An Amicable Dissolution?

Some three years ago or so, I posited (on a now defunct blog) the concept that perhaps it was time for the United States to seriously consider the idea of peaceful dissolution.  Now more than ever, I am convinced that this is an idea worth considering.

The reality is not only that we are a nation deeply divided.  The political atmosphere alone should show that.  The more concerning issue, at least from my position, is that we no longer have much holding us together.

We do not really share much in common at all.  We happen to live together.  There is that.

But in reality, we are really not the same any more.  Much like a married couple that has grown distant over the years, various groups within the country have found interests far more compelling - in some cases, they have verbally said things to other members of the union that they would never say to outsiders.

Were this situation to exist in a relationship or marriage, we would urge our friends and loved ones to leave it before things got out of control.  It happens in a political entity, we simply sigh and say " Well, we are one people."

But we are not any more, not really.  We are sets of groups that define ourselves by our differences, not by our similarities.

A break up need not be angry or disastrous, you understand.  Countries in recent memory have done so peaceably - The Czech Republic and Slovakia, for example, or even the greater separation of Scotland from Great Britain.  These were peaceable enough separations.  Sure, there would be disruption and undoubtedly many people would choose to relocate to a place which more reflected their political and social views - but ultimately would not everyone be happier if this was the case?

I do not have specifics, of course.  No sense in trying to plan for something that has never been done this way before.  What size political entity would choose, for example?  What would we do with the debt we all accumulated as well as the assets to be disposed of?  What do we do about things in which we may still share an interest, such as defense?  All legitimate questions of course - but no different than questions that any married union seeking divorce has to resolve or any dissolving business has to confront.  These are not new problems, this separation after being together - we have at least 40 years worth of experience of doing it on the individual level.  We just need to apply that to the nation-state level.

People may think me crazy of course, or even foolish or dangerous.  But they should ask themselves:  Have you dealt with people that have been in a marriage in which each hated the other?  How did that work?  Were they happy?

And did you wonder why they did not try to make themselves be?