Nolte: This CHAZ Idea Is Growing on Me

Demonstrators march to the Seattle Police Departments East Precinct after marching inside Seattle City Hall, led by Seattle City Council member Kshama Sawant, on June 9, 2020 in Seattle, Washington. Protests have continued in many parts of the city including around the Seattle Police Departments East Precinct, an area that …
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This whole CHAZ idea is starting to grow on me. Border walls. High-capacity weapons. Federal and state governments no longer exist. A neighborhood in charge of itself, creating its own laws, its own mores, its own economic and justice system. The left like it. The media freakin’ love it. If you think about it, what’s not to like?

As I write this, Black Lives Matter and Antifa have created their own confederacy and seceded from the union with the establishment of a Capitol Hill Autonomous Zone, or CHAZ, right in the heart of Seattle. They have seized six city blocks, built border walls, and are running around with guns in a community that reflects their values and their desire to live their lives in the way they choose to live their lives.

This includes high-capacity weapons and vigilante groups that punish vandalism with a good, sound beating.

The best part is that the CHAZ residents are refusing to allow “biased media” to enter their country. That sounds like paradise to me.

As far as I know, anyone who wishes to exit the Seattle CHAZ is allowed to exit the CHAZ, so what’s the harm? If you want to live under a warlord, you can live under a warlord.

Obviously, there are some issues here. Within the CHAZ you have about 500 residences, people who might not want to be part of the CHAZ. You also have property owners who are probably a little worried — and for good reason.

But is this really the worst idea in the world?

I’m not calling for armed insurrection or anything, but let’s be adults for a second and talk about the concept…

I don’t know anyone on the left or right who isn’t fed up with the one-size-fits-all madness coming out of Washington DC, the courts, and state governments.

The left is frustrated and angry over abortion restrictions, laws that allow corporations to donate money to political campaigns, and voter ID. What’s more, they want guns, the police, prisons, and charter schools outlawed and pot legalized. They want green energy, CEO pay limited, more socialism, lockdowns during pandemics, speech restrictions, and biological men to be allowed to compete in women’s sports. What the left resents more than anything is having their lives shaped by executive orders signed by Donald Trump and whichever way Clarence Thomas votes.

The left believe in centralized authority.

On the other side, there’s the right, who oppose abortion, public schools, and the war on their sacred religious rights being waged by the sexual revolution. We want to hunt, fish, worship, judge people based on their personal character as opposed to identity… We want a colorblind society with unlimited speech and artistic freedom, as well as a level playing field that allows everyone to achieve as much personal freedom, wealth, and success as their hard work will allow.

The right believe in individual liberty within the framework of “live and let live” and the Ten Commandments.

Does a workable CHAZ not sound like a possible solution to this massive cultural divide?

Thomas Jefferson envisioned a nation of farmers, where everyone owned their own little piece of America and basically governed themselves: an agrarian society that grew its own food, hired its own teachers, built its own churches, and left the neighboring societies alone. If you didn’t like the way your town was governed, you were free to vote with your feet and move to a place more to your liking. That might sound less than visionary when you consider how technology — cars, planes, mass media — changed everything, but you have to keep in mind that from the beginning of civilization to the day Jefferson died in 1826, there was almost no real technological advancements.

But basically, Jefferson described a CHAZ, no?

The Southern Confederacy was a CHAZ, no?

Obviously, we cannot allow for a CHAZ where slavery is legal or NAMBLA has its way with young boys, but maybe there’s a way for Blue and Red America to agree to just leave each other the hell alone.

Maybe we can agree that the federal government should protect us from foreign invaders and otherwise stay out of our business.

New York City can be its own CHAZ.

Wyoming can be its own CHAZ.

Southern California can be its own CHAZ.

Northern California can be its own CHAZ.

If the Austin CHAZ wants an abortion clinic on every corner and rural Texas wants abortion outlawed… Well, there you go.

Tear down or erect all the statues you want!

A CHAZ can be as large as a state and as small as a compound.

The more we eliminate central control and authority, the more we balkanize into societies governed by laws, mores, and rules that reflect our own personal beliefs, the happier we will all be and the less concerned we will be with how others live because it’s no skin off my nose if you legalize pot in your CHAZ and teach homosexuality in your schools, and it’s no skin off your nose if my CHAZ legalizes prayer in school.

Honestly, what’s wrong with that idea?

You go your way. I’ll go mine.

We’ve already self-sorted and migrated into Red and Blue enclaves where this could be pretty quickly put into place.  

The federal government and some state governments are now so overbearing and powerful, every political decision is a bitter battle because we’re forcing our values and ideas on one another.

Remove that stress, and things can only get better.

I’m just saying think about it…



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