Well, that was not what I expected to happen yesterday.
It seems that there are some new Interstate Compacts forming.
With the dystopian-fiction names of “The West Coast Pact” and the “6-States Council”, though that second one keeps getting updated; I think they’re the “Multi-State Council” now?
This was pretty predictable, though.
A nationwide crisis, and the federal government basically sitting it out?
Of course the states will need to set up new institutions to coordinate their activities. That’s what the federal government is for, after all, and if it bows out then the smart states will get together to build new institutions to get themselves through.
But hoo, boy: the MAGA-Americans are freakin’ out, man.
Ironically, most of the ones I’ve seen freaking out the most on Twitter have confederate flags somewhere in their profiles.
So, that’s weird.
And the Cascadians are getting all hipster.
Posting stuff like “We were into secession before it was cool”.
So, that’s weird too.
Of course, it’s not actually secession.
It’s just an Interstate Compact, which is totally normal and even mentioned in the Constitution (though the case law on them seems to be a tad wonky, with major rulings going directly against the actual wording so who the hell knows what’s suppossed to be legal in this area).
And Newsom did refer to California as a “nation state” the other day.
So, that’s really weird.
Probably the funniest thing I’ve seen, though, was this:
When asked about the argument of federal vs. state decisions to lift the stay-at-home orders, our county health officer said “actually local health officials will make the final decisions“.
Which is frankly awesome: everyone’s arguing over whether the feds or the states get to make these decisions and here in Sonoma County our official response is “screw the both of you; I make that decision”.
We’re bigger than Rhode Island, and have the population of Wyoming; just sayin’.
