7 ms·

DC shouldn't be a state, it would give that "state" too much power and also make politicians there outsized politically powerful and we have enough of that alre

DC shouldn't be a state, it would give that "state" too much power and also make politicians there outsized politically powerful and we have enough of that already with states like rhode island, wyoming, and the dakotas

Bud 5y ago
- dnautics 5y ago
  It would be the only state with no agricultural interests, the only state with no ports, the only state where the majority of the residents work for the federal government... The last one alone is pretty scary and a bit of a conflict of interest.
  - lmm 5y ago
    > the only state with no ports Huh? What about, IDK, Idaho?
    - deleted 5y ago
      [deleted]
    - dnautics 5y ago
      https://itd.idaho.gov/poe-locations/ https://itd.idaho.gov/poe-locations/
      - lmm 5y ago
        I think those are weigh stations, not ports in the usual sense of the word.
        dnautics 5y ago
        Ports of entry are surprisingly important regulatory entities at the state level, and DC doesn't have any. Don't deflect from your ignorance.
        lmm 5y ago
        Here is a list of usual definitions of the ordinary word port: https://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/port https://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/port . If you mean some term of art which is opposed to the usual everyday meaning of the word, it's your responsibility to be explicit. Don't deflect from your poor communication.
        Aloha 5y ago
        Doing what? I'm a former truck driver - they levy no substantive taxes, they perform at most a cursory vehicle safety function. Like I was unaware that oversized and overweight truck permits were an important regulatory function.
      - Aloha 5y ago
        If you want to make an argument about what a port is, picking land "points of entry" isn't a good argument. Airports are a better yardstick. A new Capitol State could easily establish both a port and points of entry if it so chose, the Potomac is somewhat in practice (and legally) a navigable river and there are US highways and interstates that go thru Washington DC. Furthermore the WMAA would likely come under the control of the city.
    - chromatin 5y ago
      Bad example, Idaho has a seaport https://portoflewiston.com/ https://portoflewiston.com/
  - wbl 5y ago
    North Dakota? Montana? Arizona? Lots of landlocked states.
    - dnautics 5y ago
      These states all have ports of entry.
  - vkou 5y ago
    > the only state where the majority of the residents work for the federal government... The last one alone is pretty scary and a bit of a conflict of interest. You can quite literally say this about any group of people. I don't like landlords, I find it scary that landlords can vote and contribute to political campaigns. Imagine the awful and self-serving things that landlords would do if they ever turned the powers of our political machine to their own ends! I don't like resource industries, I find it scary that Texas and North Dakota get the vote. I don't like techies, California should lose a few seats in Congress, etc, etc, etc. Oh, and your numbers aren't even right, there are 140,000 federal government employees in DC, and many of them commute in. That's not 'the majority' of the residents by any stretch of the imagination.
  - imgabe 5y ago
    > It would be the only state with no agricultural interests, Wasn't aware this was a requirement to be a state. Is it in the Constitution somewhere? We'll plant some corn on the Mall or something. > the only state with no ports, You clarify below you're talking about Ports of Entry, or state government buildings for managing goods coming into the state. So...DC will make some? Are these naturally occurring structures and if you don't have any in your area you're just screwed? > the only state where the majority of the residents work for the federal government Not even true. DC has 200,000 federal employees out of 680,000 residents. A little over a quarter. Not even close to a majority. Most federal employees work outside DC. Note that taking a job as a federal employee does not mean you should be deprived of Congressional representation. [1] https://cfo.dc.gov/sites/default/files/dc/sites/ocfo/publication/attachments/EINov2021.pdf https://cfo.dc.gov/sites/default/files/dc/sites/ocfo/publica...
- MathCodeLove 5y ago
  Not everything is racially motivated. Eventually speculation like yours crosses a boundary from legitimate social concern to conspiracy and seeing racist boogeymen in every shadow.
  - Bud 5y ago
    "Eventually"? Yeah, except when it doesn't. You're right: not everything is racially motivated. Except for the things that so plainly and obviously are. Also: please do not implicitly label my concern as being not legitimate. I'm not really that into clumsy gaslighting.
    - MathCodeLove 5y ago
      I think you're legitimately concerned, but I think your concerns are about as well grounded in reality as that of most conspiracy theorists. What proof (not tweets or opinion pieces) do you have to support your claim? "There are a lot of black people therefore any adverse action to the region is because of racism" is not proof. California's demographic makeup isn't predominantly white. Why are they a state?
      - pseudalopex 5y ago
        Indigenous people didn't count when California became a state. 99% of the rest were white.[1] [1] https://www2.census.gov/library/publications/decennial/1850/1850a/1850a-47.pdf#page=8 https://www2.census.gov/library/publications/decennial/1850/...
        selimthegrim 5y ago
        cf. "Indians not taxed" in the Constitution
  - shkkmo 5y ago
    It's funny how the two major regions of the US that clearly deserve statehood (DC and Puerto Rico) but have been denied that right for decades, seem to be areas with lots of poor non-whites. Racism is not the only factor in play here (political balance of power is a huge factor), but to deny that racism has played a significant role in creating this situation is ridiculous. I place that racism squarely in the laps of both parties since they both deserve that blame.
bobsil1 5y ago
DC residents should get one-person-one-vote, like most things. We should get rid of 1700s planter superuser backdoors like the disproportional Senate and electoral college.
- bobsil1 5y ago
  Then we should rebrand away from the slaver-drafted constitution to the Free States of America, a fourth founding after the original, post-Civil War and Civil Rights Movement. That would match what we actually have, a multiethnic democracy welcoming global talent. Giving residents of Wyoming 70× the Senate voting power of any Californian is a joke.
  - imgabe 5y ago
    Not a joke. It was the intent that populous states should not be able to steamroll less populous states in the Senate.
    - MagnumOpus 5y ago
      In other words, rigging the Senate towards people in empty states. (Land ownership shouldn't matter in a democratic republic, people should.)
      - imgabe 5y ago
        There’s this whole other part of Congress called the House of Representatives that is proportional to population. Land ownership has nothing to do with anything. Everyone gets to vote for their Senators (except people in DC). We did away with the requirement to own land a long time ago.
    - UncleMeat 5y ago
      It is important to define the term "steamroll." If California broke up into 200 states, would they need 2 Senators each to protect themselves from being steamrolled? If so, then why don't Californians already need 200 Senators?
imgabe 5y ago
That's not how this works. We create a government and decide what rights citizens have. We did that, wrote a whole constitution about it. Then we make sure every citizen has those rights. If there are imbalances in the design of the government, that's a separate problem that we fix on its own. Depriving some subset of citizens of their rights is not the answer.
- torstenvl 5y ago

Bud 5y ago

dnautics 5y ago
It would be the only state with no agricultural interests, the only state with no ports, the only state where the majority of the residents work for the federal government... The last one alone is pretty scary and a bit of a conflict of interest.
- lmm 5y ago
  > the only state with no ports Huh? What about, IDK, Idaho?
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
  - dnautics 5y ago
    https://itd.idaho.gov/poe-locations/ https://itd.idaho.gov/poe-locations/
    - lmm 5y ago
      I think those are weigh stations, not ports in the usual sense of the word.
      - dnautics 5y ago
        Ports of entry are surprisingly important regulatory entities at the state level, and DC doesn't have any. Don't deflect from your ignorance.
        lmm 5y ago
        Here is a list of usual definitions of the ordinary word port: https://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/port https://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/port . If you mean some term of art which is opposed to the usual everyday meaning of the word, it's your responsibility to be explicit. Don't deflect from your poor communication.
        Aloha 5y ago
        Doing what? I'm a former truck driver - they levy no substantive taxes, they perform at most a cursory vehicle safety function. Like I was unaware that oversized and overweight truck permits were an important regulatory function.
    - Aloha 5y ago
      If you want to make an argument about what a port is, picking land "points of entry" isn't a good argument. Airports are a better yardstick. A new Capitol State could easily establish both a port and points of entry if it so chose, the Potomac is somewhat in practice (and legally) a navigable river and there are US highways and interstates that go thru Washington DC. Furthermore the WMAA would likely come under the control of the city.
  - chromatin 5y ago
    Bad example, Idaho has a seaport https://portoflewiston.com/ https://portoflewiston.com/
- wbl 5y ago
  North Dakota? Montana? Arizona? Lots of landlocked states.
  - dnautics 5y ago
    These states all have ports of entry.
- vkou 5y ago
  > the only state where the majority of the residents work for the federal government... The last one alone is pretty scary and a bit of a conflict of interest. You can quite literally say this about any group of people. I don't like landlords, I find it scary that landlords can vote and contribute to political campaigns. Imagine the awful and self-serving things that landlords would do if they ever turned the powers of our political machine to their own ends! I don't like resource industries, I find it scary that Texas and North Dakota get the vote. I don't like techies, California should lose a few seats in Congress, etc, etc, etc. Oh, and your numbers aren't even right, there are 140,000 federal government employees in DC, and many of them commute in. That's not 'the majority' of the residents by any stretch of the imagination.
- imgabe 5y ago
  > It would be the only state with no agricultural interests, Wasn't aware this was a requirement to be a state. Is it in the Constitution somewhere? We'll plant some corn on the Mall or something. > the only state with no ports, You clarify below you're talking about Ports of Entry, or state government buildings for managing goods coming into the state. So...DC will make some? Are these naturally occurring structures and if you don't have any in your area you're just screwed? > the only state where the majority of the residents work for the federal government Not even true. DC has 200,000 federal employees out of 680,000 residents. A little over a quarter. Not even close to a majority. Most federal employees work outside DC. Note that taking a job as a federal employee does not mean you should be deprived of Congressional representation. [1] https://cfo.dc.gov/sites/default/files/dc/sites/ocfo/publication/attachments/EINov2021.pdf https://cfo.dc.gov/sites/default/files/dc/sites/ocfo/publica...
MathCodeLove 5y ago
Not everything is racially motivated. Eventually speculation like yours crosses a boundary from legitimate social concern to conspiracy and seeing racist boogeymen in every shadow.
- Bud 5y ago
  "Eventually"? Yeah, except when it doesn't. You're right: not everything is racially motivated. Except for the things that so plainly and obviously are. Also: please do not implicitly label my concern as being not legitimate. I'm not really that into clumsy gaslighting.
  - MathCodeLove 5y ago
    I think you're legitimately concerned, but I think your concerns are about as well grounded in reality as that of most conspiracy theorists. What proof (not tweets or opinion pieces) do you have to support your claim? "There are a lot of black people therefore any adverse action to the region is because of racism" is not proof. California's demographic makeup isn't predominantly white. Why are they a state?
    - pseudalopex 5y ago
      Indigenous people didn't count when California became a state. 99% of the rest were white.[1] [1] https://www2.census.gov/library/publications/decennial/1850/1850a/1850a-47.pdf#page=8 https://www2.census.gov/library/publications/decennial/1850/...
      - selimthegrim 5y ago
        cf. "Indians not taxed" in the Constitution
- shkkmo 5y ago
  It's funny how the two major regions of the US that clearly deserve statehood (DC and Puerto Rico) but have been denied that right for decades, seem to be areas with lots of poor non-whites. Racism is not the only factor in play here (political balance of power is a huge factor), but to deny that racism has played a significant role in creating this situation is ridiculous. I place that racism squarely in the laps of both parties since they both deserve that blame.

bobsil1 5y ago

DC residents should get one-person-one-vote, like most things. We should get rid of 1700s planter superuser backdoors like the disproportional Senate and electoral college.

bobsil1 5y ago
Then we should rebrand away from the slaver-drafted constitution to the Free States of America, a fourth founding after the original, post-Civil War and Civil Rights Movement. That would match what we actually have, a multiethnic democracy welcoming global talent. Giving residents of Wyoming 70× the Senate voting power of any Californian is a joke.
- imgabe 5y ago
  Not a joke. It was the intent that populous states should not be able to steamroll less populous states in the Senate.
  - MagnumOpus 5y ago
    In other words, rigging the Senate towards people in empty states. (Land ownership shouldn't matter in a democratic republic, people should.)
    - imgabe 5y ago
      There’s this whole other part of Congress called the House of Representatives that is proportional to population. Land ownership has nothing to do with anything. Everyone gets to vote for their Senators (except people in DC). We did away with the requirement to own land a long time ago.
  - UncleMeat 5y ago
    It is important to define the term "steamroll." If California broke up into 200 states, would they need 2 Senators each to protect themselves from being steamrolled? If so, then why don't Californians already need 200 Senators?

imgabe 5y ago

That's not how this works. We create a government and decide what rights citizens have. We did that, wrote a whole constitution about it. Then we make sure every citizen has those rights. If there are imbalances in the design of the government, that's a separate problem that we fix on its own. Depriving some subset of citizens of their rights is not the answer.

torstenvl 5y ago