
Is America Headed for a New Kind of Civil War? - rarcher2011
http://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/is-america-headed-for-a-new-kind-of-civil-war
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wahern
Ridiculous:

    
    
      Mines’s definition of a civil war is large-scale violence
      that includes a rejection of traditional political authority
      and requires the National Guard to deal with it. 
    

By that definition the U.S. has experienced civil war, episodically, for a
significant part of it's existence.

~~~
Waterluvian
It's an interesting thought. Civil war was obvious because it was total war.
It became the focus of the entire nation. But the U.S. has become increasingly
effective at going to war without it being total war. I wonder if it can do
the same with itself?

~~~
handedness
That the US can wage small wars abroad without impacting its domestic capital
production and labor bases much at all is due largely to asymmetry of forces,
economies, and of course distance.

Another American civil war that isn't just brief and minor discretionary
intervention by the Nat'l Guard (as in the LA riots or Katrina)–which is an
awfully poor definition of civil war–but rather is more like 1861-1865, would
significantly impact domestic quality of life. In fact, I'd wager the American
middle-ground between the small regional events it's experienced in recent
history and total chaos is small, if it exists at all.

Which is probably what will keep it from happening, so long as most people are
reasonably prosperous, which is likely to be the case, assuming it deals
gracefully with the rapidly dwindling lower middle class and the rapid
consolidation of production (a non-trivial assumption).

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brighteyes
The article title is

> Is America Headed for a New Kind of Civil War?

which is much less provocative than the HN title which is

> Experts think there is a 35% chance of an another American Civil War

The former specifically mentions "kind", suggesting we are talking about
something very different than the past civil war. The latter implies 35% of
repeating the past one.

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mjevans
I believe this conflict stems from:

* Lack of opportunity (especially for the poor)

* Conflation of race (looks) and subculture with general oppression of the population rooted in the economic divide.

* Targeting portions of the population in a self re-enforcing feedback loop of further isolation and lost opportunity.

* Lack of civic planning and political leadership towards ends that improve the outcome for as many as possible as much as possible.

* Lack of a clear goal or set of goals to work towards globally, let alone locally.

The most obvious global projects for improving everyone's experience are:

* Ending hunger (surplus of food)

* Increasing available (useful) energy to improve quality of life.

* Science fiction projects in space could be a good use of productivity.

* * Robots mining the asteroid belt.

* * Orbital elevators and a ring around the planet. (Useful as a platform for communications, energy transmission, and solar arrays.)

~~~
liberte82
The most immediate concern is the rising fascist movement in the United
States. You list good root causes, but there's an immediate problem here and
it's not going anywhere.

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twiss
> Mines concluded that the United States faces a sixty-per-cent chance of
> civil war over the next ten to fifteen years. Other experts’ predictions
> ranged from five per cent to ninety-five per cent. The sobering consensus
> was thirty-five per cent.

It sounds like they took the average and called that the consensus, while in
reality, the experts couldn't disagree more.

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dvfjsdhgfv
> Based on his experience in civil wars on three continents, Mines cited five
> conditions that support his prediction: entrenched national polarization,
> with no obvious meeting place for resolution; increasingly divisive press
> coverage and information flows

This last point is fairly obvious to anyone with common sense, and may people
- also on HN - object to increasingly divisive reporting, often aiming at
clicks rather than the truth. An yet, most media outlets keep doing it, always
finding someone else to blame.

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chmaynard
I'm deeply disappointed with the decision by the Virginia ACLU to legitimize
the rally in Charlottesville in the name of free speech. The ACLU is not
naive. They must know that many white supremacists are domestic terrorists.
Why do they mindlessly support their "right to assemble"?

~~~
liberte82
They're ideologues. I'm not saying that as a good or a bad thing. But
remaining consistent to their principles is their top priority.

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xbmcuser
The way US citizens are armed is unlike anything in the rest of the world. I
used to think with Trump winning the black lives matter thing could erupt into
a civil war as Trump is someone that would send in the national guard and
start shooting. Now looking at these white protests it could go the other way
as well.

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Torai
How does one estimate the probability is 35%?

Psychohistory?

~~~
liberte82
Throw a dart at a board?

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transverse
It's pretty simple what the answer is. It is two territories, one exclusively
for blacks, and the other exclusively for whites. The rest of the USA can stay
as is. But of course, why would HN readers accept the obvious truth when it's
easier to downvote and dismiss.

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petraeus
It would be the shortest war in history

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LyndsySimon
Presumably you mean this because one side has all the guns.

While that's true enough, I wouldn't expect that to make it short. It might
cause the rapid defeat of one faction, but once the genie of naked political
violence is out of the bottle I seriously doubt it could be put back in its
place so easily.

