My "yes" is based on the assumption that no economic alternative to petroleum is found. Given the deterioration of the country's public transport infrastructure, without cheap, prevalent personal transportation, and with communication becoming more expensive because of energy/plastics costs, it would be impractical to keep a country that physical size together.
The people I've seen talking about it seem to think that the liberalisation of some states, and the rise of the Tea Party in others means that a split is inevitable.
Ah, the old "United States of Canada"/"Jesusland" map made flesh. Can see the working behind it but can't see it in practice; the likes of Rand Paul, Rich Lott and Christine O'Donnell could barely run a bath, let alone a country.
Also, the confederacy was a shitload more organized than the Tea Party people are today and they couldn't pull a split off.
The tea party people will face similar problems as the confederates. Manufacturing is still centered around the liberal sections of the country, which means that they have the ability to manufacture weapons in far greater numbers than the people who would like to not be a part of "Liberal Washington."
Agricultural states versus industrial states is a losing war for the agristates.
But what if the liberal states evicted the nuts....?
If we let them become a separate country they could charge us import taxes on fruit and vegetables and cotton and other agriproducts that we are used to getting dirt cheap.
Re: But what if the liberal states evicted the nuts....?
Canada's even colder and less fruit friendly than the Northeast, Mexico would be between us and them and it costs a lot more money to bring fruit and veg across an ocean than to drive it up Highway 9.
Re: But what if the liberal states evicted the nuts....?
Lots of food comes from California, and most of the grain comes from states that could go either way. The only thing that I see being a major loss is oil.
I thought that was what you meant. If a split *does* happen, then it will probably break down along those lines, but that political split has *always* been there - it's still essentially the old slave states against the rest. The levels of patriotism, and the love on all sides for what they perceive as the *idea* of 'America' (though the two groups see that idea totally differently) is so ludicrously high over there compared to any other Western industrialised country, that I don't see it. Both sides essentially see the other side as 'traitors' and see themselves as 'fighting for the soul of America' - *they're* not going to split away because *they're* the *real* Americans. "Let the other side split if they want to, but we're staying American!" The only possible exceptions I can see are Alaska and Texas, both somewhat special cases...
those tea party people are talking out of both sides of their mouth, decrying government on one hand and receiving every possible handout with the other.
You want an anti-government believer, go find a religious colony member. Otherwise, can it.
mm. Several Rep. Senators actively decried Obama's bailout while accepting 97% of the money. The one notable exception was unemployment benefits. because, y'know, people who have nothing deserve nothing... right?
An alternative might just be that the norm becomes that people travel just within their own state. Countries of a fair size (and empires of enormous size) existed before the steam train; it was just a given that most people didn't move far from home. The US might get more federal, but poor communications aren't a reason (in themselves) for fragmentation.
True. But those old empires were also based on technologies and skills that don't really exist now - for example the huge number of horses in existence then compared to now - which allowed a greater amount of movement and communication than would be possible in a hypothetical post-oil society which hadn't bothered to adapt until it was too late.
Not very long. There are ~7 million horses in the States atm (depending on which figures you look at) and one census from 1867 lists the number of domestic horses at 8 million. There was an increase in domestic horses until 1915 where it peaked at 21.5, and then declined again after the introduction at the automobile. But assuming a significant portion of those are breeding age, you could breed a pretty large increase in usable horses less than a decade.
Yeah. I'm pretty sure that a post-oil Texas is pretty screwed no matter what, though. The lack of air-conditioning alone would make it essentially uninhabitable...
Taking 1960 as a rough starting point for "when air conditioning became fairly prevalent", Texas' population doubled between then and 2000, while the population of the US as a whole increased by a little under 60%. In the last fifty years there has been a mass migration southwards in the US, and that's been in large part because air-conditioning has made the heat bearable for people who otherwise couldn't tolerate it. It wouldn't be literally uninhabitable - very few places are - but it would be a lot less pleasant, and many fewer people would live there...
The air-conditioning thing is actually a big reason for the increased North-South tensions and the rise of the Republicans in the South.
“If we could travel back to 2000 and have each state vote red or blue just as it did that year but with the relative populations and electoral votes distributed among states as they had been in the 1950s (before the big southward migration) Democrat Al Gore would defeat Republican George W. Bush by 18 electoral votes instead of losing by three.”
I am informed [but have no idea how to fact-check] that existing oilwells could have their outputs drastically increased by washing them out with liquid CO2 - that stuff we're so keen to get rid of. Oilwells are currently flushed with cold water. You will already be aware how effective that is if you've every tried to wash anything vaguely oily.
this does not currently happen for various reasons, the most pressing of which is the glorious idiocy of mankind [though I must declare that I utterly fucking despise the entire fossil fuel industry and hate cars with a furious passion]
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I hope I'm wrong though, for many, many reasons.
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The tea party people will face similar problems as the confederates. Manufacturing is still centered around the liberal sections of the country, which means that they have the ability to manufacture weapons in far greater numbers than the people who would like to not be a part of "Liberal Washington."
Agricultural states versus industrial states is a losing war for the agristates.
But what if the liberal states evicted the nuts....?
Re: But what if the liberal states evicted the nuts....?
If we let them become a separate country they could charge us import taxes on fruit and vegetables and cotton and other agriproducts that we are used to getting dirt cheap.
Re: But what if the liberal states evicted the nuts....?
Re: But what if the liberal states evicted the nuts....?
Canada's even colder and less fruit friendly than the Northeast, Mexico would be between us and them and it costs a lot more money to bring fruit and veg across an ocean than to drive it up Highway 9.
Re: But what if the liberal states evicted the nuts....?
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The levels of patriotism, and the love on all sides for what they perceive as the *idea* of 'America' (though the two groups see that idea totally differently) is so ludicrously high over there compared to any other Western industrialised country, that I don't see it. Both sides essentially see the other side as 'traitors' and see themselves as 'fighting for the soul of America' - *they're* not going to split away because *they're* the *real* Americans. "Let the other side split if they want to, but we're staying American!"
The only possible exceptions I can see are Alaska and Texas, both somewhat special cases...
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One would assume Austin would become some sort of exclave of liberalism...
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You want an anti-government believer, go find a religious colony member. Otherwise, can it.
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because, y'know, people who have nothing deserve nothing... right?
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It wouldn't be literally uninhabitable - very few places are - but it would be a lot less pleasant, and many fewer people would live there...
The air-conditioning thing is actually a big reason for the increased North-South tensions and the rise of the Republicans in the South.
See for example http://globetrotter.berkeley.edu/people2/Polsby/polsby-con4.html , http://www.lasvegasweekly.com/news/2010/jul/08/cold-truth/
“If we could travel back to 2000 and have each state vote red or blue just as it did that year but with the relative populations and electoral votes distributed among states as they had been in the 1950s (before the big southward migration) Democrat Al Gore would defeat Republican George W. Bush by 18 electoral votes instead of losing by three.”
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Oilwells are currently flushed with cold water. You will already be aware how effective that is if you've every tried to wash anything vaguely oily.
this does not currently happen for various reasons, the most pressing of which is the glorious idiocy of mankind
[though I must declare that I utterly fucking despise the entire fossil fuel industry and hate cars with a furious passion]