secession

Yesterday was California Admission Day. We became a state on September 9, 1850, the U.S. having forced Mexico to give up what is now the state after the Mexican-American War (1848). British and Spanish ships began exploring the coast of California by the mid-1500s. By the 1700s Spanish missionaries started building missions and the Spanish military started building forts and towns-- including what are now Los Angeles and San Jose.

On September the 25th of this year, Kurds in northern Iraq are to hold a referendum on secession from Iraq. Rex Tillerson, the US Secretary of States has recently come forward asking the Kurds to postpone the referendum.

A large region of Spain called Catalonia has announced October 1 as the date of a binding referendum on its independence from Spain. This is the culmination of eight years of independence activism, regional elections, and public consultation. The Spanish government says the referendum is illegal; the Spanish Constitution declares Spain to be “indivisible.” If the referendum vote succeeds, should Spain allow Catalonia to secede? And if the Spanish government forbids it, how should other governments respond?

With all the talk about constitutional conventions, secession, and so on we've been hearing, I suggested recently to Catherine Austin Fitts that there was…
The post ON CONSTITUTIONAL CONVENTIONS: AN INTERVIEW WITH CATHERINE AUSTIN ... appeared first on Giza Death Star.

For weeks, it appeared the Republican Party was headed for imminent civil war. Eminent Republicans disavowed their own presidential nominee, Senators and Representatives seesawed, there were the #NeverTrumpers and the #RepublicanwomenforHillary.

A president of the United States would never operate outside the law, ignore the U.S. Constitution and the courts, shut down the presses, imprison his domestic adversaries or turn his guns on his own people. Well, Abraham Lincoln, the 16th president did of all of that and, curiously, has been turned into a national hero for his troubles. Lincoln ignored his closest advisors and the temper of the times to engage in the bloodiest war in American history, a war that could easily have been avoided. Single handedly Lincoln terrorized the entire nation. So let us take notice.

• TV for Dummies: Sarah Palin launches her own channel• Crazyspeak of the Year nominee No. 17: Arizona schools superintendent John Huppenthal (rhymes with Neanderthal)• The final Crazyspeak of the Year nominee -- and also the winner!Yes, it's Sarah Palin TeeVee!

This week, Harry Reid says he's bringing the Energy Savings and Industrial and Competitiveness Act (S. 2262), sponsored by Jeanne Shaheen (D-NH) and Rob Portman (R-OH) to the floor for a vote. Support for a bill that should be the height of uncontroversial is widespread... on both sides of the aisle. But Republican obstructionists, content with nothing less than the complete disruption of an orderly functioning of government have vowed to prevent passage.

We'll never know for sure how deeply involved Rep. Steve Stockman (R-TX) was in the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing that killed 168 people and injured another 700. But we do know that the militia groups involved were in touch with his office about the bombing and that he has been highly sympathetic to their paranoid-- if not psychotic-- cause.

[We continue our encore presentation of Noah's Idiocracy series.