The Jokes Write Themselves These

The Jokes Write Themselves These Days - G. Pascal Zachary thinks the Bay Area should secede from the Union:

"We, the people of the Bay Area, need to leave the United States. We are held prisoner by a foreign power, colonized by an alien civilization. We require cultural and social self-determination. We demand, in short, a declaration of independence -- and our own nation."

It's hilarious. No, not in that intentional, Scrappleface kind of way. No, this is very different:

Maybe Lincoln would have been an even greater president if he had let the South leave the Union in 1861. In the absence of Southern racists in Congress, the North would have become an industrial democracy of the European sort. American global power would have been moderated, humanized and democratized -- because urban voters in the industrial cities of Pittsburgh, Chicago and New York would have insisted on solidarity with workers of the world. Our roster of presidents would have included the populist William Jennings Bryan, the Socialist Eugene Debs and the one-worlder Henry Wallace. A more compact, social-democratic America would have still struggled mightily with the legacy of slavery and discrimination against African Americans, but a movement for racial equality would have begun decades earlier.

"Slavery, Schmavery - we could have had socialized health care!

Might the liberation of the Bay Area unlock similar positive change? Think of the model social legislation that a Bay Nation could enact: bans on guns altogether, full legalization of same-sex unions, an expansion of public television and radio, complete decriminalization of marijuana, basic health care for all, environmental protections that would be the envy of North America.

I just can't add anything. What'd be the point?

Hesiod has met his match.

UPDATE: And then, when I think I can't find anything as wierd as the above, I run into this via Sullivan; Edward Asner talks about his admiration for Joseph Stalin, to Ed McCulloch in WorldNetDaily:

"I think Joe Stalin was a guy that was hugely misunderstood," said Asner. "And to this day, I don't think I have ever seen an adequate job done of telling the story of Joe Stalin."

Literally - you can't make it up fast enough these days.

Posted by Mitch at October 13, 2003 06:08 AM