Thousands sign WhiteHouse.gov petition for Alaska to secede -- to Russia
Thousands sign WhiteHouse.gov petition for Alaska to secede -- to Russia
Published March 27, 2014 FoxNews.com
http://a57.foxnews.com/global.fncsta....jpg?ve=1&tl=1Mar. 10, 2014: A frozen beach on the Bering Sea coast is seen near the last stretch mushers must pass before the finish line of the Iditarod dog sled race in Nome, Alaska.REUTERS
Moscow’s annexation of Crimea was condemned worldwide, but some people in Alaska apparently are yearning for the days when they, too, were part of Mother Russia.
A petition on the White House website created by “S.V.” of Anchorage is calling on Alaskans and others to "vote" for Alaska to secede from the U.S. and become a part of Russia.
In less than a week, the petition, titled “Alaska Back to Russia,” has garnered nearly 30,000 signatures, though it's unclear where they are from.
“Vote for secession of Alaska from the United States and joining Russia,” the petition says.
The petition, though strangely worded and difficult to understand, describes how Alaska was originally settled and populated by native Russians.
Secretary of State William Seward purchased Alaska from Russia in 1867 for $7.2 million, in a decision decried at the time as “Seward’s Folly.” The territory officially became the 49th state on Jan. 3, 1959.
Even if the White House responds to the Alaska petition, it is almost certainly going nowhere. The Alaska petition offers no specifics for how the proposed secession would even be executed, whether by referendum or some other process. Further, the Supreme Court ruled, in the wake of the Civil War, that unilateral secession is unconstitutional.
The White House typically issues an official response to petitions on the official website if they receive 100,000 signatures in 30 days -- in this case, the deadline would be April 20. A similar petition in 2012 calling for Texas to secede from the U.S. reached this goal, and the White House responded by saying “our states remain united.”
“Our founding fathers established the Constitution of the United States ‘in order to form a more perfect union’ through the hard and frustrating but necessary work of self-government,” the official response to the Texas petition said. “They enshrined in that document the right to change our national government through the power of the ballot -- a right that generations of Americans have fought to secure for all. But they did not provide a right to walk away from it.”
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2014...cmp=latestnews
30,000 Alaskans sign petition to ditch US, rejoin Russia
30,000 Alaskans sign petition to ditch US, rejoin Russia
POSTED AT 3:01 PM ON MARCH 29, 2014 BY JAZZ SHAW
Unrest in the nation must be running high if people are looking for ways to pull up stakes and leave the union entirely. Some Texans petitioned the White House to break away in 2012, though not much came of the effort. Possibly my favorite breakaway story was that ofthe Conch Republic, which seceded from the US in 1982, immediately suing the government for $1B in war damages.
Despite the lack of success on the part of these previous efforts, they all had one thing in common. They weren’t looking to join up with any other nations, but rather to strike out on their own as a new, independent state. But not so the latest effort, reported by our colleagues at Town Hall, where a petition has been submitted to the White House to allow Alaska to secede from the United States and join up with Russia.Some Alaskans apparently are not opposed to Russian President Vladimir Putin’s recent annexation of Crimea—in fact, they are hoping to begrabbed up next.
More than 30,000 Alaskans have signed the petition “Alaska back to Russia,” pleading that the White House allow them to secede and join their native land. If the request garners 100,000 signatures by April 20, the White House will make an official response.
I’m not entirely sure how to gauge the heat index for this idea among Alaskans. 30,000 signatures in New York City wouldn’t cover two city blocks, but in Alaska (population less than 3/4 million for the entire state) it starts to sound like an at least marginally beefy number. But are those folks all actually from Alaska? I only ask because I’m not sure how they screen the IP addresses for these things. In any event, perhaps they’d have drawn a bit more support if the originator had employed something that sounded a bit more like… English?Groups Siberian russians crossed the Isthmus (now the Bering Strait) 16-10 thousand years ago.
Russian began to settle on the Arctic coast, Aleuts inhabited the Aleutian Archipelago.
First visited Alaska August 21, 1732, members of the team boat “St. Gabriel »under the surveyor Gvozdev and assistant navigator I. Fedorov during the expedition Shestakov and DI Pavlutski 1729-1735 years
Vote for secession of Alaska from the United States and joining Russia
On a second read, perhaps it was written by somebody who is a native Russian speaker with English as a second language. Either way, it’s a bit of a puzzler.
I can’t imagine why the rank and file Alaskan would have any interest in changing their status. Dropping out to join another country really only suggests two options. One, as the author offers, leaves you stuck with Vladimir Putin. The other? Canada… and the less said about that the better. The mainland US certainly has no incentive to lose Alaska either. It’s a strategically important location for a variety of reasons, not to mention being a key element in our energy infrastructure. Alaska is a treasure trove of natural wonders and a great tourist destination. On the other side of the balance sheet there is virtually nothing to argue in favor of losing them.
If this petition is coming from nothing more than a general dissatisfaction with either Barack Obama in particular or Washington in general, it’s a drastic overreaction. Obama will be gone soon enough, and if you don’t like the way things are going in DC, elect better people. But stick with the USA, Alaskans. While imperfect, it’s still the best (and pretty much only) game in town.
Tags: Alaska, crazy, Russia, Vladimir Putin
Related Posts:
http://hotair.com/archives/2014/03/2...rejoin-russia/
