What if America Split?

Are we so hopelessly divided that a Split between red and blue America is inevitable? And how would that look? Kurt Schlichter's Kelly Turnbull stories are the perfect cautionary tale.

Four years ago, I suggested that it might be time for America to split.

Red and Blue America simply cannot continue pretending to even like each other anymore. We have, as I wrote at the time, Irreconcilable Differences.

The union between Red State Americans and Blue State Americans is irreparably damaged.

We have irreconcilable differences that we simply cannot overcome.

It isn’t even your affair with gay marriage. That’s nowhere near the biggest problem.

It’s just the last straw.

And, honestly, compared to your hundred-year affair with Socialism? This affair with gay marriage really is just a drop in the bucket.

I think it’s time for you to move out.

Listen, I’d say we’d leave, but, really, you’ve always hated our home here in the United States of America. You’ve spent the last one hundred years trying to change our home. You’ve flirted with communism. We’ve seen how you made eyes at those Marxists in Cuba. Don’t tell me we’re wrong about that. And we hear those nasty things you say about our home to your friends in Europe and the Middle East.

So, no. We get to stay in the United States of America. You’re the ones who have to change your country’s name. Perhaps the Union of the Soviet Socialist Democracy. Has a nice ring to it, don’t you think? It has “union” in it, and I know how much you like that. Plus socialist! You guys have always been very taken with that word. And, since you’ve always thought we were a democracy even though we weren’t, “Democracy” seems an appropriate word for your new nation.

Now, I’m not the only conservative writer who suggested this split.

In April of last year, Jesse Kelly wrote “It’s Time for the United States to Divorce Before Things Get Dangerous.”

And this past February, Kurt Schlichter addressed this idea of a split in his column “It’s Time for America to Break Up with Liberals.”

Not to sound snotty or smug, but I wrote about it first, boys.

It really does seem that we are reaching the point where half the country detests the other half of the country.  We all see the exact same news story.  Half will conclude Trump is a puppet of Vladimir Putin. And the other half will conclude that President Trump was the victim of a witch hunt.

There is no convincing one side or the other.  There is no persuasion possible between the two sides.

It is, as Scott Adams described it, a Two-Movie Reality:

We’re all looking at the same events and interpreting them wildly differently. That’s how cognitive dissonance and confirmation bias work. They work together to create a spontaneous hallucination that gets reinforced over time. That hallucination becomes your reality until something changes.

This phenomenon has nothing to do with natural intelligence. We like to think that the people on the other side of the political debate are dumb, under-informed, or just plain evil. That’s not the case. We’re actually experiencing different realities. I mean that literally.

The way things are headed, it really does seem that a Split is inevitable. There is no uniting us anymore.

And I just don’t see that improving any time soon.

We might still be one nation in name.  But are we still one nation?

The Split is already happening.

When Alabama passed its pro-life bill, half the country thinks nothing of virulently attacking white men, those dumb white women who are dupes of the Patriarchy, and people of faith who (in the words of Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez) want to “turn the United States into a far-right Christian theocracy.”

How do we avoid an inevitable split when this is the kind of seething hatred one side has for another?

Even those running for President feel no compunction over attacking and vilifying half of the country in order to appeal to the other half.

We’re “deplorable,” “extremists,” “racists,” “Islamophobes,” “Xenophobes” – the list is endless.  These labels aren’t being hurled at half the country by random nitwits on Twitter.  These are things said by candidates for President of a nation with the word "United" in its name.

So is it time for America to split?

Or is this Split simply unavoidable?

After spending Saturday morning clearing my landscaping and doing transplants (take that Lupus!), I decided to spend the afternoon relaxing with a good book.

So I chose Kurt Schlichter’s 2016 novel “People’s Republic.”

The premise of the book is just this topic.  What if America split?

It is set in 2034 and the Split (as it is referred to) began during the presidency of the “sickly Hillary Clinton” (Schlichter’s words) and culminated with the Treaty of St. Louis – when both red and blue states agreed to the Split.

Red America remains the United States of America. And Blue America becomes the People’s Republic.

In typical Kurt Schlichter fashion, “People’s Republic,” while disturbingly dystopic, is quite funny.  There were several times that I laughed out loud.

I started the book around three in the afternoon and finished it just before nine – taking only one break to feed the animals.  I even forgot to feed myself, I was so into the story.

“People’s Republic” is the first in a series of novels featuring Schlichter’s character Kelly Turnbull.  Currently, there are three novels.

The prequel “Indian Country” came out in 2017.

And the most recent, “Wildfire” was released last November.

Turnbull is a cross between Mitch Rapp and Snake Plisskin from “Escape from New York" -- which makes for a really cool hero.

In “People’s Republic,” Turnbull agrees to enter the Blue to retrieve a young woman who defected to the People’s Republic from her home in Texas.  The young girl has become a bit of a propaganda celebrity in the Blue States – the pretty, blond Red-stater who kicked the dust of the racist Red off of her shoes and headed for the Blue Utopia of the People’s Republic.

And trust me.  The People’s Republic is about as much of a Utopia as Venezuela – with the elites walled away in their enclaves while outside the walls, the rabble riot for food.

It really is a great yarn.

This Split is not the America Kurt Schlichter wants.  But rather, the America we will have if we continue on the path we are on.

It's a cautionary tale.

This afternoon, I’ll be reading the prequel “Indian Country,” which means by Monday night, I’ll probably have "Wildfire" read too.

I’ll be sure to report back when I’m done.

In the meantime, you really should check them out at Amazon.  You can get all three for less than forty bucks.