{"id":12961,"date":"2014-02-12T15:01:58","date_gmt":"2014-02-12T15:01:58","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/praag.org\/?p=12961"},"modified":"2014-02-12T18:21:04","modified_gmt":"2014-02-12T18:21:04","slug":"western-maryland-wants-own-state","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/praag.org\/?p=12961","title":{"rendered":"Western Maryland wants own State"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"secession\"<\/a>A tale of two Marylands: Western Maryland and the rest of the state. Fed up with high taxes and gun control, some people want to break away and go it alone.<\/p>\n

Mary Bubala explains why they\u2019re trying to form their own state.<\/p>\n

There\u2019s a storm brewing over the beautiful mountains and valleys of Western Maryland. More and more people in those five counties say Governor Martin O\u2019Malley is out of touch and they want to break away from the rest of the state.<\/p>\n

\u201cI can\u2019t imagine Maryland without Western Maryland,\u201d said Governor Martin O\u2019Malley.<\/p>\n

\u201cDo you actually care about your citizens?\u201d questioned Rob Parr.<\/p>\n

\u201cI certainly don\u2019t live in a bubble and I go around the state all the time,\u201d O\u2019Malley said.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhy don\u2019t you want to listen to people that you don\u2019t agree with?\u201d said Suzanne Olden.<\/p>\n

\u201cI spend my whole day listening,\u201d O\u2019Malley said.<\/p>\n

Scott Strzelczyk, Suzanne Olden and Rob Parr are part of a growing group that wants to rip Maryland in two, creating the nation\u2019s 51st state. They met recently at O\u2019Lordan\u2019s Irish Pub in Westminster to tell WJZ they\u2019re fed up with politics as usual in Annapolis.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf your vote doesn\u2019t count, it\u2019s the same as having no vote. We\u2019re not free,\u201d Strzelczyk said. \u201cWe\u2019re doing exactly what they did in 1776. I just simply want to live as a free human being with limited government intrusion in my life and that\u2019s really why I do this.\u201d<\/p>\n

They claim Maryland\u2019s lawmakers don\u2019t listen to their concerns so they want to form a state more in sync with their beliefs.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve gone down to Annapolis. I\u2019ve complained; I\u2019ve been in rallies,\u201d said Parr. \u201cIt all falls on deaf ears.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThe attitude is sit down, shut up, we don\u2019t care what you think,\u201d said Olden.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are enslaved to this government in Maryland that we want nothing to do with. All we simply want to do is peacefully leave,\u201d Strzelczyk said.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a free country. People are allowed to express those opinions but we\u2019re one Maryland and we\u2019re stronger together,\u201d O\u2019Malley said.<\/p>\n

Maryland isn\u2019t the only state where frustrated citizens want to break away. It\u2019s happening in Colorado, California, Arizona and Michigan.<\/p>\n

\u201cRepublican counties are becoming more emphatically Republican; Democratic counties are becoming more emphatically Democratic, which means the divisions between Republican and Democratic counties are becoming all the more sharp,\u201d said Johns Hopkins University professor Matthew Crenson.<\/p>\n

Now the movement here is picking up steam. More than 8,000 people like the Facebook page for the Western Maryland Initiative and more than a thousand have signed petitions\u2013but could they really form a new state?<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is a peaceful way to resolve irreconcilable differences,\u201d Strzelczyk said. \u201cLots of people out there feel like there is no recourse, there is no hope.\u201d<\/p>\n

But they know their chances of success are slim to none.<\/p>\n

\u201cMaryland\u2019s my home. I was born here. It\u2019s my home,\u201d Olden said.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf we leave and other people come in our place, buy our homes or whatever the case, these problems still exist,\u201d Strzelczyk said.<\/p>\n

\u201cA diversity of perspectives and a diversity of people. That\u2019s what makes us one Maryland,\u201d O\u2019Malley said.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhy would anyone want to deny us our right of self-determination when that\u2019s the basis of how all our governments are formed in this country? Why would anyone want to deny us that?\u201d Strzelczyk said.<\/p>\n

The Western Maryland Initiative is still working on a name for its proposed state. So far, the choices include Liberty, Antietam and Augusta.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A tale of two Marylands: Western Maryland and the rest of the state. Fed up with high taxes and gun control, some people want to break away and go it alone. Mary Bubala explains why they\u2019re trying to form their own state. There\u2019s a storm brewing over the beautiful mountains and valleys of Western Maryland. … Continue reading “Western Maryland wants own State”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":12962,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,10],"tags":[1553,2158,745,8312],"class_list":["post-12961","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","category-united-states","tag-diversity","tag-secession","tag-usa","tag-western-maryland"],"cc_featured_image_caption":{"caption_text":false,"source_text":false,"source_url":false},"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/praag.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/02\/secession.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/praag.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12961","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/praag.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/praag.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/praag.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/praag.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=12961"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/praag.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12961\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12979,"href":"https:\/\/praag.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12961\/revisions\/12979"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/praag.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/12962"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/praag.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=12961"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/praag.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=12961"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/praag.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=12961"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}