The last time there was a big secessionist movement, it was because the south did not want to think of black people as fully human.

This time, it's ... well, it's pretty much the same.

Oh sure, it gets dressed up with lots of other stuff.  It did then too.  But this thought has been working its way through my head ever since the other day, when either Olbermann or Maddow noted that the failure of the "socialist" label to stick was now causing the wingnuts to attempt to use the "fascist" label, and wondered what they would say when that one failed to stick.  I realized the answer: the Becks and Limbaughs and so on would, if they were really honest, grab hold of the nearest bored-looking voter, shake him vigorously, and yell: "my God, man, haven't you noticed that the President is black?!?"