[Rembrandt_fan]

You wrote, "That's rich. Republicans redefining states' rights to fit their agenda. Nope, that's never happened before...."

Unless I'm mistaken, you're making a reference to the Civil War, where the core issue was the 'state right' to impose the institution of slavery within its state borders, and to implement that 'peculiar institution' in similarly inclined territories.

And you wonder why that particular issue gains no traction in the national debate. Stating the obvious, any candidate who argues a de facto pro-Confederacy position is doomed politically, and rightfully so.

A descendant of Union veterans, I'm very, very glad the Confederacy lost, although troubled the issues igniting that conflict still somehow manage to come up--usually with sour-grapes neo-confederates who confuse the personal greatness and nobility of men like Robert E. Lee and Stonewall Jackson with the utter moral bankruptcy of the cause they served.

[billbears]

Unless I'm mistaken, you're making a reference to the Civil War,

And who says Republicans are thick?

where the core issue was the 'state right' to impose the institution of slavery within its state borders,

Well you were doing so good. The right of the separate and sovereign states to determine their destinies and not be overtaxed to prop up northern industries. Republican/Whig industrial protectionism was a cause, perhaps the most important cause. But victors do write the history don't they?

This is the stance of conservative libertarians. An understanding that laws do need to be implemented at some level of government, if the majority of the citizenry agree to such laws. But nowhere in the Constitution was it intended to be at the federal level. And if all the Republican party has to offer is implementation of moral or other laws that were intended at the state level, they can rot for all I care.