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[Assyrian]

To nationalize the oil fields currently in production, they would be breaking the contracts that the international corporations hold - in effect, Louisiana would have to steal the oil from its current owners. If they tried to sell this confiscated crude on the open international market, they would be sued.

How would the ordinary Louisianians benefit? By redistributing the profits from nationalized resources?

It seems to work ok for the ordinary people in Venezuela.

 

[TeddyReceptus]

All of which they pay for in federal taxation. Washington D. C. does not have a magic money tree - despite all the well-wishing of the left

Louisiana receives something like $1.15 for every $1 they pay into the system.

And of course the next big hurricane that hits NO directly like Katrina will require additional billions of dollars which Louisiana doesn't exactly have on hand. They will be calling the Federal Government immediately for help.

If I were still living in Louisiana I think I'd become friendlier with the Federal gov't. They stand to lose a lot when the weather turns bad.

And tropical diseases.

 

[Creech]

Red states are generally more welfare states than blue states, which is particularly ironic given their penchant for complaining about socialism. So as someone living in a blue state, by all means, go away and stop mooching. More money/less taxes for the rest of us.

Actually, maybe that explains the US political system! Those living in the blue states rightfully feel like they don't get enough from the government, which is why they want more government spending (on them), whereas those living in red states actually see people getting way too much money from the government all around them, which is why they want to cut government spending (and we should, on those states)

Actually, there is a large amount of ghetto communities that cause many red states to have far lower economies and education. The people that cause red states to be poor in many areas vote blue, not red.

 

[TerranceL]

Yes sir We do have a problem...

And with Mexico, they'd be more than justified in getting it back on a myriad of fronts when considering the ways it was aquired as other states were.

Really? When texas was made part of the union it was an independent country.

 

[Rion]

Really? When texas was made part of the union it was an independent country.

Stop using history like that!

 

[Dracil]

Actually, there is a large amount of ghetto communities that cause many red states to have far lower economies and education. The people that cause red states to be poor in many areas vote blue, not red.

Interesting

I don't dispute that there are probably many ghetto communities in red states though, but those who are poor tend to also have lower voting turnouts and thus less influence than you think in elections. If *everyone* actually voted in Texas, it would be a blue state.

 

[Rion]

Interesting

I don't dispute that there are probably many ghetto communities in red states though, but those who are poor tend to also have lower voting turnouts and thus less influence than you think in elections. If *everyone* actually voted in Texas, it would be a blue state.

Correlation does not imply causation - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

[Gxg (G²)]

Really? When texas was made part of the union it was an independent country.

Texas, prior to being independent, also had a lot of issues in the background that as it concerns double-dealings in order to aquire it as a state and make it a part of the U.S....and the history was never beneficial for First Nations groups when studying history. Internal politics of the Republic were based on the conflict between two factions. The nationalist faction, led by Lamar, advocated the continued independence of Texas, the expulsion of the Native Americans, and the expansion of Texas to the Pacific Ocean. Their opponents, led by Houston, advocated the annexation of Texas to the United States and peaceful coexistence with Native Americans. The Texas Congress even passed a resolution over Houston's veto claiming the Californias for Texas. The 1844 presidential election split dramatically, with the newer western regions of the Republic preferring the nationalist candidate Edward Burleson, while the cotton country, particularly east of the Trinity River, went for Anson Jones. Although Texas governed itself, Mexico refused to recognize its independence

Stop using history like that!

As it concerns using history badly, indeed...there needs to be a ceasing of that on the part of the poster talking of Texas being independent as if that makes a lick of difference in the concept of having land stolen from Hispanics.

Prayerfully, you can do better than this in argument.

 

[serge546]

I'm not from the South, but southerns have separate culture, traditions, and civilization then the North.

I'm from the south. I get along just fine with my professors from New Jersey and New York. We have differences but I don't cry about them and demand a separate biology department because of them.

 

[Rion]

Texas, prior to being independent, also had a lot of issues in the background that as it concerns double-dealings in order to aquire it as a state and make it a part of the U.S....and the history was never beneficial for First Nations groups when studying history. Internal politics of the Republic were based on the conflict between two factions. The nationalist faction, led by Lamar, advocated the continued independence of Texas, the expulsion of the Native Americans, and the expansion of Texas to the Pacific Ocean. Their opponents, led by Houston, advocated the annexation of Texas to the United States and peaceful coexistence with Native Americans. The Texas Congress even passed a resolution over Houston's veto claiming the Californias for Texas. The 1844 presidential election split dramatically, with the newer western regions of the Republic preferring the nationalist candidate Edward Burleson, while the cotton country, particularly east of the Trinity River, went for Anson Jones. Although Texas governed itself, Mexico refused to recognize its independence

...and? England refused to recognize our independence.

 

[TerranceL]

Interesting

I don't dispute that there are probably many ghetto communities in red states though, but those who are poor tend to also have lower voting turnouts and thus less influence than you think in elections. If *everyone* actually voted in Texas, it would be a blue state.

LOL

It's 2004 all over again!

You guys do know it's not all that hard to get a college degree now right?

IQ by State in 2004 Election

 

[Rion]

I love the conclusion:

a. There is no discernible intelligence difference between Bush voters and Kerry voters.
b. Kerry supporters who insist that Bush voters are "dumb," and who point out as evidence state-by-state IQ scores, are engaging in behavior that could be construed as racially inflammatory.

 

[Gxg (G²)]

...and? England refused to recognize our independence.

So? Minus the fact that your independence came at the expense of Native Americans whose sovereignty wasn't recognized when genocide was enacted upon them by settlers colonizing the land and removing them in order to set up what England wanted to take, Englanad is not something that was annexed to the U.S. Texas was, with many of the dealings for making it independent never being just.

Period.

Trying to argue about England not recognizing independence (poor argument as it is), is like seeing a country taking over another land that was supposedly "independent" even though the indepenence was already done without accuracy and by stealing - with the people who had things from them stolen never recognized once the land, valuable as it is, is taken. For those who are First Nations groups and Hispanics, it's why the discussion is idiotic whenever people talk of "Well, Texas was independent" and ignore the many who were wiped out to make it as such to begin with - alongside the others eradicated when it came to Manifest Destiny and many others taken out as the SOuthWest was taken up by the U.S with Texas being a step to that once settlers managed to go in/dominant and try independence only to give into the U.S. It'd be similar to having money stolen from a community/given to rich elites who argue amongst it before having that money taken over by another large corporation ...and the moment the ones originally having money (alongside lives taken to get it ) complain, people try to say "Well it was used by people who are free!".....as if that addresses anything remotely.

There's a reason Abraham Lincoln called the war "unconstitutional"...despite what James K. Polk felt.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vKNZfBOVgJA
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g9k3hJOlOiY

As another noted best:

Mexico lost much of its territory in the war, leaving it with a lasting bitterness towards the United States. Santa Anna fled to exile in Venezuela. General Porfirio Díaz, President of Mexico from 1877–1911, would later lament: "¡Pobre México! Tan lejos de Dios, y tan cerca de los Estados Unidos." ("Poor Mexico! So far from God, and so close to the United States."). In the United States, victory in the war brought a surge in patriotism as the acquisition of new western lands – the country had also acquired the southern half of the Oregon Country in 1846 – seemed to fulfill citizens' belief in their country's Manifest Destiny. While Ralph Waldo Emerson rejected war "as a means of achieving America's destiny," he accepted that "most of the great results of history are brought about by discreditable means." The war made a national hero of Zachary Taylor, a Southern Whig, who was elected president in the election of 1848.​

However, this period of national euphoria would not last long. The war had been widely supported in the southern states but largely opposed in the northern states. This division largely developed from expectations of how the expansion of the United States would affect the issue of slavery. At the time, Texas recognized the institution of slavery, but Mexico did not. Many Northern abolitionists viewed the war as an attempt by the slave-owners to expand slavery and assure their continued influence in the federal government. Henry David Thoreau wrote his essay Civil Disobedience and refused to pay taxes because of this war.​

The main issue which furthered sectionalism was the expansion of slavery into the national territories. The Missouri Compromise of 1820 banned slavery in national territories north of 36 degrees, 30 minutes (roughly the southern border of Missouri, although that state had been exempted). Also, the Senate was constructed to give equal balance to slave and free states. The Missouri Compromise, however, left room for more free states than slave states and, if continued, would upset the balance of power within the Senate. Thus, many Southerners supported the war to provide more room for slavery to expand (believing that if slavery were not allowed to continue to expand, it would ultimately die out). There were proposals during this time to split Texas (which was easily the largest state in the Union geographically) into multiple slave states, but this did not come to pass.​

There's no escaping the fact that the U.S-Mexican War was connected deeply to the expansion of slavery. If we're going to speak of history, deal with history..but don't talk of it with arguments that don't come close to addressing it. Thus far, what has been shared in insulting to Hispanics and Native Americans when talking of independence as if nothing was taken wrongfully

• Mexican War
• The Hispanic Experience - Stolen Birthright
• The War Between the United States and Mexico - PBS
• Consequences of the Mexican War « The Historic Present
• The U.S.-Mexican War . The Aftermath of War . A War of Violence
• Reclaiming Their Stolen Birthright – Mexicans in the American Southwest

 

[Gxg (G²)]

To nationalize the oil fields currently in production, they would be breaking the contracts that the international corporations hold - in effect, Louisiana would have to steal the oil from its current owners. If they tried to sell this confiscated crude on the open international market, they would be sued.

There'd really be a myriad of problems with Louisiana trying to do its own thing with that which doesn't belong to them..

 

[TerranceL]

So? Englanad is not something that was annexed to the U.S. Texas was, with many of the dealings for making it independent never being just. Period.

You purposefully miss the point.

It doesn't matter that Mexico didn't recognize our independence.

To recognize our independence is to say were free of them and they naturally didn't want that.

 

[Gxg (G²)]

You purposefully miss the point.
.

Nothing purposefully done, as if you know intent. And you obfusticated and ignored the context of what was said when it came to avoiding history. For Texas being "independent" has nothing remotely to do with showing that land was not stolen from Mexico or taken justly when the U.S took it...unless, of course, one advocates for the mindset that Manifest Destiny advocated in saying all things regarding aggressive land policy (alongside settlers from the U.S colonies going into the SOuthwestern territory of Mexico/taking it over to become independent before assimilating was not a big deal). There was also the reality of how many slaves also went southwest at one point to escape slavery in the South and they wanted to live in peace since it was territory they didn't get harrassed in...but many of the Southern States had others wanting to go into it/make it a territory for themselves even though the slaves (alongside Native Americans sent there amongst the Mexicans) were present already.

The book "Black Indians" by William Katz is one of the best addressments on the issue around. Although there were many Native Americans who had already been forced out of the south/other areas colonized and forced to relocate out west on reservations (many dying in the process of the journey)m there were others present in the west who had never encountered settlers. ....and this was significant in light of the battles happening in southern territories against both blacks/Native Americans who held their ground. Black Seminoles are one group that comes to mind amongst many others - with people like the legendary resistance fighter Billy Bowlegs II (1810–64) being one prominent example amongst many. The Seminoles were a union of Southeastern Indian peoples—especially Creeks—who had lost their lands to English colonists and moved into Spanish-controlled Florida, along with independent communities of escaped black slaves, who became known as Black Seminoles. John Horse was a powerful figure in the war that the Seminoles waged with the United States to fend off forced removal from Florida to Oklahoma. Unwilling to accept a restricted life of defeat in Indian Territory, he led a band of Black Seminoles into Mexico, where he died in 1882. There were, of course, many others who resisted/fought when it came to Indian removal...

As William Katz wisely noted, almost all of the slaves who sought the protection of the Seminoles in Florida also left with them for Oklahoma when that was opened up. Many of their descendants are there today, organized as "Freedmen's Bands," and still living under the aegis of the Seminole Nation of Oklahoma. A few, who left Oklahoma in 1849 with the famous Florida warrior, Cowák:cuchî or Wild Cat, to fight other Indians in Mexico, returned to Texas and their descendants now live in the tiny town of Bracketville, near the Mexican border.” As Katz explains, Wild Cat led the offshoot Seminoles into Mexico because politically the pro slavery group held sway in Oklahoma in 1849 even though it was originally an area many blacks had fled to/hoped to gain dominance so that slavery wouldn't be so powerful. They were so effective in helping the Mexican President Santa Ana to police the Rio Grande border that the U.S. army sent Captain Frank Perry to negotiate the black Seminoles crossing into Texas in 1870. In return for their young men pacifying the previously uncontrollable Comanche, Kiowa, Apache, United States and Mexican bandits along the United States side of the border, the Seminoles were promised, ”food, necessities and, eventually, good farming land.” ( page 76) “Seminoles remembered signing this ‘treaty’ with Perry, but the piece of paper, which soon became a bone of contention, disappeared. (page 78).

Although many who went to Mexico were blacks/slaves and Natives seeking freedom from colonial expansion, there were MANY men/women in great numbers who moved to the Texas territory as colonizers who came in search of wealth and adventure, eager to grab up the land Mexico was handing out by the acre. To those in the U.S colonies, as far as they were concerned, Mexico and anything West was up for grabs and simply needing to be cultivated...and in doing so, they agreed to convert to Catholicism and become Mexican citizens. Few did either. Once in Texas, they also realized there was much money to be made in Mexico's cotton industry. Their problem of labor involved was quickly solved through slavery which Mexico had banned.

Shocked by the rapidly rising rate of white immigration and disgusted by their use of slavery, the Mexican government started slapping on restrictions, which were ignored. The battle of the Alamo was fought over issues like Federalism, slavery, immigration rights, the cotton industry and above all, money. General Santa Ana arrived at San Antonio; his Mexican army with some justice regarded the Texans as murderous barbarians. Many of the American settlers ("Texians" they were called) were Southerners who believed in and practiced slavery. ..with them, again, seeing expansion west as a means of promoting their livelihood of slavery..

Through a series of battles on April 21, 1836 Santa Anna's force of about 1,200 was over-run in broad daylight by a sudden attack on its camp by Sam Houston's entire Texan force, then numbering 918. With the Texan camp only about a mile away over open terrain, Santa Anna had apparently posted no sentinels before retiring for a siesta and letting his tired troops do the same. The Texans lost nine dead and 30 wounded. Houston, who led from the front, lost two horses and was shot in the foot.

Santa Anna, captured the next day in the bushes, agreed to recognize Texas independence and ordered all Mexican forces to evacuate the lone star state. And as said before, it was anything but "just" in the way things were taken.

• Indians of the Dakotas
• Black Women of the Old West
• USII 4a Part 2 Native Americans</DIV>
• BSRM Book Review - The Black West
• Black Seminoles -- Gullahs Who Escaped From Slavery</DIV>
• Indian Nations of Texas - Indian Relations in Texas - Texas State
• First Black President In North America Led Mexico 173 Years Ago
• colonial mexico and independence | colonisation | society | mission ...
• North America's 1st Black President? 100 Amazing Facts About the Negro
• The Black West: A Documentary and Pictoral History of the African ... - Page 103
• Escaping to Destinations South: Keynote address at the 2012 Undergound Railroad Conference

It doesn't matter that Mexico didn't recognize our independence. TO recognize our independence is to say were free of them and they naturally didn't want that

Incorrect--and one would have to ignore where other U.S presidents already spoke out on the issue to say otherwise. Again, if one wishes to support the error of Manifest Destiny, they're free to do so....but again, it's an insult to Hispanics as well as Native Americans who were considered to be in the crossfire/collateral damage to the cause of gaining land and saying it was "independent"...

 

[USincognito]

I think the majority are just trolling the WH with their stupid petition page. When it was first started, a lot of people used it for crazy things. *shrug*

https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/pe...l-2012-heisman-memorial-trophy-award/yJRHMzzB

Even some of the sillier ones are done quite well from a parliamentary perspective.

 

[TerranceL]

Nothing purposefully done, as if you know intent. And you obfusticated and ignored the context of what was said when it came to avoiding history.

Considering how many times you edited your post, yeah I wasn't able to comment on stuff you went back later and added.

I do find it telling that neither of your article is written by an actual historian.

I also find it curious that with all the wailing about the stolen birthright ignored the hispanics who fought for Texan independence also.

You behave as if the Texan revolution was done for no reason.

Texas Revolution - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Texans were becoming increasingly disillusioned with the Mexican government. Many of the Mexican soldiers garrisoned in Texas were convicted criminals who were given the choice of prison or serving in the army in Texas. Many Texians were also unhappy with the location of their state capital, which moved periodically between Saltillo and Monclova, both of which were in southern Coahuila, some 500 miles (800 km) away; they wanted Texas to be a separate state from Coahuila (but not independent from Mexico) and to have its own capital.[15]
The other interest of the Texans was representation of their interests in the government. They believed a closer location for the capital would help to stem corruption and facilitate other matters of government.[citation needed] Texans continued to lobby to overturn the laws of 1830. In April 1833, settlers called a convention to discuss proposed changes in immigration, judicial, and other political policies. The delegates also advocated separate statehood for Texas and elected Austin to carry a proposed state constitution to Mexico City. The new Mexican President, Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna, approved many of the proposals, but refused to agree to separate statehood; Austin was jailed when he wrote a letter advocating that Texans act unilaterally on statehood.[16]
In 1834, because of perceived troubles within the Mexican government, Santa Anna went through a process of dissolving state legislatures, disarming state militias, and abolishing the Constitution of 1824. He also imprisoned some cotton plantation owners who refused to raise their assigned crops, which were intended to be redistributed within Mexico instead of being exported.

Wow Lincoln called a war unconsitutional? I find that given Lincolns actions I put about as much stock in his constitutional knowledge as I do our current president.

Abraham Lincoln and Civil Liberties in Wartime

In the words of historian James G. Randall: "No president has carried the power of presidential edict and executive order (independently of Congress) so far as [Lincoln] did.... It would not be easy to state what Lincoln conceived to be the limit of his powers."5 In the 80 days that elapsed between Abraham Lincoln's April 1861 call for troops--the beginning of the Civil War--and the official convening of Congress in special session on July 4, 1861, Lincoln performed a whole series of important acts by sheer assumption of presidential power. Lincoln, without congressional approval, called forth the militia to "suppress said combinations,"6 which he ordered "to disperse and retire peacefully" to their homes.7 He increased the size of the Army and Navy, expended funds for the purchase of weapons, instituted a blockade--an act of war--and suspended the precious writ of habeas corpus, all without congressional approval.

 

[USincognito]

Make up my mind? I feel regions like the South are being dictated to by people with a whole different culture and world view. Progressives claim that they are being held back, while conservatives claim that we are falling off a cliff. Why not just leave the Union and make everyone happy?

Have you looked at the Purple maps of this country? I'm willing to bet you have people living in your city or area that fall to the left, the right and the center. You might be weighted one particular way regionally, but your view is not monolithic. In my part of Dallas, there's plenty of red staters, blue staters, centrists. In other parts the suburbs tend to be very red while the city proper runs a more blue.

It is very possible that the cohesive forces that brought people together in the last centuries are on the wane now. The USSR is dissolving Czechs and Slovaks nave disbanded, Scotland is becoming more autonomous, the Balkans have become Balkanized. Likewise, the forces that made a large America seem like a good idea at the time are starting to fray at the seams.
it is not inconceivable that something like this could catch on soon enough.

In every one of those examples you're talking about older, hetrogenous nation states cobbled together politically or by conquest dissolving. The U.S. is a relatively young, homogenous state populated by wildly diverse peoples who are here because of some basic concepts like freedom and equality before the law. Your list is not analagous at all.

 

[Gxg (G²)]

Considering how many times you edited your post, yeah I wasn't able to comment on stuff you went back later and added.

.

Considering the fact that anyone can read if they want, it's inconsequential just as it's a moot point if someone goes back/adds something in and I complain on "well you added more" - as that has nothing to do with addressing information.

I do find it telling that neither of your article is written by an actual historian

Wrong...and telling of the lack of actual understanding on history/historians, as William Katz is well known as it concerns historical research. Same with Henry Louis Gates and many others- and if you can't deal with that much, you're really about reinvisionment of U.S history and one can do that alone.

I also find it curious that with all the wailing about the stolen birthright ignored the hispanics who fought for Texan independence also

Had you read what was given, you would not have made a moot point about Hispanics fighting for Texan independence since it was already pointed out earlier where the Hispanics did their part as well. For those slaves of the colonists of the South, many were forced to fight by their owners and NOTED it, alongside the many who fought for independence so that they could be FREE from colonization/pro-slavery groups that came to dominante in Texas alongside other SOuthern States. And with Mexicans, they had their own reasons. By 1810, boldened by the American Revolution and the French Revolution, Mexicans sought their own revolution...but it'd take time. 1810-1821, the War of Independence, was very big...

Henry Louis Gates spoke in-depth on the subject in his documentary entitled "Black in Latin America" when it came to exploring the history of blacks in Mexican history..and being Black Hispanic myself, it's a big deal.

Black in Latin America E03, Mexico and Peru: The Black Grandma in the Closet

Again, others had their own reasons for fighting, some wanting things to remain as they were with Mexico ruling and hoping that the independence gained would be used to work with Mexico in alliance/mutual relatioship and honor of Hispanic culture on their terms rather than that of the whites coming over to dominate...while others were about trying to make Mexico like the other SOuthern States where Native Americans, blacks and Hispanics would be second-class. It's different than the dynamic of blacks who fought in the Civil War - with their OWN reasons for doing so that were starkly different than the majority of whites fighting (as they weren't really considered highly by them as it concerns being equals and they wanted the opportunity to have freedom - with the South promising many slaves they'd be free from slavery if they fought and the North promising the same, even though blacks/oppressed felt they were largely on their own side and caught in the middle).

Thus, again, it's a dumb point talking on "Well, we're independent" when looking at the full context of what happened...and I find it curious one has to rewrite history/ignore where many things were never done fairly. It's really another variation of Manifest Destiny mindset really..

You behave as if the Texan revolution was done for no reason.

Texas Revolution - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Incorrect, as more was already addressed...and sadly, you behave as if you don't read with real understanding. If you're gonna use resources, one can do better than going to a secondary source such as Wikipedia. And on the issue, it'd behoove you to actually study the history of Blacks who moved to the West and their actions in the entire affair. Many, alongside Hispanics and Native Americans, were content with the Mexican government since they had refuge there from what was happening in the other U.S colonies and the aggressive expansionist ideology.

Wow Lincoln called a war unconsitutional?

Yep...and so did President Grant and many others when it came to noting the actions of James Polk.

I find that given Lincolns actions I put about as much stock in his constitutional knowledge as I do our current president.

By the logic you just tried to use when pointing out Lincoln in what he did in wartime, one comes off as if they justify the Confederacy/South in their reaction and as if Lincoln did not need to do as he did during the Civil War to address the issue of states succedding from the Union over a host of issues (slavery being prominent).

Be that as it may, again, nothing you said remotely deals with the mistreatment of Hispanics and other minority groups who found refuge in Mexico and the ways the land was taken wrongfully by the U.S. That cannot be erased..