CNN.
It was a revealing sign of the times when the Supreme Court last week, in response to a lawsuit from the Republican state attorneys general in Texas and Louisiana, blocked President Joe Biden’s administration from changing a key element of federal immigration policy.
The case was just the latest example of how red states, supported by Republican-appointed judges, are engaging in a multi-front offensive to seize control of national policy even while Democrats hold the White House and nominally control both the House and Senate. The red states are moving social policy sharply to the right within their borders on issues from abortion to LGBTQ rights and classroom censorship, while simultaneously working to hobble the ability of either the federal government or their own largest metro areas to set a different course.
Right out of the gate, the author makes the same mistake all progressives make. Since they are mostly comprised of flunkies and lackeys who await instructions from their “leaders” on what to believe, what to say and what to do, they assume the entire world behaves that way.
The problem the author never points to because of his bias is the root of the issue. More on that momentarily.
To a degree unimaginable even a decade ago, this broad offensive increasingly looks like an effort to define a nation within a nation — one operating with a set of rules and policies that diverge from the rest of America more than in almost any previous era.”
The only time I can recall in American history even remotely like this [divergence] was after the Civil War when the separate but equal doctrine began to emerge” across the South as a backlash against the attempts of the 13th, 14th and 15th Constitutional amendments to ensure equality for the freed slaves, says Donald Kettl, the former dean of the public policy school at the University of Maryland and author of the book, “The Divided States of America.” He added, “It’s a multifront war with very sharp swords.”
The elements of the red state offensive include a flurry of lawsuits seeking to block actions from Biden’s administration on issues from the environment to civil rights to immigration; other lawsuits, such as the case around a Mississippi law that prompted the Supreme Court to overturn the right to abortion, aimed at providing states more leeway to deviate from previously nationally guaranteed rights; a flurry of red state laws that advance the cultural priorities of the GOP’s predominantly White Christian electoral base; and a steady flow of red state statutes blocking Democratic-leaning large cities and counties from setting their own policies on everything from police budgets to recycling.
The willingness of so many red states to adopt these common approaches testifies in part to the energetic organizing efforts of many conservative groups, from Heritage Action and the American Legislative Exchange Council to the Republican Attorneys General Association. But even more profoundly, the alignment of so many red states behind this shared agenda and strategy underscores how many of them are being shaped by a common set of economic and demographic trends.
You see, by finding no right mentioned in the constitution to abortion, the Supreme Court is denying “civil rights,” while failing to mention the one most significant right discussion, that of the RKBA which underlies all of the others.
And don’t fail to note that the author mentions formalized groups such as the AG association. He fails to understand that these AGs are elected and are doing the bidding of their constituency. In other words, this is as grass roots a movement as any in the history of the country. The people are deciding to seek distance from FedGov. The author doesn’t like it, but cannot seem to understand the root cause.
On everything from gun ownership and religious affiliation to reliance on fossil fuels and participation (or not) in the 21st century information economy, most red states are following similar tracks, while diverging more sharply from the experience in blue states. Broadly speaking, blue states are more heavily exposed to the big demographic, cultural and economic forces reshaping American life, while red states are less exposed, and to the extent they are, those changes are centered overwhelmingly on their large metropolitan areas, which are trending Democratic and often — like in Austin or Atlanta — are a target for the Republicans controlling state government.
“It’s not at the level of Jim Crow, or certainly the difference between slave states and free states, but the differences are major,” says Jake Grumbach, a University of Washington political scientist who studies divergence among the states. And like Kettl, Grumbach believes the economic and political differences between the red and blue states are on track to only widen.
Once again, those concerned for sovereign borders and the RKBA are compared to Jim Crow. In other words, they are racists.
Yet the real threat in the red state effort to set their own course may be less an advantage for one side or another than a challenge to the nation’s underlying cohesion. As red states grow more aggressive about going their own way, while working to preempt challenges from above (the federal government) or below (blue local governments), they are testing how much divergence the nation’s fundamental cohesion can take before it begins to unravel.
“You have a very dangerous situation,” said David Leopold, a former president of the American Immigration Lawyers Association and legal adviser to the immigration advocacy group America’s Voice. “This is a direct threat to the nation as a unified entity. This is one step closer to the country dividing into two separate countries.”
It isn’t the progressives pushing open borders, spending money we don’t have, engaging in globalism, pushing worldwide wars, pushing fake pandemics, and pressing for abortion on demand, who are “testing how much divergence the nation’s fundamental cohesion can take before it begins to unravel.” In their world and life view, it’s anyone who doesn’t share their goals and seeks others. You see, it’s your fault, not theirs.
And finally, note that the author and his “experts,” while laudably noting that there are massive problems afoot, still miss the boat on the magnitude of them. They see the current events as a precursor to the beginning of the unraveling.
Here’s a news flash for them. The great unraveling began long, long ago, and is proceeding apace today. It has just become so obvious now that they cannot ignore it.
Yes, the country may divide into two separate countries if the opposing forces seek a peaceful divorce. That would be best for all parties. Without that, their worst fears will obtain.
My money is on the fact that they don’t even having an inkling of what that would look like. That doesn’t bode well.
