Elizabeth May suggests Cali, Oregon, Washington State join Canada or join British Columbia to form 'Cascadia'

As a resident of British Columbia, I would support this with the sole condition that we all use only the metric system.

Lulzwut

But that is where all the food comes from...

Balkanisation - except Yugoslavia becomes bigger than ever

But that would take a new constitution… Yeah, its a good that the thing that is only a couple centries old has been updated to match modern times and all.

Ironic when you consider that the people who would cry foul and act all offended the most if you ever were to suggest thinking about changing the entire constitution, have no issue with blatantly ignoring it entirely when it suits them.

Almost like the people who follow and believe in it the most are the only ones about to get mega dicked.

Gets rid of the borders which are honestly just traffic jams.

And I think more regional nationalism will be healthier for everyone. Lot of frustration seems to come with seeing someone on the other side of the country behaving in a way that you think doesn't fit in with the idea of your nationality.

I think the biggest pro for me would be that sane policies at the federal level that are broadly popular in my region could stop getting blocked by yokels representing states that sometimes barely even have the population of the semi-rural county I grew up in in the Northeast. Ditto for not having to worry about corporate interests from those same states filing frivolous lawsuits that manage to block the implementation of the odd policy that does make it through, like student loan forgiveness.

Also, I'm not above admitting that there's a great deal of appeal in the potential schadenfreude of all the "But I don't want my taxes paying for the trans, minority welfare queens getting bottom surgery! Down with any social safety net!" Republicans from the South and Midwest being forced to reckon with the fact that they have actually been the welfare queens this whole time, and it's only been by the grace of those dang liberal states paying in disproportionately high shares of taxes that get funneled towards red states that their shithole states haven't yet collapsed entirely. Let's see how Alabama fares with its whooping 1.1% of the national GDP when they no longer have federal funding to prop them up. Their top 5 employers are all public institutions that likely depend on federal funding to remain operational, and 2/5 of them are military bases. Good luck, guys, the South will fall again.

For cons, obviously it'll suck for the people who still live in those states until they finally move, but that's been the case for a long time. If the decent regions help finance the move for those who are willing to leave, but unable to for lack of money, I'm kind of fine with it. Same goes for overlooking criminal charges when people are unable to leave their state due to some BS non-violent crimes landing them on parole and being refused travel permissions. If Mississippi wants to lock you down as exploitable labor because you got pulled over with some weed, or loaned a kid a book that said gay people actually aren't the spawn of Satan sent to destroy US civilization, come on over. They can keep their sex offenders and violent criminals, though. For the folks that don't move because "Oh, but my family is here and I love them too much to move away," or similar reasons, good luck with living through the second feudal age, but that's your own choice.

Likewise, it'll be sad to see them destroy national and state parks in the name of business, as well as visiting those places while they still exist being a much riskier proposition.

Honestly, I think most red states severely underestimate how poorly things would go for them if they were to be cut loose, while overestimating the popular support they would enjoy and their international appeal as trade partners. Even for the ones who are in a relatively favorable economic opinion, like Texas, would probably see absolutely insane levels of brain drain from industry and higher education that would leave them dead in the water, barring state-sanctioned violence to prevent people from leaving.

That said, their economies would be devastated. Arizona, New Mexico, Texas, Oklahoma, Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, Tennessee, North Carolina and Kentucky would all see between 20.7%-30.7% of their overall revenues for state and local governments vanish overnight if they stopped receiving federal funding. States like New York and Texas could probably come away at a net profit just by retaining the taxes they'd previously passed on to the federal government, even factoring in how many new services would have to be provided for at the state/regional level that were previously financed by the federal government. For the states like New Mexico, Mississippi, and Alabama that manage to claw back almost all of what they contribute in federal taxes, if not get more back in federal funding, good luck. Somehow, I suspect their new, libertarian overlords in Texas aren't going to be so keen on subsidizing their impoverished neighbors to any real extent.

Stops federal government from...existing and strong arming states miles away. I know a lot of Europeans are looking at the u.s. right now and asking why we aren't pulling out guillotines, it's because 200 million Americans live west of the Mississippi. At the very best that's a 900mile journey, with the largest population center being 3k miles away. All that versus most states having their capitals centrally located, or at least within a days drive.

The other pro is that if every state just sent a representative, we wouldn't have a figurehead for massive swaths of vastly different people, we'd have a straight Congress/parliamentto represent each states interest and thats it. (My personal hot take is that having a figurehead hasn't been very beneficial to the u.s. since Washington. Like I'd even say Lincoln is debatable, not that freeing the slaves wasn't cool as shit, but that him being a figure head at that time didn't have much benifit)

It’s gonna be called the DMV because I’m pretty sure that’s the coolest metro area name in the north east.

It will become DMV City when New York City becomes connected

I second the motion to have Cleveland become part of Canada alongside New England. The rest of the state can sort itself out on it's own.

True but few are as important as CA.

California's economy is extremely dependent on being part of the USA. They barely cover the hap between money taken from the government and what they contribute and it is fairly easy to make the case they take more.

The government would not need to invade. The moment they make clear that CA farmers cannot access the Colorado river waters like they used to and that any foreign tech company is no longer able to access US DOD money you will see tech be willing to move and agriculture collapse in CA. After gutting any aide and scholarships for students attending CA schools and the USA will have crippled the top 3 industries in CA without firing a shot.

CA wouldn't be akin to France ir Italy if it left the USA it would be more like Mexico economically.

Canadians were clever enough not to enshrine gun ownership as a right in the constitution. As a result, Canadians have limited gun rights, and almost no handgun rights. Sure, having guns for hunting is pretty common, especially in rural areas. But, the idea of a gun for home defense or a gun for taking on a tyrannical government is something that never took hold in Canada.

The tech companies would relocate as the US DOD will not give any contracts to the companies that remain. CA,WA, and OR aren't going to be making a lot of money if they leave.

As someone not in these states I would support all efforts to retain Colorado. There's a fuckload of critical infrastructure the USA requires that is in CO. It's on a short list of states the USA cannot function well without- NY, CA, TX, CO, IL, and GA are all too important to the day to day functioning to let go.