Let’s be honest, 2009 is when the Cold Civil War really turned hot. A Democratic Congress and a BLACK PRESIDENT sent the modern Confederate GOP around the bend. This was THE END OF THE WORLD and had to be resisted at all costs, which they did. Scorched earth all the way, in a way the Democrats chose not to do to George W. Bush despite losing with more votes for their candidate than he got. (A lesson I hope the Democrats will go to school on this time.)
But where it really became possible was in the tortured logic of the Supreme Court when John Roberts decided that individual states were free to opt out of the Medicaid expansion in the Affordable Care Act. And so they did. GOP-controlled states decided that they would simply not participate in any meaningful way in the biggest expansion of health care access since Medicare. That was, in effect, secession by other means. Through tortured logic, “states rights” and the malice – willful or otherwise – of the Chief Justice, they cut themselves off just so they wouldn’t have to be part of “Obamacare.”
There’s a lesson here, and that is: a surprising amount of stuff still depends on the states and is only “federal” inasmuch as Uncle Sam provides a financial carrot to encourage things. Stuff like education funding, stuff like highway funds – the only reason the drinking age is 21 nationally is because Congress made that a condition of getting interstate money back in the 1980s. If a state wanted to get on its high horse and reject the temptations of the federal sugar tit, they could cut the drinking age to 12 and there’s nothing in law to prevent it.
Thing is, you’re starting to see this go the other way. California raised the smoking age to 21 (which they are legally able to do) and legalized weed (jury’s out, even if you consider the irony there). California already has stricter air-quality standards than the EPA because the California Air Resource Board predates the EPA. And California’s gun control laws are already tighter than anywhere else in America bar perhaps Massachusetts, to the point where most gun makers have a separate line item on the website for “CA Compliant” merchandise. Even that Federal money stick goes the other way. Republicans are threatening to cut federal money for “sanctuary cities” and San Francisco has already told them to go shit in a hat. Covered California isn’t going anywhere anytime soon, and there’s very little to prevent it being sustained locally even if the ACA bites the dust nationally, not least because Jerry Brown has never been averse to raising taxes to pay for goods and services. Judging by the GDP of the state – top ten in the world – it doesn’t seem to be hurting much.
In 2014, California sent more money to the Feds in taxes than it got back, to the tune of over $3500 for every man, woman and child in the Golden State. If Ferret Top wants to cut taxes, California will be happy to keep that money for itself, and will do just fine spending on itself. We’ll be happy to show you what happens when “states rights” becomes a race to the top instead of the bottom. We are California. We’re where the future comes from.