More counties want to secede from Colorado

Bla-bla-bla. Call me when you have something to say. Originally Posted by JD Barleycorn
Congrats, Professor Barleycorn!

That's the most intelligent statement you've posted so far, either in this thread or the other ones in which you promoted this secession B.S.

Good luck with that. Somehow I just don't see the Colorado legislature permitting the oil and gas rich sections of Northern Colorado to leave and to take all that tax money with them. Originally Posted by ExNYer
The key point, concerning which these North Colorado secession nuts seem to be in full-blown denial. Revenue from oil and gas production is an important and increasing source of funding for the state. Can anyone conceivably imagine the legislature just letting it ride away?

And as ExNYer additionally noted, the U.S. Congress would also have to approve secession. Can you imagine the ensuing chaos if congress opened up the floodgates for this sort of stuff? Clusters of counties all over the nation would start making noises about secession, arguing that precedent should allow them the opportunity to break away at their pleasure. This whole idea may be the biggest political non-starter I've ever seen.
The counties in question set up their own shadow government, break all legal ties with Denver, and dissolve all contractual agreements. Originally Posted by JD Barleycorn
Shadow government? And how would that work exactly? Do they collect shadow taxes? Hire shadow police? Provide shadow services?

If the Colorado legislature refuses to let some sparsely populated counties secede and/or Congress also refuses to let them secede, where do they get their legal authority?

Or do they have "shadow" authority? That means they are pretty much the same as those "Republic of Texas" nuts living in trailer parks and filing liens against property from their phony courts.

What happens when folks living in those counties refused to pay them taxes? What happens when the rest of Colorado demands that sales taxes continue to be paid by stores in the seceding counties? What happens when CO state troopers continue to enforce Colorado laws in the seceding counties?

What does the shadow government do then?
Yssup Rider's Avatar
Stay in the shade?
JD Barleycorn's Avatar
I guess I have to explain something else. First shadow government is not something sinister. In England the opposition party puts together a shadow government from the top down. They elect someone that they want to be PM and cabinet officers. As events unfold they make their decisions as if they held the office. For example; the GOP "elects" Mitt Romney to become the shadow president. Every decision that Obama makes or should make a decision Romney will come out and announce his decision and policy. This way the voters have a direct comparison between those in power and those who wish they had the chance to be in power.
Now in Colorado they could do the same thing; elect a governor, state senators, state reps, etc. and go forward as the elected officials until such time as they are recognized as a sovereign state.
When did England take us back. Isn't that something to worry about like Sharia law?
I guess I have to explain something else. Originally Posted by JD Barleycorn
Yeah, that's the ticket! Just keep right on explaining stuff to us, professor.

Do you teach "shadow" courses at a "shadow" university?

Now in Colorado they could do the same thing; elect a governor, state senators, state reps, etc. and go forward as the elected officials until such time as they are recognized as a sovereign state. Originally Posted by JD Barleycorn
If you had taken a moment to learn anything about the basic rudiments of laws governing the secession process, you would obviously understand that "such time" is "never." Then you wouldn't continue serving up all this idiocy.

Perhaps the problem is that you have a "shadow" brain.

What happened to the relatively high-performance model you described in this post?

http://www.eccie.net/showpost.php?p=...6&postcount=39

Perhaps you're going to tell us that large sections of it successfully exercised their lust for liberty and seceded!
JD Barleycorn's Avatar
One of the banes of education has always been the purposely obtuse. It becomes very difficult to motivate when you don't know if it that obtuseness is genuine or faux.

Lets handle this point by point;

The "shadow government" I described exists in more than one country and it is an EXAMPLE but not the law. To believe I am describing law is near stupidity and there is no cure for stupidity.

From the outset I maintained that it is unlikely for a secession movement to succeed but not impossible. I also gave examples (backed up by another poster) where secession did happen in accordance with the laws. It is not a "high performance" model and was described as such except by you.

It is ridiculous to think a constitution would have a self destruct switch built into it but many constitutions have in their words the method and motive for a drastic change. If the northern counties use the threat of secession to call for a constitional convention or massive changes in government powers then they win. Sometimes the threat is sufficient. In 1860 the threat did not stop Lincoln from taking office as required by the U.S. Constitution.

Before you go off half cocked (that is an interesting turn of phrase by the way) do the minimum of research, a little thinking beyond the needs of your dick, and try to write without being cowardly, dull, and insulting. One of the latter three is allowable but not all three.
If the northern counties use the threat of secession to call for a constitional convention or massive changes in government powers then they win. Originally Posted by JD Barleycorn
How so?

Are you taking about a constitutional convention to change the Colorado Constitution or the US Constitution?

Because if you are talking about the US Constitution, then your idea is even crazier. The Northern Colorado movement can't win a popular vote in Colorado, so how are they going to win one nationwide?

Why would anyone - including conservatives - want to overhaul the US Constitution just because the northern counties of Colorado want to keep oil and gas revenues for themselves instead of sharing it with the rest of the state?
Before you go off half cocked (that is an interesting turn of phrase by the way) do the minimum of research, a little thinking beyond the needs of your dick, and try to write without being cowardly, dull, and insulting. One of the latter three is allowable but not all three. Originally Posted by JD Barleycorn
Oh, puh-leeeeeze!

Sorry, Barleycorn, but I lost any semblance of patience with you some time ago. Your compendium of posts demonstrates beyond any reasonable doubt that you're an uneducated and quite ignorant individual. Given that, don't you think it might be a good idea to avoid blanket insults of other people's intelligence, as is so frequently your wont, and as you started out doing in the very first sentence of your opening post?

I also gave examples (backed up by another poster) where secession did happen in accordance with the laws. Originally Posted by JD Barleycorn
Like West Virginia?

There obviously was no issue at the time concerning possible loss to Virginia of income tax revenue (let alone large revenues from oil and gas production). Even more importantly, those promoting the new state pledged support for the Union, whereas the State of Virginia had joined the Confederacy. Don't you think that posture might have enabled the breakaway region to quickly get quite an enthusiastic level of support in Washington? If you can't understand those very simple points, and still try to hold up cases like West Virginia in a forlorn effort to support your opinion that some Colorado counties can actually break away and form a new state, there's little hope for you.

One of the banes of education has always been the purposely obtuse. Originally Posted by JD Barleycorn
A far bigger "bane of education" is that in all too many cases, stupefyingly ignorant people are allowed to teach. Like you, for example. You often fail to demonstrate that you've undertaken any effort at all to understand the issues under discussion.

No wonder our educational system is in such a state of decline.
JCM800's Avatar
which Colorado will get the Coors plant?
which Colorado will get the Coors plant? Originally Posted by JCM800
Whichever one loses the bet.
BigLouie's Avatar
I just checked in on this on the web site of some Colorado newspapers. It's dying out as expected. They are just going to look at changing the way their state Senate is made up.
It's dying out as expected... Originally Posted by BigLouie
Of course it is.

The attention-seeking county officials responsible for ginning up all this fatuous nonsense didn't think for a minute that the idea was actually going to come to fruition. It was obviously just a publicity stunt.

The only people who bought into it were uneducated simpletons and fans of conspiracy-mongering talk shows or websites. (Sorry for the redundancy.)
chefnerd's Avatar
I just checked in on this on the web site of some Colorado newspapers. It's dying out as expected. They are just going to look at changing the way their state Senate is made up. Originally Posted by BigLouie
According to the link posted originally, they want to create one senator per county. Good luck on that one. It will only be upheld if they can get SCOTUS to overturn Reynolds v Sims which ruled that the states must allocate based on population.