In a small town in southeastern Pennsylvania, a war-weary president commemorated a new military cemetery, few of which's first honorees had to travel far to final interment, having laid down their lives on that ground just a few months before. It's useful to remember the words, in light of the recent election, and all the angry talk of Blue and Red, instead of Blue and Gray:

Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth upon this continent, a new nation, conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.

Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battlefield of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.

But, in a larger sense, we can not dedicate - we can not consecrate - we can not hallow this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us--that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion - that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain - that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom - and that government of the people, by the people, and for the people, shall not perish from the earth.

All for nothing, if the blue states' currently whimsical musings on secession were to come to fruition.

I just got through reading through the thread on that topic below. Interesting how the blue staters seem to think the current distribution of industry and wealth would remain static in the event of such a momentous change. Never mind the cushy deals they get with the red states for raw materials and food under the current arrangement, they might want to check and see how their captains of industry voted before taking that particular leap...

All for nothing, if the blue states' currently whimsical musings on secession were to come to fruition.

Slightly off-topic, but it amuses me that these also tend to be the states with the strongest gun control laws.

[quote]All for nothing, if the blue states' currently whimsical musings on secession were to come to fruition.[/quote]

Considering that 85% of the .mil and the guns are in the red states, it would be:

[comicbookguy]Shortest insurrection ever![/comicbookguy]

Maybe a split isn't such a bad thing since there does seem to be a real schism between the two regions. Make sure the Federal debt is assigned per capita!