This book is now available in paperback or on Kindle!!!!!

Click on one of the following links to order now!!!

https://www.createspace.com/4596674

http://www.amazon.com/Want-Divorce-America-Needs-Separate/dp/1494853760/ref=pd_ybh_1

In this book, the Badass Economist makes a case for nothing less than the dissolution of the United States as we currently know it. The author states that America is in many ways already in a civil war, it is just that nobody has started shooting………….yet. He argues that the divisions in American society are the function of deep seated cultural and economic splits that have evolved over decades and have resulted in Americans being so different that they can’t understand each other nor come to any sort of general agreement as to how the country should be run. It is this situation that has led to the increasing partisanship in Washington and media, as people who have little to no personal contact with the ‘Other America’ resort to cheap cultural stereotypes to describe their political opponents, which further poisons the nations politics. The author asserts that were America 50 independent countries, they would not all today choose to form the United States that we see today (i.e. California and Montana would not freely choose to be part of the same country). Rather than continue this state of affairs, the author argues that most people would be happier if the country were to break apart, and outlines a vision for what political geography of the area currently comprising the U.S. might look like.

 

An Excerpt From ‘I Want A Divorce’ Follows:

 

In this second decade of the 21^st century, even a blind hermit living in a cave on Mount Everest knows that America is undergoing wrenching changes. An America that dominated the 20^th century appears to be in decline. On the other side of the world, China is rising to challenge us not only economically, but militarily as well. The Middle East is continuing to be a source of political instability. The world economy appears poised to slow down.

Here at home, the great American jobs machine that was the source of upward mobility for generations of Americans appears to be broken. The life paths of millions have been irreparably altered by the economic downturn. Although it has been officially over for more than 3 years, the after-effects of the recession are still being felt. The country is drowning in debt. The Fed has been printing money, fueling fears of inflation. The technocrats in Washington don’t seem to have answers. The population is aging which is threatening the fiscal viability of the safety net that has been the mainstay of sustaining seniors in their old age for 75 years.

The American political system is polarized and incapable of making a decision. Our elections now take on the characteristics of a civil war, rather than honest national debates, with propagandists on each side in the opinion pages of newspapers and on cable news shows expressing “analysis” designed to serve their specific side. This occurs even if they have to contradict earlier opinions expressed in earlier situations when those opinions, if consistently held, would now cast the opposing “team” in a good light. Half of the country dislikes, or even hates, the sitting President. In fact, one could make the case that we no longer have a true U.S. President any longer. As hard as it may be for people under 30 to believe, there actually was a time when Americans voted for a President, and then accepted that the person elected was the President of all Americans (whether they voted for him or not), and that was that until the next election. Today, the nearly half of the country that didn’t vote for the sitting President doesn’t think of him as “their” President too. The same thing was largely true of the prior President as well. It even goes so far that those who don’t like whoever is President often seem to go out of their way to ensure that he has difficulty governing. (And while partisans who engage in these tactics may consol themselves with delusions that “the other guy is worse”, the truth is that those partisans are emotionally invested in the fight and are hardly in a position to truly know which side is behaving in a more despicable manner, not that it matters).

Today, we can’t even agree on a basic definition of what marriage should be, nor do we even agree any longer on how such issues should be decided. One side thinks they should be decided by democratic means (either direct vote or through the legislature), which is fine with the other side unless they don’t win. Then they think it should be decided by a court. If they don’t win that, then they try and delegitimize the court by declaring the decision to be ‘unprecedented’ or that the justices have engaged in “judicial activism”. This is isn’t just the case with an issue such as same-sex marriage, but with most (maybe even all) controversial laws.

It may seem hard to believe now, but there once was a time when there actually was a pause between elections. Politics may not have been pretty, but it wasn’t the 24 hour blood sport that we see today.

People are buying gold, guns, and clinging to God.

So what are people to do when they see their world changing in ways that they can’t control? They undertake actions that appear to give them some measure of control (like saving for a rainy day for instance). In certain parts of the country, people are talking about stockpiling canned goods, buying weapons, and, if Barack Obama is to be believed, clinging to God. While Obama might have meant it derisively when he implied that certain people are “bitter clingers”, another segment of the country might have countered that certain people cling to a government check or pension (i.e. Mitt Romney’s 47%). The point of that last sentence isn’t to call out certain stereotypes, but rather to assert that the fact that certain highly educated people would buy into such stereotypes indicates a profound ignorance (of which they appear to be blissfully unaware) of how certain segments of the population actually live. It may come as a shock to some, but Americans have had a love-affair with God and guns for over two centuries. To describe such a fascination as a product of bitterness associated with being left behind economically bespeaks a historical illiteracy and lack of curiosity that should embarrass those that hold such views, much like the assertion that 47% of the country won’t vote for you under any circumstances because they are dependent on a government check. After all, the civil service employees may tend to vote Democrat, but they don’t do it 100% and 47% of the country is not on welfare.