Elizabeth May suggests Cali, Oregon, Washington State join Canada or join British Columbia to form 'Cascadia'

Yes, fucking, PLEASE.

Sick of our tax dollars supporting these fucking deadbeat ass states like Arkansas,Louisiana, Alabama and Mississippi.

Also Louisiana, Arkansas, and Mississippi all smell like a fucking asshole because of all the paper mills.

As a Washingtonian, I would unironically support this. I'm sick of being forced to fund a fucking genocide.
- As a resident of British Columbia, I would support this with the sole condition that we all use only the metric system.
Yep. There’s a reason me and my wife left Mississippi a few years ago for Washington.

That would immediately launch it into the #2 spot of countries by GDP. I'm down for that 🤣

No, it woukdn't. A ton of California's money comes from being part of the US economy. Redirecting all the money the state gets from being oart of the USA away from those states will change theor GDP considerably.
Every single tech firm that wants DOD money will have to leave those states. That will gut any potential gain you could expect.
- Lulzwut
- Do you think there would be no DoD equivalent?
  And how do you fund the US DoD without CA?

Just FYI Canadians, don’t get fooled when people say California is “leftist”. Check out recent referendum results, they voted against abolishing slavery (for prisoners) and in favour of the death penalty for example. They are only “leftist” in relation to the neofacist US’s overton window.

Yes, as a Californian leftist, our government has always been more interested in money than people, and it will continue to be a problem. NIMBYs will be the death of us.
Canada's prisoners work on average for 30¢ an hour. I don't think they car about prison slavery there.
- Canada doesn’t have private for profit prisons and the difference in the quality of life shows.
Do you think Canada is on average that much more leftist than California? Canada has plenty of Trump supporters and they aren't even US citizens.
California has a rural state within it that's called The State Of Jefferson and it's very rural and conservative. You can just cut that part out of Cascadia
- But that is where all the food comes from...

I personally support all of Canada amd the US breaking into smaller countries but with an EU style freedom of movement and trade deal.

Texas immediately invades smallest Southern states
- I don't think that's quite how it would play out.
  Texas has long been aching to leave the US. They've setup all sorts of their infrastructure and economy to not be dependent on the rest of the US.
  Many southern states, particularly Oklahoma, fantasize that they're part of that. When Texas leaves, they will expect to join. But Texas views them as freeloaders.
  It's possible Texas invades to steal resources, but they don't want the land or the people. More likely it's the reverse - The poor states (now extremely poor, since they won't be getting all that juicy federal money) will be envious of Texas's wealth, and may invade to claim some of it for themselves.
- New Mexico turns off the Pecos and Rio Grande
  Fuck off.
So, this was pushed for a while and was later discovered to be Chinese propaganda. But it holds water is the thing.
Breaking into smaller counties isn't the solution because you lose economies of scale and inefficient trade. Which was why China pushed it, to leave themselves and the EU as the largest single economies in the world.
The real solution is to regionalize block of states and instead of having one head of state as President, a council of state like Switzerland with a rotating chair that functions as the ceremonial head of state.
But that would take a new constitution...
- But that would take a new constitution… Yeah, its a good that the thing that is only a couple centries old has been updated to match modern times and all.
  Ironic when you consider that the people who would cry foul and act all offended the most if you ever were to suggest thinking about changing the entire constitution, have no issue with blatantly ignoring it entirely when it suits them.
  Almost like the people who follow and believe in it the most are the only ones about to get mega dicked.
Just say no to balkanisation
- Balkanisation - except Yugoslavia becomes bigger than ever
I like this because it’s closer to “articles of confederation” version of the proto United States which imo is closer to anarchism although still far from it.
Genuinely curious: What do you see as the significant differences under such a scenario? What are the pros and cons of these differences?
- Gets rid of the borders which are honestly just traffic jams.
  And I think more regional nationalism will be healthier for everyone. Lot of frustration seems to come with seeing someone on the other side of the country behaving in a way that you think doesn't fit in with the idea of your nationality.
- I think the biggest pro for me would be that sane policies at the federal level that are broadly popular in my region could stop getting blocked by yokels representing states that sometimes barely even have the population of the semi-rural county I grew up in in the Northeast. Ditto for not having to worry about corporate interests from those same states filing frivolous lawsuits that manage to block the implementation of the odd policy that does make it through, like student loan forgiveness.
  Also, I'm not above admitting that there's a great deal of appeal in the potential schadenfreude of all the "But I don't want my taxes paying for the trans, minority welfare queens getting bottom surgery! Down with any social safety net!" Republicans from the South and Midwest being forced to reckon with the fact that they have actually been the welfare queens this whole time, and it's only been by the grace of those dang liberal states paying in disproportionately high shares of taxes that get funneled towards red states that their shithole states haven't yet collapsed entirely. Let's see how Alabama fares with its whooping 1.1% of the national GDP when they no longer have federal funding to prop them up. Their top 5 employers are all public institutions that likely depend on federal funding to remain operational, and 2/5 of them are military bases. Good luck, guys, the South will fall again.
  For cons, obviously it'll suck for the people who still live in those states until they finally move, but that's been the case for a long time. If the decent regions help finance the move for those who are willing to leave, but unable to for lack of money, I'm kind of fine with it. Same goes for overlooking criminal charges when people are unable to leave their state due to some BS non-violent crimes landing them on parole and being refused travel permissions. If Mississippi wants to lock you down as exploitable labor because you got pulled over with some weed, or loaned a kid a book that said gay people actually aren't the spawn of Satan sent to destroy US civilization, come on over. They can keep their sex offenders and violent criminals, though. For the folks that don't move because "Oh, but my family is here and I love them too much to move away," or similar reasons, good luck with living through the second feudal age, but that's your own choice.
  Likewise, it'll be sad to see them destroy national and state parks in the name of business, as well as visiting those places while they still exist being a much riskier proposition.
  Honestly, I think most red states severely underestimate how poorly things would go for them if they were to be cut loose, while overestimating the popular support they would enjoy and their international appeal as trade partners. Even for the ones who are in a relatively favorable economic opinion, like Texas, would probably see absolutely insane levels of brain drain from industry and higher education that would leave them dead in the water, barring state-sanctioned violence to prevent people from leaving.
  That said, their economies would be devastated. Arizona, New Mexico, Texas, Oklahoma, Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, Tennessee, North Carolina and Kentucky would all see between 20.7%-30.7% of their overall revenues for state and local governments vanish overnight if they stopped receiving federal funding. States like New York and Texas could probably come away at a net profit just by retaining the taxes they'd previously passed on to the federal government, even factoring in how many new services would have to be provided for at the state/regional level that were previously financed by the federal government. For the states like New Mexico, Mississippi, and Alabama that manage to claw back almost all of what they contribute in federal taxes, if not get more back in federal funding, good luck. Somehow, I suspect their new, libertarian overlords in Texas aren't going to be so keen on subsidizing their impoverished neighbors to any real extent.
- Stops federal government from...existing and strong arming states miles away. I know a lot of Europeans are looking at the u.s. right now and asking why we aren't pulling out guillotines, it's because 200 million Americans live west of the Mississippi. At the very best that's a 900mile journey, with the largest population center being 3k miles away. All that versus most states having their capitals centrally located, or at least within a days drive.
  The other pro is that if every state just sent a representative, we wouldn't have a figurehead for massive swaths of vastly different people, we'd have a straight Congress/parliamentto represent each states interest and thats it. (My personal hot take is that having a figurehead hasn't been very beneficial to the u.s. since Washington. Like I'd even say Lincoln is debatable, not that freeing the slaves wasn't cool as shit, but that him being a figure head at that time didn't have much benifit)

Why does the east coast always get left out?

Because the east coast will form Mega-City One.
- It’s gonna be called the DMV because I’m pretty sure that’s the coolest metro area name in the north east.
  It will become DMV City when New York City becomes connected
Do you really want to merge with Quebec?
Maine should be part of New Brunswick but we hate Americans the people so that’s why these suggestions are just jokes

As a Washingtonian, I’m totally okay with this.

Same here, this sounds like the best thing I dare hope for at this point

Can you please bring the Northeast in as well? NY and Toronto are already buds, and Niagara Falls has one foot in each

Cleveland and buffallo are oddly tied at the hip when you think about it.
And by that, I mean I'm tying Cleveland to this deal by teaming up with Buffalo to get in on this. C'mon. We got beer and chocolate and a pretty strong polish population. Which are great people to be friends with. C'mon Canada! You know you like chocolate, and beer, and perogis! Slso buffalo has buffalo wings.....I mean I assume. Why else would you name a whole place after a food if that place doesn't have that food???
eats french fries
Ah the french. Known for their CHAMPAIGNEXCELLENCE!!!!!*
long awkward silence.....like, really long......like you're wondering how the other guy isn't breaking character AT ALL. He's too scared to disrespect Orson Wells
- Cinci's chilli is just too weird, though.
- I second the motion to have Cleveland become part of Canada alongside New England. The rest of the state can sort itself out on it's own.
Fuck it. I'll volunteer western NY to just become part of Ontario. We don't even need to be our own province.

Ok, but we made a promise in the past to take Alaska and Hawaii with us too.

It's super convenient because Hawaii and Alaska are in boxes just off the west coast on maps.

Never going to happen. The USA will not let CA leave.

Or any other state
- True but few are as important as CA.
So, I think this could happen. Trump and Musk are just trying to speedrun smashing the administrative state; it's difficult to overstate the enormity of the damage they're going to do to the federal government's ability to govern over the next two months. Laying off all these administrators and closing their offices is going to create a glut of administrators at the same time as it creates a demand for administrative capacity to make up for what the feds dropped. Plus, they're going to want to stop California, but how will they when they've gone and replaced every competent person in the DOJ/DOD/FBI/CIA with incompetent stooges?
California has an advanced enough administrative state to handle breaking off, jokes aside. California also has the economy. Here's the kicker: California has the geography. California would be a complete bitch to invade; for most of the coastline, the mountains (hills, as the locals call them, but they ARE mountains) just run right into the ocean, and the ocean is notoriously a bastard for much of that coastline; as for an overland route, there's basically, like, three big highways that cross the Sierra Nevadas to inland Cali. A couple of big bombs or cal fire bulldozers would make short work of them. Plus, California has a LOT of agriculture to support itself with. Basically, the one weak spot is water supply, and we could be doing a lot better than we are if we just tightened up on our industrial, livestock, and rich dumbass consumption.
- The geography you are talking about is important as a minor modifier in the context of highly professional fighting force using it. By itself it changes nothing compared to dry flatlands, a bit more costly transportation. When a military doesn't have a road, they first make the dirt road (throwing sand and gravy here and there), then lay armed concrete shields in line, and then may even use asphalt on top of that. I don't know anything about that, so may be a bit more complex, but the point is that it's a solvable problem.
- California's economy is extremely dependent on being part of the USA. They barely cover the hap between money taken from the government and what they contribute and it is fairly easy to make the case they take more.
  The government would not need to invade. The moment they make clear that CA farmers cannot access the Colorado river waters like they used to and that any foreign tech company is no longer able to access US DOD money you will see tech be willing to move and agriculture collapse in CA. After gutting any aide and scholarships for students attending CA schools and the USA will have crippled the top 3 industries in CA without firing a shot.
  CA wouldn't be akin to France ir Italy if it left the USA it would be more like Mexico economically.

The National Post seems to have taken down the article so linking to archive.is

Elizabeth May says a lot of things I like, but also comes out with bizarro-world shit like this

It was mostly a joke I'm sure, but a good retort :)

Taking away 74 reliable Democratic electoral college votes would permanently throw the US to the Republicans.

Texas (40) and Florida (30) would steamroller New York (28) and Illinois (19).

Yup. Guess those who want to stay out of a Repub hell-hole would want to move to Cascadia (or more realistically, an enlarged Canada) while they still could, then.
Last election did that. If you think there will continue to be free and democratic elections in US after Trump you are mistaken. Those college votes are no longer going to matter.
While true, this is pretty much gonna happen anyway. Next census, if the GOP is still in control they'll exclude non-citizens from the counts and pretty much make up numbers. Who knew the entire West Coast was 30% non-citizen!

So, instead of Canada becoming the 51st state, the suggestion is that Canada just loses BC? How about we dismiss all the options where Canada loses territory?

Also, if BC seceded, it would only be a matter of time before Quebec did too.

I'm not fundamentally against the idea of states splitting off or joining up. There's no reason that the configuration of countries should always stay as they are in 2025. But, the reasons should be good. If there truly is a "Cascadian" culture, then yeah, maybe a nice separation agreement could be negotiated that's fair to everyone. But, having spent time in Vancouver, Seattle, San Fransisco and LA, I sure don't see it. The cultural difference even between SF and LA is pretty huge. And, I can't imagine that most people in BC would be keen to accept the guns of America, and the lack of free health care. Or, going the other way, would Americans be willing to give up their guns to join Cascadia?

It just seems to me that every time the world adds borders or moves borders, the result is conflict. I hope that over time there are fewer borders, and that the borders matter less. But, the only way to do it while avoiding war is really to do it slowly.

The "Cascadia" idea wouldn't be viable IMO. It would be better for all to just add the newcomers to an enlarged Canada. (I 100% wouldn't want B.C. to leave Canada, just to be clear, nor any Canadian territories to be 'exchanged' or lost).
I'd be against any absorption that brought US gun ideology to Canada... if they're splitting from the US, they'd better be doing so for the goals of taking on the more pacifist and commensalist Canadian values.
You realize that Canadians can own guns too, right?
- Canadians were clever enough not to enshrine gun ownership as a right in the constitution. As a result, Canadians have limited gun rights, and almost no handgun rights. Sure, having guns for hunting is pretty common, especially in rural areas. But, the idea of a gun for home defense or a gun for taking on a tyrannical government is something that never took hold in Canada.

The REMNANTS of the US would be fucked without the regular contributions of CA and tech folks based in WA. Most (or is it all?) red states are net takers (pull more from government than they contribute back) while publicly whining about welfare. Fuck around and find out....

As a Californian I'll say that if they want to take our rights and go home, we'll take our money and go home.

I wish my state wasn't surrounded by red states because I'd be down to join too.

Colorado? I always want to include them in Cascadia nonsense but yeah geography issues.
- As someone not in these states I would support all efforts to retain Colorado. There's a fuckload of critical infrastructure the USA requires that is in CO. It's on a short list of states the USA cannot function well without- NY, CA, TX, CO, IL, and GA are all too important to the day to day functioning to let go.
Alaska is surrounded by Canada yet it's still part of the US

Canaforeton

Hmm, pretty sure those states have a "lien" on them.

Cascadia. Sounds like a rejected Hunger Games spinoff. Let’s carve up nations like a rotisserie chicken because the Overton window’s been replaced by a funhouse mirror. California can’t even fix a pothole without 17 ballot initiatives, but sure, let’s rewrite sovereignty. BC would sooner adopt Texas’s gun laws than tolerate Sacramento’s NIMBY circus.

This isn’t secession—it’s geopolitical fanfiction. Canada’s already two polite arguments away from Quebec storming out. Cascadia would collapse faster than a Jenga tower in a MAGA rally. Balkanization’s a cute fantasy until Alabama starts eyeing your water rights. Keep your “eco-state.” I’ll stick to my prepper bunker—at least it’s got a shot at surviving the next zoning meeting.

I was actually just reading a book a couple months ago, Blasphemy Online where the US fell apart and and several new countries formed after the US fell and Cascadia WAS one of the countries... so that's neat I guess.

News flash:

Political party leaders who suggest succession and independence are almost always pushing Russian propaganda.

Breaking apart the US is the greatest victory that Russia (and other nations hostile to the states) they could hope to accomplish.

May's definitely not a Russian asset. She just has a good sense of humour.
It was in response to Trump's comment about annexing Canada.
Having nothing to do with Russian politics, I am sick of my state's voters being disenfranchised by the US government.
My vote is only worth 1/5th of an South Dakotan's vote.

Terrible idea, that new country would instantly realize how awful it is needing to negotiate for oil when you have zero local sources of it.

The US has Texas, and Canada has Alberta.

You do not wanna form any kind of new pseudo country that doesn't have oil in 2025, you will have some serious issues within a couple years.

The only people that talk about any states or provinces separating are the people too ignorant of just how deeply they are dependent on all the rest of their country's exports, imports, and production.

Yes, even backwater places have an absolute fuck tonne of stuff they produce that you depend on every Just because you might think mineral mines, farms, oil, steel factories, forestry, etc etc isnt of major value, it is and you literally depend on it daily

You cant break out from that, but too many people have become too deeply dumb to grok how fucked their life would become if their specific state/province seperated.

You're cost of living would fucking skyrocket to levels you cant even imagine. So much random shit you currently take for granted still being affordable would vaporize as you suddenly realize "Oh yeah I guess we dont make that here locally do we, where does that come from? Shit it comes from there? I never knew they made this stuff, I use it every day! Now I cant have it at all? I can still, it just costs a lot more and is imported? Well how much does it cost? (spit take) IT COSTS HOW MUCH NOW?!?!"

The pure dollar loss for the US in tax money from California alone, combined with Seattle’s import hubs, not to mention all the west coast tech sector would likely end with several remaining US state collapses in sheer funding weight alone. Several southern states only survive because of the critical mass of tax money from west cost cities.
- The tech companies would relocate as the US DOD will not give any contracts to the companies that remain. CA,WA, and OR aren't going to be making a lot of money if they leave.
Fun fact, oil can be brought in from other countries and when you control all the access to the Pacific ocean you're the one who controls the negotiations.
- I think you just made an incredibly strong argument for why the US would use it's military to prevent this.
I'll guess that you have never been to California. There was pumpjack one block away from my house when I was growing up.
But in fact, the biggest thing keeping us from moving away from fossil fuels is the political pressure from people who make money from it. And if California went into Canada or Cascadia, those people would come with it, kicking and screaming all the way.
Note the idea was joining Canada as-is, or forming a "Cascadia". I think the latter is much much less realistic myself :)
I sure as heck wouldn't want B.C. or any Canadian province to split off from Canada.
EDIT: I think you're absolutely correct that separatists ignore their own region's dependencies on the parent state. Quebec, for example. The separatists there always hand-wave away the question of how they would deal with losing access to the rest of Canada's resources (physical, cultural, economic and political).
So there are levels of depth to this analysis. Yes, most people think about it very shallowly. Just saying I want out of the bad situation I am in. Kinda like the grass is always greener on the other side of the fence. Then there is where you are at. Hey what about all the thing we get from outside this new bubble. The level after that is, what do the outside places get from us. And how do they balance. There are plenty of places that don't have thier own oil, yet they are fine because they produce something the places with oil need. That said, water is another sticking point for California depending on where the line ends up getting drawn.