http://content.usatoday.net/dist/custom/gc...=37212228.story

 

Still florida of the day

 

I was talking to some guy from GA the other day and he was asking me what side WI took in the "War", like it was a big deal and was going to determine how the rest of our conversation was going to go. How the f should I know, no one up here cares about that. I've spent almost no time in the south but it was surprising to hear that is still a big deal to some people.

 

This post makes zero sense

 

[QUOTE=dammitjim,Jan 8 2010, 05:00 PM] I was talking to some guy from GA the other day and he was asking me what side WI took in the "War", like it was a big deal and was going to determine how the rest of our conversation was going to go.

 

florida is now synonymous with foolishiness

Interchange the words at your convenience.

 

Good Lord - there's your first clue right there!

Fail elementary school geography, fail at life it seems...

 

I was not going to explain it..... but thanks for doing so

 

I think the bigger issue is that the states did not want the federal government making such drastic changes to laws and then trying to enforce them. The backbone of the USA was the strength and independence of the states themselves.

The states did not want to break away at all. They just didn't want the federal government "infringing" on their "rights". Their reach out to other countries was a defensive move more than anything, to try and gain allies for the war.

 

I thought it was more economic than political. The economic bases of the north (manufacturing) vs south (agriculture) were quite different and there were big disagreements about the taxation and regulation thereof. Like today, I think it was the same back then - nebulous "rights" were/are secondary to wealth. Rights, self-rule and the like were means to an end, not the end goal itself.

Instead of north vs south, industry vs agriculture like in the past, today mostly we have corporate vs consumer. And the consumer has vastly less power (lobbyists, etc.) than corporations, much less will to utilize power (bread and circuses, plus see voter turnouts) and even when there is great interest in a subject there is no clear geographic delineation between the factions. We're all intermixed to a much larger degree than during the Civil War. Therefore we'll likely never see a civil war again. Protests, riots and general chaos, perhaps yes if things ever get really, really bad. But never a general civil war like before.