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SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 17, 2012
COMMENTARY
Secede?
By all
means,
and soon
By Frank Cerabino
Thousands of Floridians have
gotten the idea this week that
seceding from the United States is
the proper reaction to last week’s
presidential election.
This is good news for me, especially if these foes of tyranny follow
through on their rugged individualism by extending their symbolic
gesture into action.
It’s going to make my commute
much easier without having to
share the federal interstate highway
95 with freeloading secessionists.
Since President Barack Obama
was re-elected -- an outrageous
perversion of democracy that ended
with the person with the most
votes being declared the winner
-- online petitions of secession have
popped up in more than two dozen
states.
Florida’s go-it-alone crowd has
two petitions to choose from.
There’s the “Peacefully grant the
State of Florida to withdraw from
the United States” petition and the
“Petition calling for the Independence for the State of Florida.”
The second one appears on a
Web page featuring the Confederate flag with a “Never Apologize
for Being Right” motto. So that
one is apparently geared for
people who are dismayed at the
results of both the 2012 and the
1860 elections.
“Reform is not possible,” that
petition says. “We must now demand our independence.”
Please. Do us a favor. Many of
the states where these secession
petitions were filed are states that
receive more federal assistance
than they pay in taxes. So it’s a
win-win proposition.
Your quest for freedom is our
freedom from underachievers.
But I do feel a little sorry for
you secessionists and your Founding Bubbas.
It’s going to be rough at first,
considering that you’ll need your
own currency, national defense and
disaster relief funds. And it will be
challenging to grow old without
your federal retirement and health
care plans.
To wean yourselves off Medicare
and Medicaid, you might consider
experimenting with leeches, mustard plasters and tincture of opium.
Also, it wouldn’t be fair for
you to still take advantage of all
that tyrannical federal support of
education.
And you’re going to need some
educating. One of the Florida petitions, the non-Confederate one, was
apparently written by somebody
sorely in need of a Pell grant.
“We therefore as free men
and women of our great state do
believe that it is time to take matters upon ourselves to ensure our
continued freedom, and to enact
our own laws and here buy govern
ourselves without the federal
government’s involvement in our
internal matters from this day
forward,” it says.
I hereby declare that you here
should buy into the idea of a more
perfect union of your secession language with the English language.
But go, please go. You can
always bone up on English while
you’re trying to protect your
sovereign citizens from the next flu
pandemic.
Many of the people who signed
the Florida petition for secession
live in other states.
Knock it off. You’re only allowed
to secede from your own state. And
what you’re doing is unnecessary.
Because Florida has proven
over the years that it doesn’t need
outside help in embarrassing itself.
Frank Cerabino writes for The Palm
Beach Post. frank_cerabino@pbpost.
com.
DANA SUMMERS
ORLANDO SENTINEL
PEN
POINTS
Views of the nation’s cartoonists
JACK OHMAN
TRIBUNE MEDIA
MATT WUERKER
POLITICO
TOM TOLES
SCOTT STANTIS
THE WASHINGTON POST
READERS’ VIEWS
CHICAGO TRIBUNE
Show with Johnny Carson and
grow a megachurch. This obviElection seasons bring a clamor
ously was a man without a clear
about rights. In this country all
single goal.
rights must be founded upon this:
His idea that books are suc“We hold these truths to be self-evi- cessful if the writer perseveres
dent, that all men are created equal, also is off target. A writer must
and are endowed by their creator
have something to say — not just
with certain unalienable rights,
write. Even tap dancing needs to
among these are life, liberty …”
In lauding the auto bailouts,
send a message.
Truth is, rights are always
your Nov. 2 editorial glossed over
This litany of failures, he
granted or bestowed by the greater writes, was painful. Yes, kicks in
some basic questions. Forget that
to the lesser. The creator, God,
General Motors is rapidly becomthe rear usually are. And these
grants to the created, us, certain
ing China Motors and that we
improbable goals lacked basic
rights that we may claim. Because
gave Chrysler to Fiat so it can
soundness. Who, for example,
he made us he is the greater and we would found a megachurch in
expandto China. The taxpayers
are the lesser.
are underwater by over $30 billion
thinly populated Kentucky? Try
The landowner may, if he
when you consider stock losses
India or the Philippines.
chooses, grant me the right to
and tax breaks. When will we get
What a flippant series of life
our money back, how much did we hunt on his land. Because he is the goals. What a sorry outcome.
spend per job “saved,” and have the owner he is the greater and I am
Let’s hope no one else falls into
the lesser.
companies been properly restructhis trap.
So what happens when we claim
tured for the long term in America?
Risto Marttinen
a right that has not been granted?
The answers? Probably never, too
Lexington
The claim is bogus or fraudulent.
much, and doubtful.
Take abortion. God never has
Contrary to President Barack
given anyone the right to take an
Obama’s statements, the auto cominnocent life. Can there be a more
panies did go through bankruptcy.
Faith, science both
innocent life than a child in the
But the process was political, not
Those who claim the theory
womb? Only if the life of the child
legal, with the government pickof evolution is inconsistent with
threatens the life of the mother
ing winners and losers. The bond
the Bible do not know the Bible
holders and non-UAW workers, like would she have a legitimate claim
or the process of evolution. The
on the life of the child. Sometimes
those at Delphi, got shafted, and
theory states that random increwomen have willingly given up this
the UAW surrendered little.
mental changes in the genotype
right to see their child born and
The greatest costs of the baillead to changes in the attunement
lost their own lives. Greater love
outs are inestimable. Because the
of individuals to their environhas no one.
bankruptcy occurred outside of
ment, and changes in their fruitNext time you hear a right
bankruptcy court, it signaled to the
fulness. A species thereby evolves,
claimed, ask the simple question,
markets that we are living under
and may eventually form a new
the rule of men rather than the rule “Has God granted us this right?” If species. Random incremental
he has not it is doomed to failure
of law. Because the priority inveschanges.
(slavery), no matter how many of
tors were not properly and legally
In Genesis it states that, at
protected, companies issuing future us want it, or how loud we yell.
first, creation obeyed exactly
bonds will have to offer a risk
Joe Bowsher
God’s words. “‘Let there be light,’
premium to attract buyers. This will
Nicholasville
and there was light.” “‘Let there
raise consumer prices, erode profits
be a firmament.’ And it was so.”
and damage job creation.
But, when God ordered plants
Politicians are masters at harmto come forth, they came forth
Uninspired
goals
ing the many to help the few. They
differing slightly from his exact
can always count on the support of
Sometimes a well-meaning life
wording (Genesis 1:11-12). A
the few, who see paychecks, because story turns sickly or soggy. So
medieval commentator, Rashi,
the many cannot see how they have Paul Prather’s shift in priorities
points out these minor changes.
been hurt through higher prices
was not inspiring (“If I’ve settled, Even before animals appeared,
and exported jobs. Our kids get the it’s for more, not less,” Oct. 27).
plants showed random incremendebt, and kids don’t vote.
He early sought to become a best- tal changes.
selling author, earn a fortune in
Cameron S. Schaeffer
The Bible could not express
business, appear on The Tonight
fully the evolutionary theory,
Lexington
Our rights, bestowed
Editorial on auto
bailout left out
important details
since it had to be expressed in the
language of its time. But it left
a clear hint that God created the
world in a way that allowed it to
evolve.
However, as long as the theory
is expressed purely materialistically, it cannot explain the rise of
qualitative experience.
As the philosopher David
Chalmers expressed it, “The hard
problem of consciousness is the
problem of experience.” Materialistic evolution cannot explain
why we are people, and not just
zombies. It cannot explain why we
have love, and not just lust.
Nevertheless, its ability to
explain lust validates the theory of
evolution. It is true science. And
it is compatible with the Bible.
Rabbi H.D. Uriel Smith
Lexington
Hurrah for Warren
Americans need to give a
shout-out to Massachusetts voters
for electing Elizabeth Warren one
of our newest U.S. senators.
The nation was introduced to
Warren as we watched her take
on Wall Street and the “too big
to fail” banks on behalf of average
Americans.
Sen. Warren will have to work
with House Speaker John Boehner
and Senate Minority Leader Mitch
McConnell. Boehner’s intellectual
wattage could barely keep a nightlight burning. McConnell’s irritable bowel obstructionism must
now vow to make Barack Obama a
two-term president.
Lucky for us Warren has a
work ethic of steely will, guts, reason and fortitude, which she will
exert to get this country working
again.
Perhaps Warren can finally
answer the 4-year-old question
voters keep asking: “How come
those guys aren’t in jail?”
Judy Rembacki
Georgetown
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READERS’ VIEWS
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