Ugh, secession

Sorry for writing so much today, this is what happens when I only have half of my morning class and then half of my afternoon class. Lots of time. Anyway, secession.

I had thought that this nonsense was pretty much over, and it was no longer an issue. But CNN.com has an interview up with Ron Paul where he says secession is American and a whole lot of other nauseating garbage.

Look, I don’t care if the 13 colonies seceded from Great Britain, that doesn’t make secession American. Remember that whole Civil War thing? I think that established, pretty much unequivocally that secession wasn’t cool. Same with nullification, not allowed. That’s not how federalism works.

I don’t understand how people can justify this by saying that the government is doing all sorts of terrible things and, as Gov. Perry said, “thumbing its nose at the American people.” Someone needs to explain that to me. President Obama has been in office for like three months, not even 100 days yet, after winning the Presidency by a pretty wide margin. And he’s got pretty strong approval ratings. Seems to me he’s doing what the majority of the American people want. The only people at whom the government is “thumbing its nose” is a group of right wing conservatives still bitter from November.

And, Daniel Webster:

I have not allowed myself, Sir, to look beyond the Union, to see what might lie hidden in the dark recess behind. I have not coolly weighed the chances of preserving liberty when the bonds that unite us together shall be broken asunder. I have not accustomed myself to hang over the precipice of disunion, to see whether, with my short sight, I can fathom the depth of the abyss below; nor could I regard him as a safe counselor in the affairs of this government, whose thoughts should be mainly bent on considering, not how the Union may be best preserved, but how tolerable might be the condition of the people when it should be broken up and destroyed. While the Union lasts, we have high, exciting, gratifying prospects spread out before us and our children. Beyond that I seek not to penetrate the veil. God grant that in my day, at least, that curtain may not rise! God grant that on my vision never may be opened what lies behind! When my eyes shall be turned to behold for the last time the sun in heaven, may I not see him shining on the broken and dishonored fragments of a once glorious Union; on States dissevered, discordant, belligerent; on a land rent with civil feuds, or drenched, it may be, in fraternal blood! Let their last feeble and lingering glance rather behold the gorgeous ensign of the republic, now known and honored throughout the earth, still full high advanced, its arms and trophies streaming in their original luster, not a stripe erased or polluted, not a single star obscured, bearing for its motto, no such miserable interrogatory as "What is all this worth?" nor those other words of delusion and folly, "Liberty first and Union afterwards"; but everywhere, spread all over in characters of living light, blazing on all it sample folds, as they float over the sea and over the land, and in every wind under the whole heavens, that other sentiment, dear to every true American heart, - Liberty and Union, now and for ever, one and inseparable!