Re: Alternate history[Here's my Timeline](long)

In a message dated 2/18/00 5:21:52 PM Central Standard Time, 
john_t_leary@pronetusa.net writes:

<< > > Yukon, Central Provinces, the US Plains States and the Southwest
are
 > > returned to Native Peoples.
 > 
 > ^This is ridiculous^ 
 ...Snip...JTL
 That's like saying lets just give
 > Israel back to it's neighbors, with out any one bothering to think
"hmm,
 > wonder what the Israelis will tell us to do with this idea".
 > 
 > Jade Tseng
 
 Jade,
      I must agree that this is science-fiction, not fantasy!
 Not stopping to consider that every man, woman, and child in
 Isreal has a gun and knows how to use it, would mess up the timeline
 that was presented.   Same thing with the USA, a million man army
 of occupation would cease to exist in about two weeks.
  >>

I would agree, as far as the Southwest, but the rest of the area
mentioned, 
the plains states especially, are going that way anyway, if you look at 
census reports from those areas, they are either losing population, or 
holding steady, which means that the population is getting older, and as
soon 
as it hits a certain average age, will start depopulating quickly. There
is 
already an environmental movement, small but growing, to make vast 
unpopulated regions of the plains states what they call the "Buffalo
Commons" 
to go back to it's original natural state. It's not out of the realm of 
possibility that this could be combined with a well thought out PR
campaign 
to allow the decendants of Native Americans to make that a independant 
homeland. After all, with the decrease in population, via moving and
age, 
there won't be too many "red-necks" living there at that time, and they
don't 
have good PR... So an internal Native American "independant" state, I
can 
buy, give it enough time, and it'll probably happen. 
As far as the Southwest, the timeline should be more realistic, as I
live 
here and can see the demographic changes. If Mexico doesn't have another

revolution in the next 10-20 years, the whole border region will be
defacto 
mexican territory, with the US having token control of their side of the

border. This is simply taking present trends and extrapolating them out,
it 
could change for a number of reasons. For example, if there is a
revolution 
in Mexico, then the border would become heavily militarized, preventing
the 
leakage we see now. Or if relations between Mexico and the US soured, we

could see again a tightening of border controls. If a isolationist
faction 
came into favor in the US, there could be a reversal of this trend. But 
barring significant changes the southern border will "change hands",
sometime 
in the next 10-20 years.

John
JohnDHamill@aol.com