Would you vote for Calexit?

[CavLancer]

No need to pay for using Cali/Hawaii bases with Alaska/Guam and the other places including foreign Tims.

Valka, I'm pretty sure that makes plate tectonics illegal too.

 

[CavLancer]

What the heck to call a nation comprising Cali, Oregon, Washington and Hawaii?

 

[Timsup2nothin]

No need to pay for using Cali/Hawaii bases with Alaska/Guam and the other places including foreign Tims.

LOL...as someone who served out of San Diego, Pearl, and Bremerton and at one point spent a seemingly endless port call in Adak Alaska with a tiger team flown in from Pearl doing the work I can say with some authority that yes, there is a serious need. You might be able to beef up Guam and Adak by the end of a twenty year lease to a point where you could do without ONE of those three...maybe.

 

[Valka D'Ur]

Valka, I'm pretty sure that makes plate tectonics illegal too.

The interesting thing about plate tectonics is that it will happen without any regard whatsoever of what humans may prefer.

 

[Timsup2nothin]

What the heck to call a nation comprising Cali, Oregon, Washington and Hawaii?

Someone said Pacifica, and I quite like that.

 

[Timsup2nothin]

The interesting thing about plate tectonics is that it will happen without any regard whatsoever of what humans may prefer.

Another really interesting thing about plate tectonics is that the whole "California departing the US" line displays a complete lack of concern for how it actually works. The plate boundary is pushing California INTO North America, not pulling it away.

 

[whyidie]

West coast could pull it off easily. Add the east coast and it would be game over for those left behind.

Space would be the primary problem. Ton of migrants. Think of the poor souls who wouldn't be able to get out.

That and all that open space in the middle of the country would be sold off to Chinese/Russian interests. It'd be Bay of Pigs all over again.

Should they ? Of course not. Millions in red states voted for Clinton.

Start with the A's (Alabama, Arkansas, Arizona) and you're already at 2million+.

Or take the 3 states that had the largest % of votes for Trump. WV, OK, WYO came in at 26%, 22%, and 29% for Clinton. Take those people and put them in the same town and they become the 5th largest city in California with a population of 663,194. Right behind San Francisco.

This is progress folks. We're coming off consecutive terms of Barak Obama for cripes sake. Barak Hussein Obama.

51 years removed from the voting rights act. 49 years from interracial marriage being off the books. We ain't there yet. We may take a step (or two) back. But this country, even in the reddest of states, is going in the right direction.

 

[Hygro]

Would California be ok financially as in independent state? Yes. California "GDP" is somewhere in the 2TN range iirc which puts it somewhere around what Italy does. Should California do it? No. For one it's illegal to do so. For two the Democratic Party and therefore America would be even more ****ed than it already is without California's 55 electoral votes, and for three it's a pretty weak move, dude. What coward cuts and runs the instant things get tough? That ain't American, and it ain't Californian neither.

All of this except it'd also be rad and that's enough.

 

[Bootstoots]

Oregon is already working on a ballot initiative, so California won't be going alone.

The comparison to the southern secession is interesting, but it breaks down at the stupidity level. The north needed the lock on southern cotton that a united country gave them. They knew it, so they wouldn't let go. California is the economic engine that provides the wealth that keeps the dim and destitute afloat, but the dim and destitute are stupid and don't understand reality. They can easily be manipulated into "better off without you, so go." The only problem will be that when the RSA (Remaining States of America) realize that letting 10% of the population leave with 20% of GDP was a really stupid play they will likely go to war after the fact.

But under what conditions would the national security apparatus, including the military - which as you know is full of US soldiers from all over the country and has numerous bases of great importance in California - ever begin to entertain allowing this? I can imagine a bunch of yokels somewhere thinking this would be great, and I could imagine the presidential Twitter account making some ill-considered 3 AM comment like this during the next four years, but the actual structures of power would not allow it.

 

[Smellincoffee]

California doesn't have the cojones. Texas, on the other hand...

 

[Hygro]

If we don't shoot them they can't shoot us.

This trick also works with sight.

 

[Timsup2nothin]

But under what conditions would the national security apparatus, including the military - which as you know is full of US soldiers from all over the country and has numerous bases of great importance in California - ever begin to entertain allowing this? I can imagine a bunch of yokels somewhere thinking this would be great, and I could imagine the presidential Twitter account making some ill-considered 3 AM comment like this during the next four years, but the actual structures of power would not allow it.

You do realize that absolutely no one, anywhere, expected a bloodless dissolution of the USSR...but it happened. The military got sorted out. The individual republics squabbled about details. Questions of currency were asked and answered. It works out.

 

[Timsup2nothin]

West coast could pull it off easily. Add the east coast and it would be game over for those left behind.

Space would be the primary problem. Ton of migrants. Think of the poor souls who wouldn't be able to get out.

That and all that open space in the middle of the country would be sold off to Chinese/Russian interests. It'd be Bay of Pigs all over again.

Should they ? Of course not. Millions in red states voted for Clinton.

And millions of Californians voted for Trump.

I would expect that the border would be pretty open and a lot of migration would occur both ways. And there is plenty of room in California, even if no one left.

 

[Berzerker]

Cali's economy would suffer as imports seek other entry

 

[whyidie]

And millions of Californians voted for Trump.

I would expect that the border would be pretty open and a lot of migration would occur both ways. And there is plenty of room in California, even if no one left.

I have a hard time believing more people would leave than would come in. People with the ways and means are already gone considering the disparity in real estate values. The only way the Remainder States could hope to compete would be modern day equivalent of the Homestead Acts.

 

[CavLancer]

Maybe Oregon would not join Cali, we Oregonians know they would steal our water and landscape out trees out of existence. Every time a Californian buys a house they cut down all the trees. Then winters come and it starts raining and they move back leaving nothing but desolation. Seen this so many times...

 

[GoodEnoughForMe]

I voted "no" simply because one day I want to live in LA even though I know deep down I will never, ever be able to afford it.

 

[Bootstoots]

You do realize that absolutely no one, anywhere, expected a bloodless dissolution of the USSR...but it happened. The military got sorted out. The individual republics squabbled about details. Questions of currency were asked and answered. It works out.

Sure, it's not a thing that is actually impossible, looking at history. As I think certain people (*cough* Sam Wang *cough*) have realized, prediction is hard, especially about the future. In the USSR's case, it involved a central leadership just kind of losing its will to hold everything together after an embarrassingly failed hardline coup attempt. Something like that could possibly happen, but I wouldn't count on it.

The West Coast states in particular are extremely divided between the actual West Coast, a band along the immediate Pacific shore stretching inland roughly 100 miles at most, and a large, rugged (except the Central Valley) inland region with lots of people who are more similar to the rest of the interior West than to the coast. Those places don't like being ruled by the coast anyway, and they have enough weapons and rugged terrain to carry on a sustained and very annoying insurgency.

The breakup of the USSR wasn't entirely bloodless but involved quite a few internal conflicts in breakaway countries and in Chechnya, along with an extremely severe (~50% of GDP) economic depression exacerbated by poor economic policies and corruption, but caused in large part by the collapse itself. In this case, the circumstances are very different, but can you imagine the business headaches? Even a peaceful breakup would leave California with rather less of a GDP than it has now. All your brilliant venture capitalists and other silicon-encrusted investors would not be happy.

 

[warpus]

Calexit is an okay name.

How about Calout?
Or Calescape.
Calscram
Calsplit

Those all suck.
I got it

Caleave

 

[Sonereal]

Lets say Califonia actually were to leave the Union, would it be a viable country? What would the effect be on the rest of the nation? I think they might actually be willing to go along with this actually... What would the seat of government be? Hollywood?

I'm just going to give opinions on these questions because the thread's gone off on a few different tangents.

I do believe that California could be a viable country with a few caveats. California benefits heavily from being in the United States because the USA is effectively a giant common market.

The effect on the rest of the nation, should California attempt to secede, would likely be anger. Secessionism isn't something the United States has historically been a lover of within its own borders. I don't believe this will be an issue, because I don't believe Californians really want to be their own country.

The seat of government would be Sacramento. Lets not be silly.