Should California “Succeed” From the Union?
It’s pretty simple to figure out when a news story has jumped from the wire services to the Popular Press. Just reading through the online comments will tell you, minute by minute, when an article has crossed over from journalism into the murky realm of The Mainstream Media.
The first few responses to any posted article will usually be tame, even thoughtful, perhaps arguing some relevant citation, or maybe complimenting the author on a well-written piece. Soon the talking-head brigade starts posting and the comments rhetoric begins to parrot the same talking points over and over –usually noted in the same order, and all with the same wording and catch phrases.
By the time you start to see the deleted-by-administrator flags popping up willy nilly you know the tablogs have picked it up. And when the story hits Drudge, they just give up and close comments altogether.
In short, the concentric rings of a story’s dilution bring a corresponding degradation of critical thought. The public’s reaction becomes the story and what the author said is rendered largely irrelevant. Such was the case in last week’s provocative essay by The Guardian reporter, Paul Harris; Will California Become America’s First Failed State?”
It was a compelling thought, and my first answer was Yes, it’s already failed. The question is what are we going to do about it? Bail it out like we did New York City? Fire everyone and put the perps in jail like we did in Orange Country, CA?
Then I thought, Nah. They’re probably going to let Goldman Sachs take it over, sell off the assets to the FED and let Treasury buy it back—or was it the other way around?
I noticed a huge number of comments after the article, and lacking anything better to do now that I’m officially classified as hardcore unemployed, I took it upon myself to read all 734 of them so you wouldn’t have to. (Actually, I did it for aladinsane. He would have loved this stuff.)
By my estimate, 80% of these surprisingly lucid and well-spelled essays (The Guardian is a Brit news journal after all,) mentioned two or more of the following factors in California’s incipient collapse:
-Illegal aliens! -Liberals! -Socialism! -Proposition 13! -Taxes!
-Proposition 98!* (*fairly obscure amendment that mandates a minimum 39% of the state budget be allocated for education. When I began seeing this reference, I knew the Americans had hijacked the thread.
-Collective bargaining rights for public employees!
-Moral Degeneracy! -Nancy Pelosi! -Delta Smelt!
Note: Barbara Boxer!, Arnold Schwarzenegger!, Diane Feinstein!, Moral Degeneracy!, and Green (anything)! accounted for another 19% or so of the reasons why The California Dream is dead.
Pretty standard stuff.
But somewhere down around the six hundredth comment I saw this– writ large in caps.
CALIFORNIA IS NOT BROKE. BIG GOVERNMENT OF CALIFORNIA IS BROKE.
And that got me to thinking.
It’s pretty obvious the State of California is going to have to come up with a new Constitution; the one we have now is literally unworkable.
At issue are The Scylla and Charybdis of the California legislative process. California’s democratic initiative process allows anyone with enough money to pay street persons a-buck-a-name to gather signatures, to get any proposition before the voters. It’s a nice idea, but it aptly demonstrates why we Americans have a representative democracy. I’ve personally seen propositions guaranteeing lifetime pension benefits for school janitors and “landscaping technicians” who have worked in that capacity for 18 months, marketed as the “Clean School Bathrooms For Children” initiative. It’s painfully obvious that the people standing in front of the grocery store soliciting signatures are likely incapable of even reading the petition they are asking people to sign, let alone understanding what it says—or who it might be behind it.
The second impediment to getting anything through the State Legislature is the 2/3 supermajority rule—which requires a two-thirds vote to pass any tax or reapportionment bill.
With an entrenched State Democratic majority controlling the ways and means scheduling, and a State Republican party that refuses to pass any tax increase as a matter of party platform, it’s a recipe for instant procedural gridlock. And on the off-chance that something should make it through the legislature, the sheer number of amendments already added to the Constitution make it likely that new legislation will be in direct opposition to at least one existing law or apportionment, and thus held up in the courts for years– if not decades– while the various faction$ battle it out.
Actually, for the electorate, it’s a pretty good system– it keeps our elected and appointed officials so busy squabbling among themselves, that it does its own damage control by keeping them and their legislative mischief out of our hair.
But to an increasing number of disaffected citizens, it’s a crony-ridden system that’s left business owners disgruntled, our middle class over-taxed and underserved, an environment that’s too “impacted” to get anything accomplished, and a host of early retirees who know a sinking ship when they’re drowning on one.
And they are leaving the state in droves. The Census Bureau projects that California will fail to gain a seat in the House of Representatives for the first time since 1920. We’re EVEN seeing a net population loss as people give up the “Golden Dream” and pack it up to go home— back where the houses are cheaper, the necks are redder, and the streets aren’t filled with, as one poster put it, Green Obamessiah-worshipping lunatics.
The outward migration has gotten so pronounced that Nevada has even launched a coy advertising campaign in an attempt to lure the few Californians who are still solvent over to Nevada’s own decimated tax base.
“Don’t Lose Your Assets,” taunts the tag line.
Maybe California should retaliate with a corollary ad campaign of its own:
“Take Your “Assets” and Leave.”
Those of us who have multi-generational roots here in California have watched in horror as our once-Edenesque utopia has turned into a bilious, economically and environmentally mismanaged cesspool. Although bankrupted, we see this new development in the California State Soap Opera as wonderful news.
For along with all the defunct car dealerships, fast food franchises, and dog-washing emporiums will go the moralizing “family values” bigots, the Midwestern bureaucrats and Eastern speculators, the southern trailer trash, the neo-Oakie illiterati and the host of smug CALPERS welfare kings and queens who think their cushy pensions are “ironclad” and that the rest of the country is going to cheerfully pick up their retirement when the state fund goes belly up.
All the double-dipping prison guards and fire captains, the city law-makers and grammar school teachers who can’t spell grammar; all the low-level civil “servants” with vacation homes and underwater mortgages, are more than welcome to submit their early resignation and leave –with our blessings. We’ll try to get by somehow.
Better yet, with them will go many of the millions of people here– not always legally– “for the jobs” that support the “support” structure.
Now that California’s underclass is seeing our monthly stipend from the state and federal government reduced by a sneaky 7% every few months or so, it is only a matter of time until someone who knows how to do arithmetic calculates that by the end of next year our subsidized incomes –even for an extended household of twelve– will be down to even more unlivable levels than they are now.
Add to this the drastic cuts in public health services, child “wellness” programs, and food, educational and housing subsidies, and we’ll likely see an ever-further “quantitative easing” of California’s massive influx of illegal immigrants.
What’s not to love?
Frankly, I’m astounded that some enterprising politico hasn’t cut a deal with Baja to lease part of the place for 100 years and turn it into an “economic free zone—an autonomous stateless retirement resort for California civil servants who are willing to give up a percentage of their government pension in exchange for a beach condo in which to live out their days.
In return Mexico would get a relatively affluent, educated, and managerially skilled population base to prop up its economy, and California gets a much-needed break in its pension obligations and demands on its infrastructure. Also a lot of retired public service union members who don’t vote.
As Mexican locals and American expats interact, a discrete new regional entity would develop bringing in investment and employment opportunities. With a bit of luck and judicious firepower, everyone could end up a winner.
Back at home, California needs to face up to reality, declare bankruptcy, and turn itself over to federal receivership. Since we’re going to have to trash the our State Constitution and start over anyway, why not go all the way and come up with a whole new state to go with it?
One possibility would be to split California along ideological lines, with the “libs” and all their expansive social engineering, venture capital, and globalist dream factories concentrated in the north and west, (and probably including the Central Valley,) and the more insular US vs. Them populations congregated in the service economy to the south and east (including rural Eastern CA.)
By dividing the State, the diverse economic and social needs of two very different ideologies could be more fairly addressed, and tax monies (and Congressional representation) apportioned in a more just and reasoned distribution.
Faced with finding its own water supply, SoCal would finally have to address its rampant overdevelopment and figure out a more rational use of the water that is available to it than growing rice and watering golf courses in the middle of the world’s driest desert. And NorCal would have to come to painful ethical grips with its dependence on the SoCal markets and cheap foreign labor.
Secession and restructure would be a perfect excuse to break the special interest stranglehold on the state economy and governance. And incorporating Baja as an economic transition zone between the US and Mexico could allow Mexico to deal with their own complex social and economic issues instead of shunting them off to California’s social services sector.
Last weekend I heard an “edgy” comic who thinks he’s a lot smarter than he actually is tell his audience that Texas wanted to “succeed” from the United States.
Maybe, if we all put our minds together California could do the same?
by ahansen
YESSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS !!!
meaning ‘no’?
Funny you’d bring this up? Just the other day I was thinking.., perhaps it might actually be better to incorporate parts of Mexico into the U.S?
No doubt drug-ridden ‘new’ border towns would sprout up over night along the newly established border but you’d be bringing countless millions in with a whole new ’stable’ of taxpayers which we could slowly bleed dry! In this newly created “enterprise zone” drugs are legal ( but heavily taxed ) That way ‘we’ could say we haven’t legalized drugs!
Property taxes and of course Sales Taxes apply.
Keep in mind that the Mexican Constitution prohibits states from signing treaties wit other countries. Any deals would have to be made in Mexico City. And while we Americans might not have strong feelings about sovereignty as we allow the illegal invasion to continue, Mexicans do. The idea of ceding ANYTHING to the US is anathema. Schoolchildren are still taught that the US stole the SW from Mexico.
Now that doesn’t mean that the citizens of the states of Baja California (both north and south) aren’t interested in seceedinng from Mexico, but that’s anothe rstory.
“Schoolchildren are still taught that the US stole the SW from Mexico.”
I thought we paid like $19,000,000 to Mexico for that land. What would that be in today’s $$$?
More than it is worth.
There would be mass migration of illegal immigrants over the new established border…a new border with nary a fence or a checkpoint or a river stopping them.
Anyone for Mulege? Todos Santos? Loreto?
Cudahy. Maywood. How’s that working out?
Back when I was a kid a friend of ours built a fantastic resort in Muleje. This was the late 60’s and after a few good storms the resort tanked! Got photos. Mesmerizing article Alena!
Good to see you, Annie!
I have to admit that hurricane season in Baja crossed my mind when I thought of all those pension obligations….
( ‘This’ is going to seem a little… weird..? )
Isn’t there something… I don’t know ( erotic? ) about an abandoned resort? I mean, where there used to be hustle & bustle along w/ neatly set row upon row of dinner tables, now only weeds, dust and emptiness.
No more chipper desk attendant, cooks, servants or -guests- for that matter? Even “run down” seems more appealing to me. I know, just… weird.
Yeah, ‘erotic’ is pretty weird, ya weirdo.
Maybe more ‘evocative’?
My first trip to California was in 1990 when I was still really a boy. I remember one of the first things I noticed was how high gas prices were. They were probably 20% higher than my home in Squareheadland. I didn’t understand why.
In 2003 the company I worked for bought a company located in San Diego. The first thing they did was try to get as many jobs out of California as possible. The work laws, and workers comp laws, were killers. Yes, some will shout about protecting workers. That only goes so far. We did testing a year after buying that company. Our area sent 3 people to do the testing. The firm in California sent 6. During the testing they accomplished nothing. My department at the time had 5 people. Our equivalent in California had more than 10. It was mind boggling.
I don’t want to make this an overly political post. I don’t align with “liberals” or “conservatives”. I just see what I see. I will just say that California was given every advantage imaginable over nearly every other state. The richness of that state is amazing. The fact that they are where they are is testament to the stupidity that has taken place there in the past decades, usually in the guise of being “progressive”. Sadly, they have progressed right to the edge of a cliff.
The fact that they are where they are is testament to the stupidity that has taken place there in the past decades, usually in the guise of being “progressive”.
Ah yes, not the least being the very “progressive” reforms of Initiative, Recall and Referendum.
Something changed after Prop 13. Or maybe that was just a symptom. I don’t know, because I got outta there about that time.
republicans pushed for Prop 13 big time.The wealthy wanted to escape increasing taxes on their wealth and properties.
The problem is, if it weren’t for Prop 13, my $250,000 house would have been valued at $1.4 Million (the price a 4/2 house next door to me sold at the peak), and my property taxes would be $22,000 a year.
You have to admit, it’s not fair if some nutjob wants to pay $1.4 million dollars (with borrowed money they don’t have to pay back) for a tiny house that me, with the paid-up house, would be forced to move.
I am not sure that is so clear. If it were not for Prop 13 your house might not have risen to a market value that is so high. Also, a more sensible form of tax relief might have been enacted, maybe something like the Prop 2 1/2 here in Massachusetts (where properties are reassessed each year, but the town can not increase the total taxes by more than 2.5% each year).
And Prop 13 put the 2/3 rule on tax increases, which sounds good but really acted to make politicians less accountable over time.
Incorrect.
Prop 13 does not push prices up. I’m not sure why people keep spouting that myth, but the seniors who own those homes have no intention of leaving their homes. Why do people think some specuvestors with loads of debt have the right to push long-time homeowners out of their own homes?
If anything, Prop 13 should keep a lid on prices…that is, if buyers actually cared about the “disparity” in prop taxes. After all, they are VOLUNTEERING to pay those taxes. Nobody is forcing them to overpay for a house. Funny how they only think to complain about the taxes **AFTER they made the choice** to pay those higher taxes.
The prop taxes are why we still rent. We can easily afford the P&I, but don’t want the high taxes; so we are waiting for prices to fall so our tax base will be low.
I have to respectfully disagree. Prop 13 supports higher property prices by keeping properties artificially off the market. On the east coast people from NY, northern NJ, Long Island, etc. retire to Fla and the Carolinas not only because they are tired of shoveling snow, but they can’t afford the outrageous taxes on their homes up north. They sell, move south and these are now properties available for families ( albeit upper middle class) to buy. In California nobody moves because they don’t have to move. Afterall, the weather is wonderful and when you are paying less than $1000/yr on a million dollar property ( like my mother and in laws are doing) you have no incentive to leave the area. In my family alone that leaves two homes in the Bay Area, in prime commuting distance, not available to working families. Prop 13 contributes to creating a shortage of property available for working families.
Those fixed-income oldsters living in the home they perhaps built with their own hands, planted, maintained, improved, paid the sales taxes, property taxes, road taxes, utilities taxes, school taxes, P&R taxes etc. etc. etc. on all those years; the very same folks who built the community and made it worth what the government now demands they pay taxes upon—might disagree with you.
but they can’t afford the outrageous taxes on their homes up north.
BS. IF as carenter stated, the original owner is still in their home, their tax basis point is still lower at original purchase price. The eastcoasters move because they want warmer temps. Otherwise, the tax basis points go up as prices go up.
If you want the true story, you should read Kevin Starr’s series of books on the history of California, then pick up a few novels like Raymond Chandler’s The Long Goodbye and Kem Nunn’s Pomona Queen to see how CA became what it has. Also recommended, Joan Didion’s account of growing up in Sacramento, descended from members of the Donner party, as I recall– Where I was From. She pokes holes in the individualistic boot strap myth which has taken hold in Orange County in particular, describing how much “old money” was predicated on huge, publicly funded infrastructure. Terrific PBS documentary, Inventing LA, was just aired last week which provides another layer to this sordid tale of oil, water and real estate.
Yep, awesome, fascinating program.
Read the Cadillac Desert which is the detailed story of how the water was brought into the desert of southern California. As well as
Phoenix. A Hollywood version is Chinatown with Jack Nicholson.
Lots of theft, crime, murder and whatnot in Cadillac Desert, with the LA Chandlers being instrumental in the entire growth of LA.
Yeah…I can almost remember those heady days when housedebtors, states and the federal gov’t all cheering and shouting.
“Yay…my assessment went up…my house is a lot worth more !”
“Relax boyz..we have all that taxpayer money rolling in ”
“Treasury’s Paulson- subprime woes likely contained”
Fri Apr 20, 2007
(chirp..chirp)
Contained is such a vague word that Paulson could claim he was actually correct. That word was chosen carefully, I would guess.
contained to the planet (possibly the moon)
Oh, Lordy! Maybe that’s why they just recently bombed the moon! My first supposition was that it was the annoying ‘Moon Pixies of Sparkle-Fantasticness’. But maybe that wasn’t it after all!
Maybe it was just to keep things contained….
*wiggles tin-foil hat around *
We bombed the moon as a warning to the rest of the galaxy. ‘You want a piece of this, you chumps?’ Sort of like shooting up a stop sign, or putting a ‘don’t tread on me’ sign in your front yard.
Yes. I can see that you are correct, here.
Except that shooting up a stop-sign can be by accident, whereas a ‘Don’t tread on me sign’ is more purposeful.
Except that shooting up a stop-sign can be by accident,
And I do know what I’m talking about, here.
You know, sometimes things just plumb get out of hand.
*regretful sigh *
So you’re just randomly shooting down a street, and a stop sign gets in your way? Tell it to the jury…
I’m assuming these ‘don’t tread on me’ signs are appearing elsewhere in the US. What are they supposed to mean? Seems like a good way to know who to ’round up’ when the black helicopters come.
Look, I told it to move—it ignored me.
Anyway, moving on. ‘Don’t tread on me’ signs make me think of carpet sort of subjects. I just cannot take them seriously. Worse than those giant fake butterflies. Now THOSE are scary and menacing and foster my respect!
Hmmm…I never thought of the carpet aspect…maybe it means keep off the grass?
Fake butterflies? You people are weird. We have lawn jockeys here.
“The outward migration has gotten so pronounced that Nevada has even launched a coy advertising campaign in an attempt to lure the few Californians who are still solvent over to Nevada’s own decimated tax base.
“Don’t Lose Your Assets,” taunts the tag line.”
What’s so hysterical about this, is that Nevada property tax rates have risen into the stratosphere. And, tax rates are not based on purchase prices. So, you can buy that McMansion for 50 cents on the dollar, but you’re going to pay 100% of the previous tax or more, oftentimes more than $500 per month. There are massive lawsuits, and the whole tax system in NV is under attack. Furthermore, business taxes, while slightly better than CA, are not as favorable as they used to be. Those looking for lower taxes need to look much further than NV. In fact, given the current economic climate, NV might be the worst state to relocate to. Forget well-paying jobs, there are few jobs in NV. Only Michigan has a higher rate of unemployment.
Hey, Griz, wouldn’t it be ironic if Nevada succeeded in luring all those Californians and picking their pockets? Then eventually Utar could have a campaign to attract all the disaffected Nevadans. Then Oklahoma the Utarns. Pretty soon everyone would all be back with their kinfolk, the money would be wrung out of the last pocket, and we could all get on with living our lives.
Yes, it would. Some are already aghast with their inflated property tax bills. The state is in such dire straights financially, that higher and higher taxes are a real probability. Nevada has changed, and it’s become more like it’s western neighbor than ever.
ahansen, I loved your post at the top. Your more personal stories of recent weeks/months had some points of interest, but your analysis of the Guardian comments and your discussion of outmigration from Calif held my attention much more effectively.
Yes and if we all went back to the extended family norm instead of nuclear families, maybe healthcare would be less?
+1
If only I had to pay $500/month in property taxes…
No state income tax along with inexpensive housing is the draw for most pensioners…
This argument never made sense to me. Retired people have more assets than income, so they should be moving to states that HAVE income tax and thereby have moderate property taxes.
Having no state income tax I’d think would be a draw for people in their peak earning years.
Yeah. Nevada and Florida are doing so well these days…..
Retired people have more assets than income,
Just the wealthy ones dennisn. the rest of them have squat and no $ either. At least a 1/4 of the hard working ones who didn’t get lucky, or got ill, or divorced and were never able to make the scratch necessary to make up for lifes events, or bad pay for women.
When did “good paying jobs” morph into “well paying jobs”?
I think it occurred about the same time as Global Warming became Climate Change and War on Terror became Overseas Contingency Operation.
Haw! What synchronicity.
Today, as it happens, some Californians are arriving on a visit for a day or so. I just barely said a sincere prayer of Thanksgiving that it’s raining good and hard.
Whew! Just in time!
Rain? Big whoop! IT SNOWS HERE! And that makes most native Cali’s soil their pants. I’ve actually had friends from San Diego ask me how many “snow days” do we get each year when schools and businesses close. When I tell them its usually zero they freak out and ask how is it possible to drive anywhere when it snows.
IT SNOWS HERE! And that makes most native Cali’s soil their pants. I’ve actually had friends from San Diego ask me how many “snow days” do we get each year when schools and businesses close. When I tell them its usually zero they freak out and ask how is it possible to drive anywhere when it snows.
HAhaah! Snow days….. ahhhh……
Now, I adore Washingtoners, and I’ll fight anyone but me who disrespects Washingtoners, but every winter we have a day, or maybe even two whole days when the incessant and steady rain turns into (*gasp *) snow! Like, a whole half an inch of snow! Noooo! OMG! Whatever will we do?!
It’s hilarious. It instantly becomes ‘cats with dogs, beans into peas, Gozer shall destroy the Universe time’ here. They cancel schools, the news channels are filled with anxious people who wonder how many ways this snow can kill us, people drive their SUV off the road at 5 miles an hour and burst into towering flames…
I grew up in Utarr. I used to drive along the highway to town and when I could see scattered parts of the pavement through the blasting, howling white-out conditions, and when more than one wheel of the jeep was actually in contact with that ground, (more or less,) then THAT was we all called a ‘A Boring and Safe Winter Driving Day’.
But I have to admit that I take advantage of this when it happens here. I call in and say ‘Gosh! I’m snowed in! I can see at least almost maybe perhaps a whole inch of snow that might be out there on my driveway! Quick! Call the National Guard!’
Then I spend all day in my flannel jammies, drinking schnapps, trying to grub up enough soggy snow for even one little ice-cube in my schnapps, and of course, checking out the HBB and talking about coffee and frogs and stuff.
Life is fun, on ’snowed-in’ days.
There is an old woman who lives in the woods,
She does all the things an old woman should;
She cleans her own house-she bakes her own bread,
She washes her windows-
She makes her own bed, She feeds the birds,
She blows her own snow,
She watches the Seasons
as they come and they go;
She grooms her two cats-
She says all her prayers,
She wishes she had much more to share;
She treasures her family-she treasures her friends,
She knows all beginnings must have an end.
She knows-
Yes, she knows.
Totally agreed, Olygal! The reaction to snow here is humorous and ridiculous—but with the way some of these idiots drive in the snow, it makes good sense to stay off the roads! The snow doesn’t scare me a bit, but they do!
(Plus it’s a great excuse to take a day off, cuz everyone else is…)
My favorite snow-reaction story is from back when we did have a decent snow (probably 12-in) maybe 10yrs back, people literally abandoned their cars in the MIDDLE OF AN ARTERIAL right near my house. No attempt to pull over to the curb, nothing. Un-freakin-real! No reason I could figure for it; those cars weren’t stuck!
I can understand snow days in South Carolina. but not CO.
It amazes me how you can take pleasure in the misfortunes of others. I really like it. Keep up the good work.
Of course some would say that you are a bad person for taking pleasure in the misfortune of others. I don’t agree. I know you would never take joy in the misfortune of a cancer patient or an accident victim. But these people whose misfortunes bring joy are not “victims” of anything but their own arrogance and greed. It is sad how their stupidity continues to pull down so many that were not arrogant or greedy. Let it rain!
It amazes me how you can take pleasure in the misfortunes of others…Keep up the good work.
Well….okay. Since you insist. But just for you, though, NYCity.
I’m glad you mentioned this in time, because my sweet and girlish nature was overwhelming me with waves of sympathy whenever I considered the plight of California. I was gonna go find and repair the worlds smallest violin, so I could play along lugubriously to all the booo-hooooing.
I mean, “who could have seen all this coming”?
HAHAHAHAHAHAAHAHAHA!
*gasps for breath *
HAHAHAHAHAAHAHAHA!!!
See Oly told ya, she’s cool.
Could you possibly ever doubt the sincerity of a girl after that performance ?
Yeah! What mikey said!
*assumes Oly-patented ‘Extra-sincere and Guileless Face # 1′ *
NYCityBoy,
What an excellent point. I’ve been feeling a little torn over our local bankers going belly up ( and being BARRED from the industry for life ) but now I’m feeling much better.
Funny to note though how willing many of those who’s only claim to victimhood is their own greed, latch onto our sentiment to be generous w/ those that are genuinely innocent victims?
It’s an important distinction.
agree
Talk about synchronicity.
It so happens that I have friends coming down from Seattle tomorrow, and they promised to bring the rain with them! Sure enough, the sky is darkening, the winds are blowing, and the animals are beginning to huddle. I am so stoked! It’s been months since we’ve seen a drop of rain here. Far from misfortune, it’s the nicest hostess gift they could possibly bring me.
Now, if you were to tell me you’d spent the morning making pumpkin pies from your garden in honor of your friends’ arrival, I would truly believe in parallel universes….
Now, if you were to tell me you’d spent the morning making pumpkin pies from your garden in honor of your friends’ arrival, I would truly believe in parallel universes….
I didn’t say they were ‘friends’, now did I?
In fact, one of em just spoke the words: ‘Do you watch Jim Cramer on Mad Money?’ *
More like, lessee…’Inescapable Wen-like Appurtenances of an Extended and Spaghetti-like Family Tree’.
But hey! It’s 6 p.m. here, and I ain’t kilt no one**, so it’s okay, even though I did NOT spend a precious punkin on a pie.
(I value my punkins.)
* I said ‘No.’ A forgivable lie, I think. Either that or a maiming would have happened, and I haven’t made dinner yet. I only maim when everyone’s fed up, so they can run faster and provide more sport.
**Yet.
Canned punkins make better pie. I wish it wasn’t so, but it is.
alpha-sloth, are you really FPSS?
I’ve never tried to make one with fresh pumpkin, and I’m glad to learn that I haven’t been missing out.
No, he’d probably say some Lebanese squash that you can only buy in some ethnic market in Queens makes the best pumpkin pie. Plus I have better buns. And that’s official.
LOL…
You’re sounding more like him with every post!
BWAHAHAHAHAAAHAAHAAHAAHAAHAAHAAHAAAA!
Prepare for the Joshua Tree Reamings you deserve, you little shmope-a-dopes!
Plus I have better buns. And that’s official.
Yep. I remember the very thread. It’s TOTALLY official.
that’s right, you were a judge…
*pumkins as overlords! *
We had rain yesterday and expect rain tomorrow. Makes me feel like I’m back in Tacoma. Did I ever mention how much we wish we had stayed when hubby got out of the Air Force? But we were young and a little stupid.
But we were young and a little stupid..
Alas, this can happen to the best of us…
*sighs sympathetically *
Hey, at least you got rain, though! What luck, huh?
Every time we have a couple of days of rain in a row, hubby says something about how the rain reminds him of Tacoma. It’s almost to the point that I would consider moving back. The only drawback would be leaving the daughter who lives next door. But who knows. Things do change.
In the last two years or so, I have noticed a creeping viewpoint along the breadth of political spectrum to scapegoat “those people” for the economic malaise that infects America in particular and some western societies in general. I have observed this disturbing trend when decipher opinions in major news outlets and blogs in the west. Strangely enough, this is not a new phenomenon since history is replete with these kinds of stories where “the other” (mostly those with less power) are blamed for economic traumas that afflict society. I am actually surprised that this kind of thinking is gaining currency in the 21 century.
Well, let me see if I can explain it a little. First of all, the creeping rot starts to set in at the political and military/industrial complex level. Then, people who like that sort of thing then tend to gravitate to it. As a symptom, more than a cause. People tend to focus more on symptoms, that’s true of any disease or condition. They see the symptoms, but don’t know how to attack the cause.
I saw a nice (sarcasm) little photo and essay the other day of a woman being stoned to death for adultery in the Middle East. It was very ugly and tough to take, but I felt I should confront it. (Oh, by the way, they bury them up to their chests in the sand for the stoning). NPR also played an audio clip of a 17 year old girl in Pakistan under the lash for just walking in public with a young man not of her family. The high, thin screams haunted me all night. Many in the West don’t like that sort of thing and don’t want it taking root. Salma Hayek has been battling for years to bring to light the situation of many disappeared women in the Mexican border towns, cracked up the middle like wishbones.
That these things exist in the 21st century is cause for concern. But they should be contained and rubbed out where they are, not spread to areas where they aren’t.
Palmy:
I will repeat myself until everyone gets it…Its about Religion and not the people. Destroy/Cripple their religion/mosques/symbols and they should revert back to sane humans.
We just don’t have it in us to fight a real religious jihad.
=========================================
NPR also played an audio clip of a 17 year old girl in Pakistan under the lash for just walking in public with a young man not of her family.
you sound like one of them liberals
Palmy, nice retort to the troll.
Jane,
gormahia did have a point. When folks feel powerless, they tend to bully those on a more powerless rung of the socio-economic ladder. Not to disparage the problem, but it’s helpful to keep a sense of perspective here.
“Illegals” may be a net drain on our American economy, but then so are Wall Street investment bankers. And oil mongers. And health “insurers.”
When folks feel powerless, they tend to bully those on a more powerless rung of the socio-economic ladder.
Yes, and the WS, oil mongers, insurers don’t get their feet held to the fire, just the little guy. Why do some of our folks bully? Oh yeah. powerless.
It seems to me that these days, people with major money are lying low, not out there lording it over the “little people” like they did in the last decade. Even the culture of celebrity has toned down significantly–it being pretty dumb to wear your bling to the grocery store, so to speak.
Nothing like looking out the south window and seeing a few dozen pickets with pitchforks to make you rethink your luncheon attire….
Are you referring to people’s complaints about illegal immigrants in Calif? (Or, how is your post relevant to ahansen’s article?)
Bravo!
However, being from the Central “San Joking Valley” (as my late uncle used to put it), the populace tends to be neither liberal nor conservative. The viewpoint is somewhere in between, and not necessarily libertarian. Look to the politics of the midwest (Iowa) and you get the same type of people in the California farm belt.
I would put liberals in San Francisco, conservatives in So Cal, libertarians in the Sierra Nevada (to sit on their gold bullion), and extreme big government types down where you suggest: Baja!
Well, you know, it IS interesting that all these restructures, many of which are embraced by so-called liberal intelligentsia (or whatever they are) call for a sort of segregation by common interests.
Didn’t a lot of the Central Valley immigrate there from the midwest during the dust bowel era?
Yes they did. They were called “Okies” and “Arkies” depending on which Dust Bowl state they fled.
To add to that, the last of the Okies who came to Bakersfield and other environs are now dying of old age.
…all these restructures, many of which are embraced by so-called liberal intelligentsia (or whatever they are) call for a sort of segregation by common interests.
Well, shoots, many of us are semi-evolved mostly-bald monkeys with opposable thumbs and credit cards and Chihuahuas and sophisticated brains and other recognized stamps of civilization and yet…and yet no matter how evolved and free of monkey-ness we should be, it seems we mostly prefer to gravitate to people who think ‘correctly’. And by ‘correctly’, I mean—how we ourselves think.
…For example, people who are not ‘So-called liberal intelligentsia (or whatever they are)
…Where do they get to go, palmy? It’s certainly a different place than you’ll be heading for, which is…where?
“…For example, people who are not ‘So-called liberal intelligentsia (or whatever they are)
…Where do they get to go, palmy? It’s certainly a different place than you’ll be heading for, which is…where?”
Well, since I’m not one of the tickety-boo social engineering crowd, and I’m a swamp rat anyway, wherever I go, there I am!
Oh, well then. Tonight I guess you’ll be sharing a delicious road-kill BBQ with ‘Skink’ then.
Skink is my hero.
If you’re hungry enough, you’ll eat anything.
Even an innocent little oyster in a Santa Hat
I would fit in better among liberals than conservatives. The libs are usually sitting on wealth, not incurring capital gains, and accept my atheism.
It rained most of the day here. This is the week I started brown-baggin’ my lunch. My poor former lunch buddy got take-out. I felt guilty, but have to fight an income tax increase coming up soon by cutting costs. Lunch and tips at restaurants are $7 more per day than eating what I bring.
“San Joking Valley” is going into my permanent repertoire. Hurrah for yer uncle! Drink a toast to him for me next time you crack a cab?
Secession is not just a California Dreamin’ goal. Let’s break up the entire U.S. of A. into however many sub-countries we choose. Use the Yugoslavia model. (There’s no longer a Yugoslavia. It’s Serbia, Bosnia, Montenegro, Croatia, Slovenia, and one or two other entities.)
Would it be easy? Heck no. But it sure would stir things up. Our breakup and realignment need not be along existing state lines, which in many cases are stupidly artificial boundaries.
Here are a few bumper sticker and protest sign ideas-
“Secession Now!”
“We Must Succeed In Our Drive To Seceed!”
“Don’t Blame Me, I Voted For Secession.”
And one with an Old South flavor-
“Make Your Ancestors Proud- Vote YES On Secession.”
Read up on your Balkan wars. Not so much fun as it may seem.
I can think of one upside to the balkanization of the US. I wouldn’t have to finance the military industrial complex anymore which accounts for 80% of the fed tax I pay.
…instead you will have to finance local gangs and warlords which on a whim may take 100% of all you have.
Do you really think it would be cheaper to finance 50 or so individual armies?
Re, Balkanization.
One would expect that any division could be accomplished without rancor. Since both/all new states would still be a part of the United States, and financial benefits would accrue to each new entity, it’s possible we could make our representation more representational, and maybe even cut through the political gridlock….both as “California” and on the federal level.
No offense, ahansen, and I really enjoyed this post, but I think this point is delusional. “One would expect that any division could be accomplished without rancor” is right up there with Chamberlain’s ‘peace in our time’. If a split-up of states were to have any meaning beyond symbolism, new legal realities would be created- and I’m not sure where the Constitution would fit in. People would win or lose under the new system. I doubt the losers in these new realities would go quietly. The Civil War comes to mind, and I don’t think that’s hyperbole. Why would this not be repeated? People here toss around ’secession’ like it’s an option on a Chinese restaurant menu. I think there’s more to it.
California is so gerrymandered that it no longer even bothers with the fiction of being a representational democracy. The resulting mess in Sacramento is financially unsustainable and benefits no one at this point—not even the traditional oil, ag, and water interests. Even the courts can’t figure the place out anymore.
If a push to divide the state comes, my guess is that it will be from the top down, (rather than a grassroots effort,) as the ruling families attempt to consolidate and regain some control over what is left of their fading empires.
Every time a bill is passed, someone loses. That doesn’t necessarily mean folks will take to arms to resist it. We essentially added Iraq as our 51st state ($1T USD and counting,) over the vehement objections of a good percentage of the US, yet civil war didn’t break out…at least not here. I would imagine the process would be more along the lines of the breakup of ATT— or of the health insurance industry as we’re seeing right now.
, rather a series of political fiefdoms.
The
I’m not sure who ’sahansen’ is, but if you’re using Iraq as an example of how secession/partition might play out (and it does seem like a rather good example), then I’m sticking with the status quo. And I bet most people will, too.
Sloth, sahansen and I are one and the same. I was apparently relegated to the spam filter last week, so we’re trying to figure how to get me out of it and back onblog.
It’s pretty relentless; wasn’t fooled in the slightest….
Could CA convene some sort of Constitutional Convention, draw new boundaries that are approved by the Senate and House, as if they were new states coming into the union? They could all use the existing CA Constitution and independently amend it as they see fit.
I’ll give you another example of what makes California ungovernable. There are 10 million people in Los Angeles county, which is governed by 5 supervisors. That is 2 million persons per supervisor. A congressional district is made up of roughly 647,000 persons, so LA county should have 3 times the number of congressional representatives as county supervisors.
The only solution I can see succeeding long term is one that divides the state into much more manageable pieces. I would suggest OC/SD and points east, Ventura/LA and points east, Central coast and valley with east slope Sierra Nevada, SF region with all points north. That is 4 states, each with 2 senators and undoubtedly divided into more manageble counties, etc.
My $0.02…
Ah, those two Senators per state! …that’s exactly why the REST of the country will never allow Calif to break up.
Totally true AZ, but one can dream, no?
A break along county lines would be a no brainer.
Maybe it’s time for the People of California invest in lots of 44 magnum ammo and bring in old Dirty Harry.
The Terminator has been shooting blanks since those Fools voted him in.
Isn’t time for a NEW movie star Clownifornia ?
Dirty Harry to the Terminator:
“Get out of the way, Hammerhead.”
Yep, I’ve often said, Gray Davis must be rolling on the floor laughing his butt off every day, seeing as how the Terminator got into office by dissing Davis.
I met Arnold once when he was trying to hustle college chicks in the upstairs bar of Grandma’s Restaurant in Duluth, Mn one night when I was there on business. I didn’t recognize or know him. The girl later thought he said he was from Austria and was living in Superior Wi.
The chick he trying to hustle saw me, slipped off the barstool from beside him, came over, asked me about a friend then gave me warm embrase and one long big nasty kiss. The beach muscle man jumped up all hot and bothered and stormed over like he was going to do something.
I think the Terminator wanted to hurt me
ha ha ha Arnold
That’s a funny story, Mikey.
My mom used to know Arnold from the beach in Venice (Muscle Beach) from back in the day before he was famous. She was from Austria, too, so they had something in common.
Keep purchase under 49 bullets…
California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger has signed a bevy of bills into law, including one that will require ammunition sellers to collect and keep information from all buyers, including a thumbprint, signature and driver’s license data.
Internet and mail-order sales will be eliminated, because sales must happen in person.
New California law tracks ammunition sales.
YIKES!! Hwy. Looks like we’ll have to camp out in town and make our “grocery” purchases daily.
First our pseudoephidrene, now our 5.56mm?! Good Lord what’s next? Our polyester curtains and redwood decks?!
dang, does this mean no more lifetime supply of ammo? Crimeny. Though you gotta love those ammo slinging survivalists in the film Tremors. Though as true with most overblown paranoia, good ol’ low tech logic saved the day.
Ahansen, I can spot you some .223 (5.56×45mm) if you come up short. I stocked up when it was cheap
One thing about ammo, it does have a long shelf life.
If I read correctly he signed 200 bills…All in the name of keeping us safe I suppose…Ammo sales now with a rectal exam included…Like this is going to stop criminals from getting ammo…Just created a better black market for the stuff and now get to track all the law abiding citizens and how much they have…
Just buy it in AZ.
Not the guvs fault. It is the other idiots and there are a lot of them.
If at first you don’t secede, try, try again.
Apropos that bon mot, the guy who drafted Orange County’s ordinance of secession from Los Angeles County, back in the 1880s or so, was a former Confederate legislator.
Second time’s the charm…
Jack, I like that! Gonna get a bumper sticker made. Maybe two if my wife agrees to decorate her car as well.
save yo’ confederate money, the South’s gonna succeed again!
I think they already issue those in CA in the form of IOUs.
“If at first you don’t secede, try, try again.”
+1 LOL!
There’s a proposal to split Florida in two, North and South, on the premise that the Southern half is being bled by Tallahassee (state capitol) to support the Northern half. Northern half of Florida has more poor, rural areas. I’ve lived in both halves and prefer the Northern half, so I’m all for it if it happens. We’ve got most of the fresh water, so we can always use that to trade, if need be. Of course, we’d have to kick out Nestle Waters first.
I can’t really comment on Cali’s difficulties, I don’t know that much about the state. Makes me sad to see it deteriorate, though.
Like I posted before, I see the US breaking up during my lifetime and that will be interesting. If I was a Californian, though, I wouldn’t be dumping on Texas. Texans are a tough bunch and seem to be very resilient. (note to potential commentors: W is NOT a Texan. He’s a carpetbagger, like Jeb in Florida. As a resident of a state who has had to contend with a Bush in the gov’s office, I feel for Texas)
I think the main problem with California government is that they are in session all of the time.
Texas legislature only meets 140 days every two years. And they have to declare their bribes, so at least you know who is paying for the law.
“…As Mexican locals and American expats interact, a discrete new regional entity would develop bringing in investment and employment opportunities. With a bit of luck and judicious firepower, everyone could end up a winner.”
Uno Problemo:
Local’s with sell Americano’s “maryjane” el cheapo…Big American Pharmaceutical Corporations will start screamin’-yellin’-hollerin’ about “unfair competition” “dangerous quality” “lost profits” “un-American to use SS checks for foreign self-medication” …lobby for a new “Mexican American War”…Jeb Bush will suddenly show up on Fox news with Glen Beck & Rupert Murdock…
California is a shell of it’s once glorious self. Sadly, I don’t see any scenario which could reverse the damage done. Oftentimes, I thought of relocating to the Sierra which I so loved growing up. But, it’s not the same California that it was 30 something years ago. It’s changed for the worse in pretty much all aspects.
“California is a shell of it’s once glorious self”.
True, the state is broke and will soon be running around nekked as the “Great Bare State”
I’ve done my share of flaming California over the years. Mainly because whatever stupid crap they come up with, generally rolls downhill to the Flyover States, no matter how stupid or non-applicable to our situation as it may be.
Thanks to the wonders of Interstate Commerce, and the size of the California market, costs of complying with California mandates are passed on to the rest of the country, even though we didn’t get a vote.
Can’t wait to see of the grown-ups (on both sides of the aisle) eventually show up.
Maybe you should be thanking California for your clean air, water, and better gas mileage.
People in rural states have clean air and water regardless, and would prefer cheap and easy to maintain over any mileage increases California may have forced on the industry. Most of the forced changes did not improve mileage, they added cost and complexity.
Your welcome.
Thank you sir, may I have another?
“The Census Bureau projects that California will fail to gain a seat in the House of Representatives for the first time since 1920.”
Can someone please tell where in the world is gaining population? Everybody is leaving everything, where are they going?
Did we really have wide scale population number-fudging? Do I even have to ask?
where are they going ??
The Carolina’s & Texas…
Utah, Arizona, Colorado, and Nevada have been gaining population at an accellerated rate in the past few years, suggesting that people from other states are moving there.
Well, maybe NV has hit a wall in the past two years. Who knows?
Colorado has been gaining about 90K per year these past few years.
We get quite a few former Californians over here. Not as many as, say, the mid-1990s surge after the Rodney King riots. But they still come to Zonie-land.
And, once they get a whiff of our job market, many of them move on.
Slim,
Well… let’s not forget ’bout good old Oregon now shall we!? Pretty much the same thing. They come w/ the best of intentions and frequently quite a bit of savings, but after a few years of constant drizzle and substandard wages..?
It’s just that we’re -still- not in any kind of an economic position to turn them away? Just look at what’s happened to Bend, OR since that ‘pipeline’ evaporated? As long as they want to become Ducks and adapt to the lifestyle ‘here’, they’re more than welcome.
When they complain cuzz’ the town rolls up the sidewalks at ten o’clock, or we don’t have 24/7 liquor stores on every corner, I really can’t help?
wyoming gaining too
Over 5,000 state retirees recieve a pension of $100,000 or more.
see
http://www.pensiontsunami.com
Reason alone to leave the state. Why would any taxpayer want to be funding that ridiculousness?
I wonder how many Wall Street thugs recieve windfalls 100x that amount over the last 30 years….
Right, exeter.
Robert Cramer,
I’ve been a fan of PensionTsunami for awhile now. I’d love to see a similar website for Oregon… but hopefully people will get the idea? Actually they said it’s 6,133 in the 100k + Club but what’s a few mil. amongst ‘friends’?
Since we have “Tier 1″ recipients here in OR I was thinking about starting a “Death Clock” where we can tick away the days until we’ll be out from under that obligation.
My oldest daughter works for the State and suffice to say ‘her’ retirement plan ( assuming she stays ) won’t… be ‘quite’ as generous? I think… the days of the lucky “lottery winners” claiming “You’re just jealous!” have kind of begun to look a little ridiculous?
Which makes me think- I want to marry an old pensioner from OR.
There I said it. I am a gold digger. Just don’t want to see the geezer coming at me with a viagra wand. Unless he is cute and interesting and funny, and very well off financially. Then I might consider, but at least that way I might have a pension in my lifetime too!?
Bravo! Ahansen. Bravo.
Maybe 3 states? The 805 deserves to be on its own.
We’ll give it back to Baja.
Nothing wrong with california that could not be corrected by solving the immigration problems.
Did you ever think about what 3-4 million illegal immigrants do to the housing situations in California?
I think it was one of the things, perhaps the greatest thing, that drove prices up.
You have a stable population, limited growth in population, little construction of homes, and all at once an influx of worker come in that need places to stay after they bring their families in.
More demand drives up house price , more demand brings on construction of home, more money made on higher prices brings up demand for higher priced houses, size wise!
Saw it all happen.
1950-1970 , very stable, then bang inflation in home prices. coincident with Prop 13, and liberalized immigration policies.
Realtors enthusized, claiming can’t lose money in real estate, encouraging buyers to buy big.
Bad scene, and now we are faced with not enough money to run government.
Don’t tell me that there is enough money, because the public demands that the state spend all the state can get by taxes, bonds, whatever.
Cure the public demand for free stuff and we might have a chance to correct the situation.
Just tell me what the state should stop paying for, and see what YOU can come up with!
Jack
Nothing wrong with california that could not be corrected by solving the immigration problems.
Uh huh.
California has no other problems ‘cept those people doin’ all the dirty work for low wages and no benefits. Dang it! Why didn’t David Duke think of that!
Damn those filthy minimum wagers!!!! They emptied the state treasury I declare!!!
You don’t live here, you have no idea.
They don’t live in Florida, either.
You don’t live here, you have no idea.
Apparently you have no idea. Illegal immigrants are everywhere in the US. That doesn’t mean they’ve caused budget shortfalls, housing bubbles, and toe fungus.
Get serious folks and think a little. Illegal aliens don’t vote. Your government is fowled up because people voted for the wrong things, or don’t even bother to vote. Aliens had nothing to do with it, legal or illegal. Face it, the enemy is us.
Totally incorrect.
California’s #1 expense is education, followed by prisons and medical care. All of these are tremendously impacted by illegal immigration. On top of that, they create a much greater burden on our infrastructure, and the taxes they do pay (very little) don’t come close to covering their costs.
Prisons are private enterprise. Hence the reason they want to build more.
The **state** is paying for the prisons, whether they’re public or private.
That’s pure cr@p. All that so-called dirty work used to be done by citizens and paid much better back in the day. Illegals have driven down wages. Construction laborers pay is almost the same as it was 30 years ago. My husband worked his way through college doing custodial work and gardening. He worked as a construction laborer. I waited tables.
You really have no clue. I’ve lived around them, been to their parties, my children went to school with them. It’s easy to live on sub-standard wages when you don’t pay taxes, your wages are under the table and you get public assistance for your children. Don’t give me that lame argument about all the SS and federal and state taxes they pay, they don’t. I’ll tell how it works you steal a ss number and claim 10 deductions.
That’s pure cr@p. All that so-called dirty work used to be done by citizens and
paid much better back in the day. Illegals have driven down wagesNo, owners, farmers, corporations even in the old days wanted cheap labor, and no, the illegal aliens IF paid with payroll checks were taxed just like you and me, but were never able to file for tax refunds.
My dad grew up on a farm, as did all of my relatives on his side. None of them ever employed illegal immigrants.
Just saying…
“…inflation in home prices. coincident with Prop 13,..”
The Jarvis Amendment, Prop 13, was instituted as a result of a rapid inflation in housing prices—hence property taxes; it was not causal.
It may not have been causal, but it was very short-sighted. Prop 13 was a sledgehammer for a problem that should have been solved with a chisel.
How dare the taxes rise on my beachfront estate? I deserve to own this property! Make the minorities and the young pay for the government.
Did you ever think about what 3-4 million illegal immigrants do to the housing situations in California?
Yes, as a matter of fact, I do think about this. And not just the impacts on housing issues, and not just issues in only California, either.
Another thing—what is this mere 3-4 million?
I bet you got wayyy more than that. I got more people than that at my typical family reunion.
The illegal aliens are swarming WA, too. The numbers are staggering as compared to just a few short years ago. Some of the most responsible parties for this mess are the builders and developers. Big corporations using cheap, cheap labor at the expense of society so the top brass can live like kings. Absolutely grotesque- the entire situation.
You must not get out much, the majority of illegals (from Mexico….I’ve also met quite a few from England and other European countries but they tend to blend in…) that I’ve observed live 12 to a small apt or house or literally live in makeshift camps in the canyons. Can’t really see how they could affect housing prices. Yes, we’ve heard about the strawberry pickers buying McMansions, but I am guessing that’s statistically not the norm. And the same businesses that wave around the flag, have been profiting by the illegal labor pool. The level of hypocrisy is astounding. One of my right wing relatives regularly hired employees without papers and then spewed the typical litany of right wing grievances.
The illegals themselves are not the problem. Their numerous children are citizens and therefore entitled to welfare, school, infrastructure etc.
Research shows (Harvard economist George Borjas, Ed Rubenstein) that the third-world newcomers are using more in services than they’re paying in taxes. It’s a bleak situation that won’t get any better as the demographics rapidly change in California and elsewhere. The 1965 Immigration Act has been a disaster. Sadly, a disaster that was preventable.
Complete the ongoing process, and turn California into a Mexican province (”Alta California”).
California liberals will have the joy of becoming an oppressed minority group, they no longer will have to live in an evil First World country, and the public employee unions will have no problems adjusting to the corrupt Mexican political culture.
Win, win!
“Alta California”
Back to the future?
A brilliant Observer–ation!
LOL, thanks.
The only difference I see in California and the rest of the federal government is that the fed gets to print money to mask it’s HUGE deficit and massive debts. We can try and single out California as a failed state but most every state, and our federal government, has fallen victim to the greed and short sighted vision that pervades our state and federal houses of government and has left those houses in a shambles.
Or we can try and oversimplify the situation by blaming it a single issue like illegals but the situation is more complex and requires a completely new look at government, its purpose, and how to implement government policy that is designed and intended for the benefit of everyone in the state instead of the special interests that have bought and paid for our government. NOT just in California.
IMO the failure we’re seeing is a failure of spirit and a failure of will to do what’s right for the general welfare of our state and federal populations.
Until we find the courage and the spirit to implement change that doesn’t count money as the first, and many times the only, consideration when designing government policy, California and rest of the nation will not only fail financially but it will fail in ways far more important and far more damaging.
It’s the fact that the Fed can print money, and the states can’t, that will keep the states (and Europe, for that matter), together. Guess what? When you ’secede’, you don’t get to leave your bills behind. (Unless you’ve got a bigger army.)
Amen, LHawes.
Alas.
It’s an interesting post, with lots of data, but you should know how i see it by now……….As i predicted, as soon as California becomes the first MINORITY White State, it’s all over. And it has.
Stupid leftists want to promote welfare and support programs, including free health care, that are a magnet to so-called minorities. It’s only a matter of time before the overwhelm the system and it collapses.
The people leaving are the white working class who are being taxed to death to support the newcomer gangbangers and drug dealers. (yea, they all come here to “work”). That’s whose leaving. They are migrating to Arizona, Colorado, and other places where they might be spared someone reaching into their pockets to support someone else.
Everywhere i look i see racial problems…..Detroit. collapsing..80% black. Worst schools…DC…..85% black. Failing cities……….New Orleans, yea “America” should rebuild it. Right. Houston? going down.
Many leftists claim that “white flight” is the problem, or was. So we need urban renewal programs, so the same people who turned the cities into a ghetto can do it all over again. Why are there 70% unwed mothers among blacks in America………welfare magnet programs.
Social engineering and institutional racism (affirmative action) has re-made america into the “multicultural malaise” that i see.
Anyway, i won’t write anymore, cause Ben will probably kill this anyway, but the way i see it, when they ran all the rest of the White guys out, the end was nigh. We can argue about the shifting borders of history some other time. La Raza (latino racists) say they are re-claiming the land, but i don’t see any of them doing anything with the “land” (except migrant farmers). They all want to move to LA and get a big mac, air conditioning and a car……….then play gansta.
“La Raza (latino racists) say they are re-claiming the land, but i don’t see any of them doing anything with the “land” (except migrant farmers).”
I’m shocked, I tell you, shocked! Where have you been? Mexico is staking out the state and national parks for pot growing.
That’s right, I said Mexico. Let’s not have the fiction that there’s any government there other than the drug and human smuggling cartels.
Oh, I forgot, it’s the US’s fault.
I’d process your observations more easily if you were to look below the surface a bit further.
We had the same transformation in NY long ago, with a shift in racial mix of course, but mostly with a shift in character. You get what you subsidize.
“You get what you subsidize.”
Whew, testify. It’s interesting to see the difference in policy between China and the US. In China, families are rewarded for keeping families small. In the US, families, both legal and illegal residents, at the poverty line and below are rewarded for having more children. How sick is that?
Not going to end well.
The reward is an attempt to keep the Social Security Ponzi scheme going. Didn’t some congresscritter introduce a bill to give $500 of our money into a “trust fund” for each newborn?
But what’s interesting is that a family is rewarded for being poor and breeding more poverty. That’s what’s so sick.
We have illegal immigrant families in this area who literally live off the welfare payments they get for their anchor babies, combined with a little side work, cash under the table, etc. That’s why I don’t buy this “we’re only here to work” crapola. If that were true, they’d work, send their money home and not start families here. Another canard “they’re only trying to feed their families”. That’s such BS, when they entered without children in the first place. There was NO family to feed to begin with.
are rewarded for having more children. How sick is that?
duggar ‘Quivverfull’ family.
“cause Ben will probably kill this anyway,”
As he should. Your post is detestable beyond measure.
Detestable? Perhaps. But is Diogenes wrong? I’d like to hear your rebuttal.
“multicultural malaise”
Multiculturalism doesn’t work, never has. Not as a freely agreed to state of affairs, anyway. One culture will always seek to dominate. You can have a multi-racial society and a successful one, so long as the language and culture are agreed-upon. People will divide along cultural/customs lines sooner than they will racial lines. One man’s custom is another man’s (or woman’s) torture, as in female genital mutilation.
We have it good here in the West. Women have it pretty good here, too, IMO. Might not be perfect, but it’s a darned sight better than in many parts of the Middle East, Asia, South America, etc. Yep, sure I’ll get flamed for that.
You might want to check out a new novel, America Libre, by Raul Ramos y Sanchez, that explores extremism on both sides of this issue, ie white supremists vs. “La Raza”. The story is about a civil war breaking out in the southwest US in the near future over unresolved issues pertaining to race and immigration. Our own West Bank scenario.
yep…i totally agree.
But why stop with California? MI, OH, NY, IL, NV, AZ, FL, RI etc., etc., are all in various states of disaster. It is time we revisit US constitution itself don’t you think. How about this crazy idea: No Federal government and we revert back to a loose “Commonwealth of Independent States”. With the big sucking and feeding of tax dollars removed, all States will rise or fall on their own. Perfect “laboratory of democracies”
The weak central government idea has been tried twice:
1) 1781-1787 under the Articles of Confederation. It didn’t work.
2) 1861-1865 under the Confederate States of America. That didn’t work either.
IT ONLY DIDN’T WORK BECAUSE THAT IDIOT LINCOLN VIOLATED THE RIGHTS OF THE SOUTHERN STATES AND STARTED A WAR!!
“Faced with finding its own water supply, SoCal would finally have to address its rampant overdevelopment and figure out a more rational use of the water that is available to it than growing rice and watering golf courses in the middle of the world’s driest desert.”
I agree with rational use of water (i.e., less watering of rice paddies and golf courses in the middle of a desert), but why would SoCal want to ever have to find its own water source?
I agree with rational use of water (i.e., less watering of rice paddies and golf courses in the middle of a desert), but why would SoCal want to ever have to find its own water source?
Could SoCal ever find its own water source?
Not at current consumption levels.
Who cares if SoCal could or couldn’t? My question was why SoCal would want to have to find its own water?
I would guess they wouldn’t want to. Which is a point I was trying to make, too. Breaking up states and/or seceding are rather difficult endeavors. It’s not like moving out of home when you’re eighteen. There are ‘entangling alliances’.
There are ‘entangling alliances’.
An utter lack of usable water is a trifle more than an “entangling alliance” — SoCal is dependent on NoCal and a handful of other states just to maintain itself. Without that resource, SoCal as we know it is DOA.
That was my point.
So if So Cal is screwed without No Cal, why would more populous So Cal ever go along with a partition? Will something override votes? What?
SoCal could buy their water. Might make them use it more wisely. SoCal water is cheap. That’s the real problem.
Well..up here in The Great Lakes Region - or, as I like to call it, The Old Nortwest - we have the largest reserve of fresh surafce water in the world. Yet our water rates are higher than AZ or CA. Why? THE FED - with some of MY tax dollars - PAYS FOR THE SUBSIDIZED INFRASTRUCTURE TO GET THE WATER TO PLACES WHERE CITIES SHOULD NOT EXIST! Like SoCal and AZ and LV. I have seen the mass migration from a region blessed with abubdant resources of water, fertile farmland (Ohio has the BEST), natural gas, infrastructure, you name it to CA, AZ, CO (it was a religion in the ’70’s thanks to John Denver!) and TX and FL…the list goes on. Move to that income-tax-free state with your generous pension…where is that check written? BACK HOME.
So, when the water runs out way out west, y’all come on back to the Old Northwest, where yer kinfolk left from. The livin’ is good, and cheap, and folks are friendly. Snow builds character.
Yeah, Detroit is a goner, it’s true. And my Brother in CA wishes he had move to Seattle when the going was good. But I’ll take OH, warts and all, and gladly welcome anyone who wants to work hard to come back. We’ll leave the light on for ya!
Got Water?
Marquis Dee
I left my native state 15 years ago but my wife’s extended family has been farming in the Northern San Joaquin Valley and Sacramento Valley since the 1870’s. I know they grow a lot of rice up north ( around Colusa, Yuba City, Marysville, etc.), but when did they start growing rice down in southern California? That is really news to me if it is true.
fertile farmland (
Ohiohas the BEST),Pennsylvania, where they ruined it and built houses. Some of the most fertile.
Their growing rice in southern california??
Ernest Callenbach wrote a novel — Ecotopia — about Northern California+Oregon+Washington seceeding from the US. But it’s definitely a fiction. Ecotopia was designed to become a environmentally friendly socialist country. I read it years ago, and I don’t think they mentioned budget deficits and illegal aliens.
The same book also probably did not mention how wealth is created. Socialists tend to ignore that.
California never recovered from the early-90’s recession. In fact, fewer people are employed in Los Angeles County now than in 1990, despite a population increase of 1 million:
http://articles.latimes.com/2009/jun/14/local/me-week14
The price at which consumer goods must be manufactured is the China price. The price for technical services is the India price. The price for hard-won knowledge is free. So, how long can anyone survive in a state where the cost of living and doing business are in the stratosphere?
God love Ahansen,
First we had “the Chinamen are hear for the women” post. (and I thought, Really? good! The women should earn their keep and your average Chinaman needs to understand why American guys are like this). (Ok that was humor OK!)
Now we’ve got the “California should consider sucession” pst.
Honestly, if Cali took all the debt she was responsible for and other BS with her, it would end up making Mexico look like the first world with in a decade.
I’m sure the first thing to go would be the constitution. Second thing would be the new currency. Then all the liberals would be going full throttle in the new democracy.
Eventually it would all be take over by a bunch of rock throwing old women from the Peoples Republic of Berkley (a substate of the Northern California Socialist Union).
Ahhhhh. Good times.
“The women should earn their keep and your average Chinaman needs to understand why American guys are like this”
ROTFLMAO!
Seriously, though, American women could do a lot worse than American men. And, from the looks of things, they will!
That line was hilarious.
I don’t know if you recall, palmy, when you conferred honorary crackerhood on me. As a result of that reward I proceeded to get myself a (semi) redneck guy. We’re doing just fine, thanks, except for the eruptions that occur time to time when he treads on my guinea.
A one-man indictment of the American educational system. Way to go there, jimbob.
Thankya. Somma my bestest work!
As a Canadian watching the US of A slowly turn into some sort of bankrupt, armed to the teeth, madhouse - I wish you guys would hurry up - decide Canada is where all the bad guys live and build your 40 foot high fence along the 49th - that might keep us safe from you guys leaving the ship as it sinks.
Our problem here is that we can’t tell the 30+ % of you guys that are bat shit crazy flat earthers from the sane ones. IF we could tell you apart by looking we could just “profile” the nut cases out at the border.
Anyway, my friends - may you find a way through this to a brighter day. Peace.
oh, we’ll come for Canada, before we’re through. You guys got oil, right? And maple syrup too, eh?….excellent…
You don’t need a 40 ft high fence. You have the merit based point system.
If California were to secede, I wish them success.
Should California households secede from California?
Housing recovery is keyed to jobs
Economist outlines his forecast for 2010
By Roger Showley
Union-Tribune Staff Writer
2:00 a.m. October 14, 2009
The prospects of a recovery in the housing market next year depend more than ever on a pickup in jobs, the chief economist for the Mortgage Bankers Association said yesterday.
“If you look at past recessions, there was always quite a quick recovery,” said Jay Brinkman, previewing the remarks he’ll deliver today to the group’s annual convention at the San Diego Convention Center. “I don’t see that this time.”
The reason, he said, is that manufacturing is less of a factor than it was after the 1980s and ’90s recessions, when companies added shifts and reopened plants to respond to demand.
Brinkman distributed a graph of unemployment and past-due mortgage payments dating to 1979. The graph shows both categories rising together now for the first time at the same rate. He said the numbers suggest that the end to distressed housing “will coincide with job-market stabilization.”
For 2010, Brinkman predicted a slowing of gross domestic product from the current quarter’s 2.6 percent annualized increase to 2.2 percent in the first half of next year, before it grows to 3 percent in the third quarter and 3.4 percent in the fourth quarter.
He forecast unemployment to rise from 10 percent this quarter to 10.2 percent by mid-2010, then slipping to 9.9 percent a year from now.
He said a quicker job recovery is hampered by consumer reluctance to spend, few tools left to the Federal Reserve to stimulate the economy and the rising federal debt that threatens to crowd out private borrowing to spur growth.
And when jobs come back, he said, there is some question which sectors will benefit. He sketched the possibility of a reverse “Grapes of Wrath” scenario, in which unemployed Californians move to Oklahoma and Texas, as the Golden State’s fiscal and structural problems hamper a turnaround.
“It’s a wonderful place,” he said of California, but it faces higher taxes, operational issues for companies and many challenges in state and local government. “I think that’s a negative.”
Of course, many national experts have predicted the demise of California in the past, only to see it revive and prosper.
Brinkman did not paint a totally bleak picture for next year.
“Consumers are feeling a little better,” he said, because their asset loss of $14 trillion has been trimmed to $10 trillion in recent months with the rebound on Wall Street.
He also said much of the $787 billion federal stimulus package passed earlier this year has yet to be spent; only $18 billion in new construction has been expended.
“Shovel-ready projects in the first part of 2010 are expected to provide some stimulus” in the construction industry, he said.
Housing faces continuing problems, the greatest of which is an overhang of delinquencies in house payments. He said the inventory of homes for sale is about 3.9 million, and 3.8 million homeowners are in arrears on their payments. While some owners will successfully get their mortgages restructured, others will not.
“That implies a large number of homes will come through the process” of foreclosure, he said.
…
California is very very unique in that it has such a huge population it is has several times the problems of any one else just because of the sheer numbers.
Long ago the state should have been divided into three states North,Central,and South.
Prop 13 as i recall was debated very vigorously by the opponents as having a very negative effect on the states budget years down the road, this of course is one of many problems but tax loss because of prop 13 has been huge.
Case in point, i have many relatives in Cal and none have ever moved because of prop 13, they are afraid and they don’t want to leave the state thus they stay put and generate a negative towards the state’s budget, multiply this by millions and you see a complete picture of short fall.
Many rich will continue to make Cal their home and many more who want the so called want-a-be life will move there if they can afford it.
The middle class and lower have little chance in the state any more, they took a hard road in their life to move there years ago they will have to tough it out, in what has become a 15% beautiful state to live in when you have money, and a third world country for the other 85%?
You’re absolutely right, swg,
If you have money to live on the coast or in the hills,
SCalifornia is one of the coolest places on the planet. If you’re stuck in the basin or the desert, it’s a toilet. When you can’t stand, PV or Malibu/Westside, or Laguna/Newport/La Jolla anymore, you know the state is skewered….
the desert, it’s a toilet.
HEY! easy girl……..why else do folks come here for winter?
But I get your drift and not all deserts are neato. Witness Mohave before developers ruin the perimeter. And please leave the turtles alone. Just look.
I agree with most things about California how the government here in our state capital can not for the most part get anything done. I dont think suceeding from the US is what we need to do, what I think needs to be done is a revamp of taxes. People in their states should only pay money to their state, we should not be paying money to our state and also the federal government our society is taxed to the limit, double taxed (even though they say we arent we are)
We should prop up California. This is a great state. We could solve our water problems if we could build enough of the desalinzation plants to bring in sea water (WE got a big giant ocean out there to use). Secondly we can support half of the US if we can get our solar and wind farms passed to build - Generating revenue for this state. (WE have a big giant desert to build this in). WE could build a bullet train along the coast from San Diego to San Francisco which would take a little under 4 hours to ride. All these things are great ideas the only problem to getting them done is too many people worrying about a freaking gnat catcher habitat land. Now dont get me wrong I agree with setting aside land and other areas for the animals and endagered species but at the same time we need to take care of this state.
The people of this state are great thinkers, and while I dont agree with alot of things right now going on in this state with the taking away rights from other sets of people, gay rights or abortion rights. I think at some point this state WILL eventually do the right thing.
Us Californians need to pull together and demand a reform of taxes, from the federal government. Let the citizens take care of their state, so that it can support its own populations of people so that we dont have to support the rest of the nation. If Californians were to demand that we pay the amount in federal taxes only to our California government and do away with the state tax, that would be more money in the workers hand, more money that the state can do everything it needs to support.
I understand about prop 13, but that is part of the problem here, a few who dont pay the full amount makes it so the rest of us have to pay our fair share and your share that you are not paying. California needs to have 1 police force, a state police and 1 fire force, Cal-Fire, this will eliminate the needs for individual cities to support and deal with a smaller police and fire force, roads would be taken care of by the state, the same for water and electricity.
We also need to crack down on supporting illegal immigration, Im all for people coming here and becoming citizens to start a family and to become members of a productive society. But it is unfair that the people of California have to support hospital and medical bills to people who are not citizens and that are here illegally, what we should do, is California should submit a bill to Mexico and charge them interest for every year it goes unpaid for the amount of hospital and medical bills and public service fees from their people crossing over here illegally into California. We obvioulsy would not deny people entrance to a hospital.
These are just a few of my ideas, along with California becoming if you will its own Republic, but co-existing with the United States this could be again a great place.