They do this all the time. Maybe Biden should call their bluff, execute his powers as Commander in Chief, and order the National Guard in Texas to turn on State Police.
We’ll have to arrange some kind of post wwII Berlin level air campaign to support Austin.
Every 15 minutes a C130 land fully stocked with Trader Joes Chili lime rolled tortilla chips, apple cider, and Joe’s O’s.
And drop brown bags filled with shit on Ted Cruz and Albots property on the way back. Time management maximized.
And drop brown bags filled with shit on Ted Cruz and Albots property on the way back. Time management maximized.
Get this person a position in the DLA, we’ve got bags of shit to drop.
Why would we freely add to Ted Cruz’s collection of bags of shit? He’d love that.
Yeah, I thought that’s how he reproduces.
Honestly, Ted Cruz stood before a podium this week and give a speech against the insanity of adding more Razorwire, mentioning that is has done nothing to prevent growing immigration numbers since they started putting it up. Fuck that guy, for real, but on this particular issue he is on our side.
And Telecaster guitars.
I just asked a coworker who emmigrated from there. He’d fully pack a c130 with only coffee and kombucha.
And to keep the pro secession people away: Offer Shiner beer at Wal-Mart for buy one, get one 50% off 12-pack.
Yeah, heading into the 2018 midterm Trump tried to create a border crisis. It didn’t work. This is their election trick, create a lot of smoke, rile up the base, think that it will rile everyone else up.
I mean let’s look at the core aspect of Abbott’s argument from his statement.
That is why the Framers included both Article IV, § 4, which promises that the federal government “shall protect each [State] against invasion,” and Article I, § 10, Clause 3, which acknowledges “the States’ sovereign interest in protecting their borders.” Arizona v. United States, 567 U.S. 387, 419 (2012) (Scalia, J., dissenting).
Right out the gate, Abbott is based his ideology on a dissenting opinion. That is, the NON-MAJORITY finding of the court in Arizona v. United States. In fact, Arizona v. United States indicated explicitly that enforcement of the border was the sole privilege of the Federal Government. So right out the gate Abbott is literally using a case that ruled the opposite of the determination he indicated in his statement.
Additionally, Art. I, § 10, C. 3 of the Constitution.
No State shall, without the Consent of Congress, lay any Duty of Tonnage, keep Troops, or Ships of War in time of Peace, enter into any Agreement or Compact with another State, or with a foreign Power, or engage in War, unless actually invaded, or in such imminent Danger as will not admit of delay.
Historically this was used for Native American invasions of property and so the key factor in cases around this is “will not admit of delay”. Texas is not burning. No historical read of this section of the Constitution supports immigrants coming into the Nation. By definition as we have it thus far, Texas is not being invaded. Additionally, Scalia’s conceptualization of this section, no other Justice has joined in on that understanding. So outside of the opinion of a single justice, a Governor just saying “I’m being invaded! I get to invalidate federal law!” nobody else has ever indicated this is the way it should be read.
With Art. I, § 10, C. 3, you can say “I’m being invaded!” But you still have to follow the law. You can fight invaders and maintain the law of this land, they are not mutually exclusive things, no matter how hard Abbott or Scalia wishes it to be otherwise.
And finally, the Art. IV, § 4 argument.
The United States shall guarantee to every State in this Union a Republican Form of Government, and shall protect each of them against Invasion; and on Application of the Legislature, or of the Executive (when the Legislature cannot be convened) against domestic Violence.
Again, no court would uphold that Texas is being invaded. But Abbott is adamant about Biden “isn’t enforcing…” And the thing is, Governors do not get to legally make that determination. What laws are and are not being enforced by a President is the sole prerogative of the Executive branch. (Wayte v. United States)
The Governor of Texas cannot just unilaterally make a determination that the President isn’t XYZing. That’s what the court system is for and distinctly the thing that Abbott has lost. If the Governor felt that the President was not holding up their end, they have every right under Article III of the Constitution to take it up there. Which that’s what Abbott did and lost. Also, why when he was questioned if his defiance would be upheld by SCOTUS, he merely indicated that he felt the 5th Circuit would uphold it. Meaning, he knows that SCOTUS will overturn any determination the Governor is making on this front.
And with all of that, his core argument has nothing. It’s easy to pick apart. Now here’s the thing, Gov. Abbott is not stupid in the legal sense. He’s quite aware that his determination is unfounded. He’s banking on stirring the pot enough to make either Biden do something so that can be plastered all over the place or getting the issue fresh into his base’s minds.
And like I said, this is exactly what they did 2018 and lost. Abbott is just trying to get under everyone’s skin and he seems determined to spend as much of Texan taxpayers’ money in litigation to do that one thing.
Again, no court would uphold that Texas is being invaded.
Which is good because if we classify border-crossing migrants as “invaders” then not only does that mean really bad things for them, it means Abbott was funneling invaders further inside our borders by paying to bus them to denver or fly them to chicago or whatever else.
It’s pretty clear he didn’t think the treasonous implications of this particular initiative through very well.
Great analysis. I genuinely think Abbott is also trying to make as much work available to conservative lawyers as possible, like a jobs program for assholes.
I do hope to come across more of your commentary analysis on Lemmy! Thanks for the informative insights.
Please, leave. Don’t come crying to us the next time your electrical grid gets overwhelmed.
Hey! Y’all used to rely on us to kick-start y’all’s power grids! Back in the '70s and '80s! Back when racism and cocaine reigned supreme!
Now y’all are all like, “ew, why is that racist coke-head talking to me?” Well, it’s cuz you’re woke or something!
Hey! Listen to me and stop walking away! Why are you taking our American flags?? Hello?
Speaking of power grids, have fun trying to keep yours maintained once you secede, Texas. It barely works as it is now.
I bet it’ll run just fine on thoughts and prayers. Good luck to you, ya Yankee heathen!
Oh shoot, my lights ran out of thoughts — gotta switch to the backup prayers…
I’m in favor of calling the bluff, but leave it peaceful:
- Army bases remain US army bases and the national guard remains US. Texas must raise its own military without any US military equipment. Existing US servicemen must resign if they wish to join the Texas military, and will be treated as foreign army – they must leave US bases.
- Any companies headquartered in Texas will be considered foreign companies and subject to all relevant taxes and laws. Employees will be considered employed by foreign companies. Any subsidizes and other credits to these companies are forfeit.
- Employees of the state government will be considered foreign state agents.
- Trade deals must be negotiated with the US. Any US facilities providing goods and services, like water or energy, will now charge a fair market rate.
- Texas must renegotiate trade with other countries.
- For the first five years, Texas and the US must allow people to freely move out of or into Texas. If any Texas resident wishes to live as a US citizen, Texas must pay for their relocation.
- After that, or if they choose to renounce US citizenship, Texans are considered foreigners and will be treated as illegal immigrants if they enter the US without proper documentation.
- Texas universities lose all US accreditation. Current Students may transfer to a US university at no cost, and have their existing credits recognized. Texas will pay for any moves. New students from Texas will be considered foreign students and applicants for admissions and tuition at US universities.
- Any attack on US people or property or facilities will be seen as an act of war.
- Texas senators and house representatives are expelled from Congress.
They’ll be crying and begging to rejoin the US within a month. They’ll be a fourth world hell scape within a year if they don’t.
So, basically brexit then.
TexBrex; like texmex but worse.
Texit.
I have to say TexBrex is better
Disagree, but I respect your opinion. Can we include TexMix somehow?
Let’s not forget the $53,000,000,000 they would instantly lose from federal funding
There is still the matter of the Constitution saying that states can’t do that.
Let the Republican controlled supreme court rule it illegal.
Texas immediately becomes the newest Narco-State, gets it’s own CIA coup and Democrats refuse to make them a state again, forcing them to be a territory.
Its* own CIA.
Set Texas adrift and you’ll see some real invaders from the south.
That would be the ‘finding out’ part.
Oh man, the cartels would love to hit that from behind.
Unfortunately I think we have too much federal infrastructure in Texas to make it that simple.
NASA is one thing that comes to mind. (Houston would have a pretty big problem then)
There’s a US mint in DFW, Houston refines the majority of oil for the US, I think there’s some US gold stored in a fort north of Austin, not to mention all the corporations that have HQs like Lockheed Martin. Not sure if all the corporations would be able to get out quickly enough or if those would be tx companies needing an international trade agreement.
There are multiple other mints. Gold is produced and stored in plenty of other areas, and won’t be a tenth as important as preppers feel it will be. There are plenty of refineries in California to support the West Coast, and there being less demand for petroleum products would work well with there being less oil supplied from Texas. Corporations are international already.
Let them go have their own stu-topia with their own energy grid.
Yes corporations are international, but they don’t have an international trade agreement with the US right now. The military would not take kindly to one of its biggest suppliers suddenly finding itself in a foreign country.
I was looking at Northrop Grumman and Lockheed Martin on Google maps earlier today, coincidentally. While the headquarters seem to be in Texas I was mostly seeing blips for plants in southern New England. I don’t know how accurate that is but I suspect that the plants are more crucial than any office or HQ.
And the US would have no obligation to help unless they decide to sign a defence treaty.
It’s like brexit all over again, but even more stupid.
I say let them leave, make PR the 50th state, and then immediately invade Texas and turn it into a territory of the US.
Does Texas have oil?
Yes. We must liberate Texas.
Like so much I think this is the reason these buffoons want to succeed. Then they can claim it as their own.
As someone who actually lives here, I would be very hard pressed to find someone who actually thinks secession is a good idea. It has been years since I’ve met someone who didn’t consider it anything more than a joke or bit of (false) trivia.
Be aware that Lemmy is a pretty radically legt place. It isn’t where to go if you want nuanced takes on stupid conservative talking points.
Why would anyone want nuanced takes on stupid conservative talking points? They’re not worth listening to because they’re not grounded in reality or knowledge of how the world works.
You can’t have a functional democracy if you don’t listen to the other side. That’s literally the problem we have right now, a bunch of boomers who scream socialism when you try to feed their starving children or get people access to medical care.
I don’t think anyone would disagree with your point, but the other side is literally daring the U.S. military to kill them right now and emitting lout screeching noises. I can’t blame anyone for avoiding engagement.
A vocal minority of cockwaffles are daring the federal government to assert its authority.
I’m sure the proportion of conservatives who support this is disappointingly high, but it is not all, or even most (around here). Even if they do support this political fuckery, the transition to a shooting war is not a small leap.
Civil war it is then. (they will start it though)
So you want dictatorship. That way there is no opposing side and as long as you agree, everything is good.
I think most rational people would like an opposition party who brings good ideas with solid justification to the table. A group of professional politicians who argue in good faith, working for the betterment of their electorate. People who can at least be respected by the international community, willing to tackle the real problems facing the world as a whole.
If we’re talking about dictatorship perhaps it’s worth scrutinising the people arguing for total immunity for the president. It’s especially worth an in-depth look at the relationships they form with leaders of other nations and the principles they share.
Rural Texas can be pretty crazy. Cities and the immediate surrounding areas are pretty normal and liberal.
Cities and the immediate surrounding areas are pretty normal and liberal.
I’m not so sure about that.
Comparing Austin to Houston (for example) you’ll see two quite different mindsets / philosophies going on. And Dallas/Fort Worth seems even different from the two other cities.
former texan… man, they really want it, even if it seems bonzo crazy, they’ll try to get it. I’m really pushing fam down there to get out before it gets worse. The GOP doesn’t care about winning by the rules, as evinced by Abbot and Paxton’s disregard for laws they don’t like and recent fights with the - checks notes - yeah the supreme court…
I can’t and won’t put anything past the texas conservatives / GOP anywhere at this point, if they have the opportunity to wreck things they will - they don’t think consequences through and don’t care about patriotism in a sense that most people do. I’d should refer to them as Texas Nationalists.
While this is true, your elected officials are acting as if it’s really on the table. You may not be able to find a Texan who says they want secession, but it’s not hard to find one who would vote for it.
Biden has immunity. He should just order seal team 6 to execute Texas political leadership.
let them fight it in court for years
Floridian here. I prefer the execution idea - it’s a better use of tax dollars than paying for lawyers (GOP donors, of course) to argue on behalf of deeply flawed state executives.
I really want for someone to call it out and be like “OK, FINE, SECEDE. GO AHEAD!” and just watch the idiots back down.
It needs a catchy name, maybe something like “Texit?” Get that on the ballot, see what happens
For a catchy name you could also point that by seceding they can be come the “United States of Systemic Racism”. That very nicely initializes to USSR.
Go ahead. Seceded states don’t get electoral votes.
Or federal funding.
they will be pretty lit after the federals decide to pay it a visit tho
As a Texan who wants nothing to do with these absolute fucking morons, but whose life is directly impacted by their asinine whims: please don’t encourage them. I can’t afford to leave yet.
They can, and should, be fertilizer. 🌻🌻🌻
I don’t get why Biden doesn’t do this. The fear is abott will say government over reach and that will be a talking point for the election? How about strong father figure, who enforced the law to keep us united?
You can’t let what Republicans say dictate what you do
No matter what Biden does, they’re going to do what they’re going to do.
Even if he doesn’t do the right thing now, they’ll just lie some more and do it anyways.
“Meet me in the middle,” says the unjust man.
You take a step towards him. He takes a step back.
“Meet me in the middle,” says the unjust man.
— A. R. Moxon
I see you’ve negotiated with Republicans before.
Malignant narcissist parents. I got started early.
I guess the flip side of that though is it’s really past when everyone should keep trying to reason and compromise with these screaming toddlers. How many times now have we seen this exact thing play out where Republicans act completely unhinged and Democrats treat them with kid gloves and keep offering them compromises and trying to appease them. Fuck em. Ignore them until they cross the line, then come down on them like a ton of bricks. No more playing nice, no more treating them like reasonable adults. Wait until Abbott puts his name on something legally incriminating then send the FBI in to haul him to a jail in DC and try him for sedition. Bonus points if they can swing the death penalty.
I mean, have you ever tried to sink to a toddlers level and get in a screaming match with them?
But sure, ideally we’d start running FDR style Dems again, get some of the 1/3 of the country who doesn’t vote regularly, and conservatives can keep screaming into the void while Dems sweep every election that matters.
FDR literally only lost two states in 36, because he was legitimately trying to help the average American.
But the DNC is very open about not wanting that, and after NH I really think they’d go as far as ignoring results in a competitive primary in 2028.
So we’re kind of stuck with trying to win over conservatives, that’s the only direction the DNC recognizes as valid.
I’ve given up on winning the game, I’m just trying to lose as little as possible at this point. Definitely doesn’t mean I have to like it either.
But the choice is try what we can or check out and watch it all burn down, I’m not ready for that yet.
Edit:
My bad, I didn’t realize what you replied to.
I’m saying don’t pay attention to what Republicans are threatening to do.
Regardless of what Biden does, they’ll find an excuse to do it anyways. Because when Republicans try to explain why they’re doing anything, they’re almost always lying and just saying what they think the best answer is in the moment.
So Biden should have activated them immediately on title 10.
The longer he waits, the bigger chance a significant amount don’t listen. And at that point it’s a legit civil war.
Fuck em. Ignore them until they cross the line, then come down on them like a ton of bricks. No more playing nice, no more treating them like reasonable adults.
Damn straight! As a parent to an actual toddler, sometimes I have to take my son’s toys away until he chooses to behave. Does that make me the “bad guy”? Maybe. But it’s also part of being an adult.
No matter what Biden does, they’re going to do what they’re going to do.
Ah, another Innuendo Studios fan, I see. Yes, just like he said in “Alt-Right Playbook Ep. 3, ‘You Go High, We Go Low’”,
Republicans are going to cry “So much for the tolerant left!” no matter what form our opposition takes, so the obvious solution is to just ignore them. But clearly it’s more complicated than that, or we wouldn’t be having this issue.
This business with the border is another example of them going low, and Biden and Democrats trying to keep the moral high ground.
Fuck that.
The high ground is fighting fascism.
Lincoln tried apeasment leading up to Civil War 1 and all that did was give the South time to build strength.
We just saw how bad of an idea it is to crush an insurrection slowly. And there are shit ton of examples of how well appeasing extremists works worldwide.
As soon as Abbots letter came out, Biden should have activated them under title 10, had them remove any remaining razor wire and the rest of the bullshit. If Abbott tried to move cops or a “militia”, then everyone involved should be arrested for sedation.
This isn’t normal republican bullshit from a decade ago.
This shit is as serious as conservative extremists make it. Giving in a little just emboldens them, and ignoring them does the same thing.
I say this as a veteran of the US military:
There’s a shit ton of US active military who would be willing to overthrow the government for some conservative bullshit.
We can’t underestimate them. Even if they’re idiots, they’re dangerous idiots.
I constantly tell Democrats this, and am constantly met with childish accusations of overreaction.
This country is completely fucked for the simple reason that there is literally no left wing. There is nothing to counter the unjust and illegal maneuvers fascists deploy that democrats are willing to use. It’s pathetic.
The Alt-Right Playbook is one of the best video essay series on YouTube 
You gotta counter with a “sure, but here are fair terms and conditions to have a clean break with the US”
I think they’ll turn tail when corporations realize they’ll be treated as foreign unless they relocate outside of Texas.
Because Democrats don’t go in for the same ‘Daddy Issues Politics’ that Republicans do, and Republicans will never vote for Biden?
I agree, but at the same time, watching fascists get stomped, legally or otherwise, brings me immense joy.
It does to me too, but I also understand why stomping fascists in an election year can be a bad idea.
‘Can’, of course. It may be that we get to stomp fascists and benefit from it. But I get why it may not happen.
Probably the best example of irony you’ll ever see: Texas becomes SAFER when illegal immigration increases. Sauce: https://www.pnas.org/doi/full/10.1073/pnas.2014704117
Gonna be hard to get that FEMA money Texas needs every few years once they secede.
