So some Indian nation seceded from the Union last night during The Biggest Loser. Won't DC have the courtesy to invade?

Lincoln's Union crushed the seceded South in 1861 for this exact behavior, just on a larger scale, like a truck scale. If Bush doesn't parade a manly tank column of freedom up and down the Cheyenne until an indigenous insurgent lobs the tomahawk heard 'round the world, W's a majestic hypocrite with a big pink papoose.

So DC doesn't care, but why doesn't CNN? When a town in Vermont finally manages to secede, that will surely be national news, right? So why isn't the Lakota story worth any mentions as of noon today?

Well, your average American has been taught that weird things are bad, except when they're done by ethnics; in that case, weird things are cultural. Like when people ignore Borat when he wants to kill gypsies; we don't know what gypsies are, but we assume if we contend that they shouldn't be killed, we're infringing on Borat's culture of killing them. Human sacrifice, fire dancing, eyelid piercing, rap, secession... these are things we know are bad, but the savages we employ like them, and we don't want to be sued. So to your average American this story is not about tax resistance and personal sovereignty, but peace pipes and wigwams and poor brown people who'll falter without our blankets and food stamps.

Indians will be forced to contend with untaxed outside investors and banking, plus freedom-loving tourists, and probably even a few small businesses started by incoming libertarians? My god, these poor brown people will be nearly as impoverished as the Cayman Islands.

Mr. bright side: At least we'll have somewhere to send the imm'grints!

Elsewhere: Is Scotland Ready for Independence?
What Crisis in Belgium?