States, which would not want a Bay Nation to pose a security threat.
What kind of a security threat could the Bay Area pose? Look out! We're being attacked by a lot of vomiting nitwits! We'd close all the bases and all the defense contractors would leave.
But we wouldn't mind. We would be like Switzerland, a neutral country that tries to help people. We, the Bay Nation, would try to prevent conflicts, not make promoting conflicts an aim of national policy.
Maybe we could talk Jimmah Carter into moving there.
To those who say that an independence drive would be fruitless, even wacko,
I pick wacko.
I reply that the people of the Bay Area have a better shot at withdrawing from the United States than winning over the political mainstream.
And I would love to see you go. Hell, take the rest of the state with you. Then we wouldn't have to worry about the Dimocratic Party anymore.
Look at the evidence. Nancy Pelosi may be the second-most powerful Democratic member of the House of Representatives, but what influence does she -- or even the House -- have over a national government bent on war,
And am I thankful for that? You bet I am!
the gutting of civil liberties
But gutting the Second Amendment is OK.
and destructive tax cuts?
Whereas he supports confiscation of capital for the glorious welfare state.
Opponents of the war can wave flags and express sympathy for the soldiers in Iraq, but the powers that be control the symbolism of patriotism. Rather than out-wave the flag wavers, radicals in the Bay Area -- and I mean most of us -- would do better to seek self- determination for our region.
Goodbye. Don't let the door hit you in the ass on the way out.
Think of the advantages of having our own country. We wouldn't have to apologize to people of conscience for being Americans any more.
If you were a real American you wouldn't have to do that now, you fucking asshole.
We wouldn't go to war against Arab dictators (or anyone else).
Give peace a chance. Kumbaya.
We wouldn't suffer through any more rogue national elections.
GMAFB! Bush won. Give it a rest already. I invoke Addison's Law. Wait a minute! Speaking of rogue elections, wasn't it San Francisco, where they found all those ballots in the Bay? And talking about bogus elections did you know that Frank Lautenberg of New Jersey was selected, not elected, by the New Jersey Supreme Court?
We would finally have a government that shared the concerns of its people.
I think our gummint shares my concerns. You are in the minority. Live with it.
It gets worse. I'm sorry. Even I have to stop fisking here. I don't even think the New York Times or the Washington Post could publish something this ridiculous. Or, maybe the Chronicle has a sense of humor and this was satire.
I know Kim du Toit agrees with this butthead on his idea to secede. In fact, Kim would like to take the idea a little further. Here's Kim's proposed map for the United States.
Works for me.
Posted by denny at April 21, 2003 08:43 PM