Since I live in the Socialist State of Kalifornia I figured I would put up a post on the complete and utter demise of this State after the last election. Couple figures first:
• Some 2.3 million Californians are without jobs, for a 12.4% unemployment rate — one of the highest in the country.
• From 2001 to 2010, factory jobs plummeted from 1.87 million to 1.23 million — a loss of 34% of the state’s industrial base. Ask any company, and it’ll tell you the same thing: It’s now almost impossible to build a big factory in California.
• With just 12% of the U.S. population, California has almost a third of the nation’s welfare recipients. Some joke the state motto should be changed from “The Golden State” to “The Welfare State.” Meanwhile, 15.3% of all Californians live in poverty.
• The state budget gap for 2009-10 was $45.5 billion, or 53% of total state spending — the largest in any state’s history.
• The state’s sales tax is the nation’s highest, and its income tax the third-highest, the BusinessInsider Web site recently noted. Meanwhile, the Tax Foundation’s “State Business Tax Climate Index” ranks California 48th.• In a ranking by corporate relocation expert Ronald Pollina of the 50 states based on 31 factors for job creation, California finished dead last.
And what did the voters of his State decide? Not only did they elect a has-been liar named Jerry Brown but they also passed a Proposition that would require only a simple majority in Congress to pass a budget. Prior to this it was 2/3rd’s which gave Republicans, who are always the minority in this Socialist State, some leverage to get some of the worst tax hikes and bad stuff out of the budget.
Not anymore.
So now expect budget busting numbers to come out of our State Legislature. But wait….wonder of wonders, Californians in the same election approved Proposition 26 which makes it harder to raise taxes. But does anyone really believe a super liberal Legislature is going to stop spending on all their Utopian idiocy?
Ain’t happening jack.
For one, knowing this State, any intelligent Proposition will go to court and a activist judge will throw it out:
Shaun Bowler, a political scientist at University of California, Riverside, said odd voting patterns often spark lawsuits, and referenda have been thrown out as a consequence.
“Prop 26 will end up in court,” predicted Bowler, who said it is poorly worded and fails to clearly define “fee.”
“You can always try to litigate [ballot measures] out of being implemented,” he added. “That’s likely going to happen here.”
And even if 26 sticks around you can expect the Legislature to spend and borrow, spend and borrow….and then all you good people in less retarded States will be sending money to bail this State out.
This place is a mess and the businesses can see it:
In executive coaching, there is a saying: “The problem you define is the one you solve.” Based on what I’ve seen, California is in serious trouble because many people refuse to admit to one of our big problems – the flight of businesses, capital and jobs to other states and nations.
Good information about the phenomena is hard to come by. Hence, out of frustration, a year ago I began compiling a list of what I call “California Disinvestment Events.”
The new compilation shows that 144 companies have fully or partially engaged in such events during the first three quarters of 2010, nearly triple the 51 companies discovered for all last year. You can see the list of companies that disinvest along with explanatory context here.
Such events are found in public documents. The real exodus is incalculable because so many are carried out without public notice. I think that for every one that becomes public knowledge, another dozen or more occur. Of course, many are small companies, but as they grow the economic benefits will be reaped elsewhere.
Since Joseph Vranich wrote the above article he has updated the list with another 14 companies bringing the total to a 158 leaving California.
And you can count Investors Business Daily as another one:
Worse is the feeling among the state’s businesses of an entrenched, almost pathological antipathy toward any job-creating activity.
As Cypress Semiconductor CEO T.J. Rodgers memorably put it: “The killer factor in California for a manufacturer to create, say, 1,000 blue-collar jobs is a hostile government that doesn’t want you there and demonstrates it in thousands of ways.”
So far this year, thanks to California’s unfriendly political environment, strict regulations and high taxes, 32 companies have announced they’ll either expand elsewhere, move or shut down operations, according to the California Manufacturers & Technology Association.
For many, it’s as simple as ABC — Anywhere But California. This is an issue near and dear to our hearts. Investor’s Business Daily was founded in 1983 in Los Angeles — and for a quarter of a century has proudly called California its home.
But we too have been affected by the state’s poisonous, anti-business political environment. With de facto one-party rule in the state since the 1960s and few signs of change anytime soon, our optimism about the state’s future has begun to wane.
As a result, sad to say, much of IBD’s future growth will happen at a new facility in Texas — where local and state authorities have bent over backwards to make us feel welcome.
California was once like Texas, but lost its way. Today, when comparisons are made, California is most often compared to Greece — another idyllic place with a sunny, Mediterranean climate on the verge of bankruptcy.
But the liberals voted to keep us on a path towards bankruptcy.
Just sad.
See author page
Okay, a rehashing of previously regurgitated statistics and commonly known facts.
I see nothing new in this article.
You need, Curt, to start thinking outside the box on this California issue.
There is ground to cover, new ground, but no one has the gonads to take it on.
Then send in a reader post Ivan
Curt,
You guys, have in the past, arbitrarily censored my posts.
No thanks.
Outside the box thinking tends to be to “controversial” for this site.
Who is “you guys?”
You’re kidding, right?
You “guys” can’t handle truthful criticism of Sarah Palin, thus you couldn’t handle the truth about the California virus which is infecting the rest of the nation.
Dissension is verbotten!
No I’m not, please point to the comment that was censored. I would like to know. Based on your history I’m guessing that you went off topic with your PDS (as your doing here) and was warned about it but please send me the link of the thread you claim to have been censored on so I can check it out.
It all seems to come down to SP like we are all ‘marching in lockstep’ behind her. She just happens to say some things we agree with. A welcome change from the past thirty years of American politicians.
Post it and see if they censor it, what are you afraid of? js
So,California had a chance to make some changes, but decided to stick with the same old crop of tired policitians and unions who are wrecking what is left of a former glorious state.
No bailouts! Not now! Not evah!
@ Ivan, the California Virus is Pelosi, Boxer, Waxman, Lofgren and their failed Agenda, irresponsible spending and the California deficit that if not checked will make economic recovery very much impossible. Is it news to you that Companies and Employers are leaving California?
If Sarah Palin scares you, you most likely are suffering from paranoia. If Fiscal Responsibility scares you wait until the new 112th Congress is in Session.
Ivan, I’ll assume you haven’t been reading FA lately; a while back there was such a heated debate over the Ground Zero Mosque issue, I thought we would lose a large percentage of our group. We did lose a permanent author and his posts and a few others. Somehow, I don’t see that as a group restricted to a collective train of thought.
You are welcome to state rational opinions with documentation, partly out of respect for Obama’s lack of documentation, name calling and off topic BS will condemn your posts to the outhouse.
Otherwise this a great place to discuss and debate. To think that you will change the thinking of Conservatives who are well entrenched in their belief systems is a forlorn hope. If you can describe practical solutions to California’s imminent collapse, you will develop a following, for there are many concerned Californios who are regulars, but to assume you are correct while expressing anger, indignation, and insults while declaring that we are stupid because we don’t recognize your wisdom is the strategy of our president and not all that effective. In fact it is counter productive, because you will alienate those who agree with you and create even more resistance from the rest.
You can be indignant with this message or you can use it to your advantage, frankly I don’t care. I don’t warn people; I just flush them down the crapper.
Curt–
I attended high school in Southern California in the sixties. Juniors with good grades got to take a field trip to a local industrial plant every Friday. Some of the places I visited:
Bethlehem Steel in Los Angeles (Yes, in the city of Los Angeles)
Kaiser Steel in Fontana
Ford Motors in Pico Rivera
A furniture factory in Los Angeles
Lockheed in Burbank
All of them long gone…
i cannot believe that california has elected again the very people who helped put them in the mess they are in. that lack of reality thinking seems to be permanent with some folks like pelosi who foolishly thinks she’ll protect the dim nightmares in her attempt to be minority leader. the repubs are relishing the idea.
so i can only hope that someone with common sense and a steady hand can help in california. what a shame to see a beautiful state inhabited by such ugly empty minds. of course we all know that some good folks live there as well who desperately want to improve things.
I must disagree with the assertion that California is on the verge of bankruptcy.
It’s not on the verge, it is already there.
I suppose it depends on how you define bankrupt. If you think that an entity is not bankrupt if it is still able to make a few more payments by running up a credit card, then it is on the verge. But if by bankrupt you mean, has financial obligations it has no conceivable means of ever meeting, then…
——————————————————
The case has been made that, nationwide, we don’t just face the bursting of a real estate bubble. We also face the bursting of an entitlement bubble. Link.
A commenter over on Ace a month or so back opined that if you live within 20 miles of a major city, beware. Disappearing entitlements + no jobs = roving bands.
Extreme wingnut view? I don’t know, there might be something to it.
Strange days. Moonbeam Brown is Governor again, cats and dogs living together, total chaos…
Think outside the box, ey?
1. In a post-2012 national conservative political environment, California goes into Federal receivership. All important decisions are made by Federal overseers. Everything is on the table Unrealistic pension obligations are cut down to size. Unnecessary spending is slashed. Business-hostile regulations are rescinded.
Or
2. Moonbeam Brown and the Democrat-dominated State Legislature save the day with increased government spending on welfare, dog parks, enhanced state employee benefits, and green energy programs. Taxes are increased across the board – income, property, business, sales. The business community is put in its proper place with more regulations. Californians who move out of the state forfeit 20% of their net worth to the state.
Which one of these is closer to what you had in mind, Ivan?
Keeping it simple for Ivan and others like him…
I moved to California from the midwest in 1980. Using my own money and student loans, I earned (earned, wasn’t given, I worked damned hard for them) two college degrees. I married, and my husband and I worked hard to save up enough to buy our own home. We had four children, and through the savings and considerable economic sacrifice, we put all four through 12 years of private school. Meanwhile we paid property taxes toward the always-demanding-more-funding public school system–for schools we never used. We’ve endured three layoffs as two of my husband’s employers and one of mine relocated for economic reasons. Despite each of us having two university degrees, we found it took months, in one case nearly two years, to find work after the layoffs.
Despite this, we stayed in California. We urged our children, however, to leave when it came time to go to university, because no matter what degrees they pursued, their likelihood of being able to afford a decent middle class life in California was nonexistent.
Thanks in great part to the sale of a small but valuable parcel of land in the state I came from, my husband and I have managed to save money toward our retirement, but we watched our investments take a major hit over the past two years. By some strange fit of intelligent planning, we chose not to include in our portfolio California bonds, but rather bonds in another state, a state which demonstrates far more fiscal prudence.
If anyone can give me one shred of rational, logical evidence that Jerry Brown, Barbara Boxer, and their cohorts will pull California back from the financial brink, that I will not be increasingly taxed and watch more and more of what I’ve accumulated with my own labors be taken from me because “others need it more,” then I’ll consider staying in this state. As it is, I see absolutely no reason why I should hand over more and more of my hard earned money to a government that has done little but take my money since I arrived here in 1980.
Seriously, I get the concept that love is blind, but nobody ought to love a state that financially rapes them. Eventually a sane, healthy person breaks away from that kind of abuse, and then wonders why they didn’t leave earlier.
In keeping with the tradition established by the liberal wackadoos who ran newsweek straight into the ground I hereby offer $1 for the State of California.
There will be massive firings followed by a brief fire sale, and a total restructuring the tax and regulations structure.
Have the Ahhhnold contact me before moonbeam takes over and does more damage or I will devalue the offer.
Excuse me, any one seen my tin foil hat? It was here a minute ago.
I’ll return the favor Radom thoughts, and keep it simple for you in return.
1. I don’t need any lectures from a carpetbagger on California. I was born there and spent the first 44 of my 49 years in that hell-hole. It wasn’t always that way, it was a great state till about 1999 and became an even bigger cesspool when Arnold became governor.
2. Honestly, that took a lot of guts to admit you had the misfortune of actually deciding to stay in that cesspool. Why in the name of God would you even admit to making that mistake? You lose a lot of cred just telling us that.
3. Any “conservative” who is staying in California is contributing TO the problem that is California. If you’re not part of the solution, Random, you’re part of the problem.
4. It sounds like, and correct me if I’m wrong, but you’re not clear about this, you intend to actually stay in that state and/or retire there? Are you insane? Do you have no idea of the fecal matter storm that awaits that state??
5. The problem with California is, well, it’s infected with Californians. They are the problem, not some nebulous “Jerry brown” types, but the actual voters. They keep making the “easy” decision or the “feel good” decision and they deserve what is coming for them.
6. Yes, I say they deserve it. Why shouldn’t they? The more cradle to grave socialism you have in your state the less “free” anything you get. No free market, no freedom of religion, no freedom of expression, etc.
All of you, get the hell out of there NOW. If you don’t, you deserve what is coming down the pike.
No, seriously Ivan – tell us what you really think.
So is the below true?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jerry_Brown
Reagan’s final year was marked by a decline in revenue and he RAISED taxes. I know he raised the sales tax, I can’t remember if he did the same with other taxes.
When Brown left Sacramento in 1983, the state was running a deficit, so Brown did mess things up.
Dukmejian brought in so much revenue that for a few years the state was giving back tax-rebates, if you can believe that.
Making predictions can be fun, and that’s why every human being makes them. When it comes to California’s financial future, however, it is not really a prediction that the beautiful State is heading for insolvency – Wm T Sherman has it right in #13 – it’s already there, and actual declaration of bankruptcy is an inevitability. CA can get bailed out, which it probably will be, but that will only postpone that inevitable and also make it worse.
Amongst other Impossibilities facing CA – No one can reduce California’s bloated, entrenched, complacent and sanctimonious government bureaucracy, that seems to be at war with all business, large and small.
The damage has been perpetrated for too many years, through too many administrations – and now a majority thinks that going back to Brown is a good concept.
The State will have to drink that distasteful concoction of “Reorganization,” which will require a complete rebuilding and restructuring of how it conducts the business of the taxpayer. None of the feeble budget cuts are working and a majority of voters seem to be incapable of acknowledging that they have a problem. They will not approve wholesale cut-backs. What occurred with GM when Obama handed its control to his Union buddies, will not be possible with this, the 7th or 8th largest economy in the world.
It almost won’t matter who’s in Sacramento when it crashes into the wall – the State will be trimmed to cut spending to within its means. That reality may hit before 2012.
Already saddled with the lowest credit rating in the Nation, California’s budget deficit is projected to reach 37 billion dollars next year.
One of the results of kissing the brick wall, will be that Californians will face head-on the illegal migrants problem which has placed an unsupportable financial burden on the State.
Businesses will be blamed for everything that has gone wrong, but the reality is that runaway government has killed the golden goose, and a majority of voters (the very same who brought back Brown) provided the ax.
Well said, JR!
The political capital that could have enabled a Federal bailout of California has already been spent on the Healthcare bill cramdown, the auto company takeovers, the stimulus, etc. etc. etc. Not going to happen in this political environment.
GaffaUK – Wikipedia? Seriously? If you imagine for one second that the Brown people have not been all over that page to edit it in his favor, I’ve got a bridge in New York to sell you.
Anyway, a few things:
1. California, more than any state I know of, has a highly cyclical budget situation due to the tax structure. The revenues zoom up and down depending on the economy.
2. Budget surpluses and deficits are created over a period of years. The groundwork for whatever Brown had the first couple of years was laid by his predecessors.
3. When Brown left office after two terms, the state had a 1 billion dollar defict. That’s all his.
4. Brown set in motion many of the trends that eventually bankrupted the state.
5. And in 2010, the question to a voter like me was, what’s he going to do now? Based on his previous performance as governor, and subsequently as mayor of Oakland, it will not be anything helpful – just a lot of feel good programs, high taxes, and pinwheel-eyed yammering about green energy. But I’ll give him this – at this point in the state’s history, his election is not really the cause of the state’s demise – it’s a symptom.
@James:
Do you have a link for the information on California’s projected budget deficit that you state?
$37 billion??????????
Damn, now you’re talking ditry to me with that figure! 😈
California can rot. They are the virus which has infected the rest of the Nation, except for a large majority of fly-over country-and they so richly deserve what is coming there way.
😛
PS “conservatives”, leave if you want to live.
California’s only salvation will be to become a protectorate of Mexico. Adopt their form of government, their civil rights record, their treatment of their citizens, their law and order, their justice system, hell it will be a moonbeam world of illegals, rainbows and pot.
Ivan, you talk like a jilted lover. She betrayed you, and so not only do you hate her, all your friends have got to hate her too.
I will probably be easing out the back door at some point. The writing is on the wall. It’s just going to be lords and peasants at some time in the near future – no place left for people in the middle. What a travesty it all is.
I live in San Diego County (not city, county). Got a Republican Congressman (Hunter) and there are enough conservatives around to give me a sense of how it used to be in the rest of the state before the madness took over.
It’s like being in one of the last human strongholds in a zombie movie.
Wm T. Sherman:
Perhaps you don’t have a sense of “home”? I do. I loved that state and it was my birthright. They, the socialists, ruined it and turned it into some proto-Marxist state.
So you’ll have to forgive me for being REALLY ****ING PISSED-OFF AT THE LIBERALS.
And, btw, I went to SDSU in the 1980s. Back then it was conservative, it isn’t any longer. The city is run by liberals who bankrupted the place.
Get out while you still can. The end is nigh!
Good luck.
Look North people. The biggest elephant is to the north. If you have anything to do with science or math go to Alberta. Huge. Skookem will back me. The most conservative people ever.Hey we’re 25b in the black.
oil guy,
Yes Albertans are probably some of the most conservative people on the continent, however, they are surrounded on all sides by liberals who, although they might not make Obama proud enough, hold socialistic tendencies and elect devout worshipers of the apologetic politically correct ethic.
Canada’s current masochistic squabble over the Canadian born traitor Omar Khadr’s trial being held in Guantanamo, is ample evidence that too many Canadians outside Alberta are apathetic to the freedom they have. A 15 year old knows what he’s doing, and this one killed a US sergeant in Afghanistan. He should be serving the full 40 years that the US military tribunal sentenced him to. Canadians want him in Canada so that he can collect his get-out-of-jail card early. That kind of sentiment might not be, and should not be much appreciated by most on FA.
But Alberta? Yes, absolutely. In fact, Canada has a wide open immigration policy which makes it by far the biggest receiver of immigrants per head in the world – and Alberta has plenty of room for entrepreneurs who know what they’re doing in the energy business, particularly those who enjoy the outdoors (that’s not me – I don’t even know how to pitch a tent 😉 ).
And that Alberta Heritage Fund throwing off billions annually, . . . nice bonus. What’s not to like? . . . Oh, yah those winter temperatures.
oil guy can you provide a link to Keef Obamaman, I’m not having any luck with my Lib search engine.
There is a lot of opportunity in Alberta and major bucks; however the rest of Canada wants Alberta to support their Welfare and Entitlement propgrams and the Socialism that goes with it. Many Albertans would like Alberta to become the “58” th state and many in BC as well. It will probably never happen. Besides Socialists like Obama Reid and Pelosi would want them to shut down their energy programs and become more Third World like to qualify for Socialism.
The rest of Canada figures it can play the socialism game a long time because Alberta has a big check book. Yippeee!
Wm T. Sherman, oh, you are so right about Ivan. He’s a bitter scorned lover wanting others to hate the one who jilted him as much as he hates her.
I’m just wondering how I can be considered a “carpetbagger.” This is the 21th century, and California isn’t the South, so I’m clearly not …a Northerner in the South after the American Civil War usually seeking private gain under the reconstruction governments. Nor am I an …outsider; especially a nonresident or new resident who seeks private gain from an area often by meddling in its business or politics. I’ve lived here for 30 years (that’s hardly “new”) and I’ve been a resident (complete with driver’s license and registered to vote) for 28 years. Never “meddled” in business or politics, and paid my state taxes like a good girl on time every single year. Arguably, the state has received more money from me over the years than I have used from its services.
Ah, never mind, Ivan is obviously a master of the ad hominem attack, and resorts first and foremost to name calling to make what he considers a point.
My husband’s family came from Scotland in the 1600s. They settled in Maine. Though “carpetbagging” as a term comes from the post Civil War era, I suppose they could have been considered “carpetbaggers” as they weren’t born there, and they went there to try to better their lot in life. The next generation of the family migrated to Massachusetts, making them again “carpetbaggers” since they weren’t born there and again arrived trying to build a better life for themselves. Two generations later, an ancestor migrated Iowa, making him (by Ivan’s reckoning) a “carpetbagger” as well no doubt. And then one of his heirs traveled by wagon to Washington Territory (it wasn’t a state yet), yet again a “carpetbagger” to Ivan. Finally, a member of the family traveled down to settle in California at the turn of the 20th century, where the subsequent two generations were born. I suppose that absolves them of “carpetbagger” status.
Apparently Ivan believes if you aren’t born somewhere you don’t belong there. Only those born in a particular state have a “right” to it, by his reasoning.
How provincial.
My family lived in the Midwest for generations, and I was the very first to move to California. I came here because I visited as a teen, and appreciated so many things about California, the weather, the amazing terrain (mountains, beaches, deserts, it’s all here), the cultural opportunities, the culinary variety, and a great many of the people.
I don’t hate Californians, and I certainly don’t hate the 31st state itself. I’m deeply saddened by it’s inescapable future. I wanted to live here–I chose it out of literally every other state in the union, I didn’t just get here by an accident of birth.
I have come to really dislike the fact that so many citizens (including a geometrically increasing number of undereducated immigrants) vote Democrat with mindless enthusiasm. And I despise the resulting government. I’ve had enough of being victimized by it, and increasingly feel that leaving is the only rational response.
If I really hated California and its people though, I suppose I’d be just like Ivan. Scary, scary thought.
Well Ivan, I was born in CA.
Moved East at the age of 10.
Moved back to CA at the age of 46.
I consider Maryland home. Came back to this cluster**** for a job. It’s been good, however I may need to move on soon.
But.
You can’t write off individual people as an abstraction in your Wrath-of-God-Judgement-Day thing. You just can’t. Quit talking about the results of human foolishness as a vengeful plunging asteroid dispatched by God, will ya? People are as stupid now as they were 10,000 years ago — they just have more stuff, so they can act real stupid and not starve to death right away. Lots of fine people here in CA– but they get outvoted. And anyway, the not-so-fine people have been systematically misled. I think being faced with actual starvation may get their attention — we have to be ready to explain things. Maybe they will listen, and maybe they won’t.
Say — what are you doing to save the place where you are right now? You’re going to run out of places to run away to, at the rate you’re going. What would you do on D-Day – swim back to England because of all the shooting?
The reality of California is that Liberalism has made this place a microchasm of what the USSR did to Eastern Europe apply to the US.
Central planning rewards the illegal invaders, unionized bureaucrats and high amount of people on public assistance, not risk takers and business owners.
Draconian laws and regulations for global warming and other eco-Boogey Men push the cost of business to a level people are unwilling to stay here for, so the move out of state or overseas.
It’s pretty simple. The tech sector has high margins, so they still survive with an increasingly imported workforce who will accept a lower wage. In time, they get smart, too and demand a higher cost. When Indian programmers form a union, run.
The Golden Goose of CA has been cooked, eaten and is heading towards the sewer.
Government power and importance has eclipsed the private sector, this is very bad because bureaucrats do not understand they are bleeding their source of income. Cannibalizing their food for short-term gains and ill-invested (CALPERS) pensions.
We are moving, ASAP.
I have no doubt that California’s economy will be go totally into the toilet now that “Moonbeam” is governor again. We must not allow our Congressional representatives to bail them out from their own fiscal irresponsibility.
@Random Thoughts:
@Wm T Sherman:
Just thought you guys would like to know that Ivan lives and works in CA.
I’d be happy if leftist loons from California would NOT MOVE TO WASHINGTON STATE… unfortunately they came en mass many years ago, further infecting our state with their ludicrous ideas. We already have enough wacko’s here we don’t need to import them from California. Oregon has done a pretty good job of filtering out many but we should consider a border checkpoint at the Colombia river.
Californians screw up their state… then move on to a healthy state and infect it trying to recreate California. It’s very cancer-esque
I’m in NY an we elected Cuomo and Schumer the men who were behind the three trillion dollar destruction of the economy. Plus Cuomo is a moral and political coward who failed to buck any of his democrap allies when they were calling republican proposals to straighten out Fannie and Freddie ‘racist’ and when Obama was filibustering republicans attempts to reform those agencies.
Cuomo only attacks dems when it is in his self interest, meaning almost never, and come January, when it is in his self interest to work with the corruptocraps in Albany, he will quickly change his tune. But, NY, just like California, got the government it deserves, and they will, using classic, Cloward Piven, socialist strategy, drive NY off the rails and decimate its productive class. Detroit, California, Zimbabwe, here we come.
Aye Ch. – He claimed that he had moved out a few years ago.
What gives?
Don, many Californios just want a second home in the Northwest to relax and help you guys around Seattle with Green Programs and the Socialist movement. I don’t really believe you need help with those projects, but they wont hinder you in those areas.
Second homes are no longer such a hot issue among Californios these days, mainly because the banks are calling in their markers for the first ones; consequently, you may notice an ever increasing migration of uber Liberals from the South, they will probably settle in your sanctuary cities. They do call them Sanctuary Cities, correct? They will be looking for jobs, true enough, but once they are established they will help with the Greening and Socializing of one of the Greenest and most Social states.
Look at the bright side, they have lots of experience driving in heavy traffic and their aggressive driving techniques will make for entertainment while you sit even longer in traffic.
I am not moving to Washington. The official state flower is mildew.
People are as stupid now as they were 10,000 years ago — they just have more stuff, so they can act real stupid and not starve to death right away.
There’s more truth in that than one suspects. The lumbering disaster that is Clownifornia has been in a slow-motion crash for some time now. In fact, one wonders if the crash will ever become manifest. The state and our society is so large that it’s like an oil tanker. Any change in course takes a long time to happen. Perhaps the comment about having more stuff than 10,000 years ago is actually an index of how unseriously people take Clownifornia’s demise. When the electricity still comes out of the wall, the food stamps show up in the mail, the shelves at the Ralphs are full, the mall is still open and full of iPods, why would anyone be expected to take notice of a massive state deficit (persisting despite it being “unconstitutional”)? Unless you worked for a company that decamped and left the state, would you as an average reflexive Demotard in CA even notice?
The hardest thing to imagine is just how the SS Clownifornia will beach itself on the shoals of bankruptcy, considering that there is no legal mechanism for a state to actually declare bankruptcy. It won’t be a doomsday scenario of looters and gangs driving Mad Max vehicles down the street. Lots of things would have to happen to get from here to there, things that are very unlikely. However what is likely? Many municipalities declaring bankruptcy? Would CA ever default on G. O. bonds? It is unimaginable that Sacramento will alter its promises to public union pensioners. That is more unlikely than some latter-day Thunderdome in Oakland. For the simple reason that the public unions own and are Sacramento. So whom will they screw? Gov. Moonbeam will be only too glad to help the unions.
@ Skookum, We have our share of ‘carpetbaggers’ up in Montana as well.
Ted Turner’s Montana adventure
He’s raising buffalo, killing fish, making money and having fun, says Fortune’s Marc Gunther.
http://money.cnn.com/2006/10/03/news/economy/pluggedin_gunther_bison.fortune/index.htm
He is no more a Rancher than I am the Pope. His ‘hunts’ are not hunts, they are like shooting fish in a barrel. His spread is a few miles from mine and his Nature Conservancy crew knows about as much about Land Management on the Plains as my neighbors pair of mules.
Turner created an artificial market for bison but the market for beef is stable and bison is not typically ‘whats for dinner’ in America. I have two streams on property that offer both brown trout and rainbows. Anyone that wants to fool with my streams are subject to trespassing violations and will get a 12ga rock salt warning.
Turner is a typical limousine liberal that is not one of my most treasured neighbors. He is just a ‘carpetbagger’ playing at ranching.
G. Orwell –
I am thinking that California will move in the direction of becoming part of the Third World – a sea of poverty and ignorance with a small island of well-connected wealthy people floating on top of it.
Wm T, you have described the perfect template for the Left’s idea of Marxist-Leninism or the Obama/Soros Plan: California is gliding down this grade of Socialism with no brakes, no integrity, and no cares.
OT, I have read with horror and trepidation of Turner’s irreversible plans to make the West his and under his control. I had no idea his spread was near yours. He is a troubling Liberal that is probably only the point man for many others that will begin to infest the Western States as their wealth attains even more power with the dwindling fortunes of the middle class that is being formulated and promoted by the Obama/Soros Open Society Plan.
@ Skookum, Fortunately the neighbors that have been here for decades hold him in the same low regard that I do. He is only troubling on a National Scale. Outsiders that come to “Meddle” are generally not well received. My spread is larger than his and is contiguous. I do not share a common border with him, damn few of the neighbors share his politics and we are by and large in my neck of the woods conservative by nature.
Newcomers are welcome if they are not Meddlers or connivers. I do have Water and Mineral Rights on my property which Turner does not. My spread is a “Homestead” property under Montana Statute so I can develop my resources with fewer restrictions. Grand Father Clauses can be good fortune in the right hands. Traditional Land Management, taught by generations here has proven success and leaves a low footprint. The employment of Non-Traditional practices is just experimentation and subject to greater scrutiny from the State and are not proven to get a harmonious outcome
Open Society types encounter difficulty in acquiring property here since Turner’s pilgrimage here. The West is fairly tolerant of a whole lot of things but we have realized that selling land to Progressives generally results in loss of opportunity for the successive generations of long time Montana Residents and Ranchers.
I do allow some limited hunting on my spread but only to friends and no fees charged for that. I am old school and despite the fact that I am only Third Generation here, I have been all over the Country and the World, my Values have remained unchanged. WE don’t need Our Community Organized or our State ‘experimented with”. Visitors are welcome but Meddlers can stay home.
@Old Trooper 2:
I googled Ted Turner, Bozeman to see what else would come up about what he’s doing up there and found this recent article. Hope it isn’t a threat to any of your animals. Note the second commenter. 😉
http://www.kbzk.com/news/brucellosis-found-in-bison-herd-on-ted-turner-s-bozeman-area-ranch/
OT, your voice is a voice of reason and reassurance in a world that wants to stagger blindly into the darkness and chaos of Socialism. Obviously, G-d has protected you all these years for a reason.
@ Missy, Basically none of my stock share and water sources or grazing with the Turner spread. Brucellosis is unfortunately common in Bison stock and Bison on National Park grazing are notoriously prone to that disease. That is well known in these parts.
Vaccinations are good but if you keep a large beef herd that co-mingles with Elk or Bison or share water or grazing, you are asking for trouble. Turner is ‘playing’ rancher and had none of the requisite knowledge or skills to understand that. His non-resident ‘experts’ are academic types that have little real world ranching experience were clueless as well.
The Folks from the State will be effective in controlling the problem as they take a dim view of irresponsible management of land, fish, wildlife or stock. The Local Ranchers take preventive measures on their own because the loss of a herd can be devastating. State sanctions are not the desired effect so we ‘police our own’ there.
Anyway, testing is performed periodically and my stock are healthy.
Curt,
It seems that Ivan is not happy with the way things have been presented. Too Bad.
I have been here in The Mojave Desert for a year now. I came here as a result of getting hired by the USAF as a Crew Chief at Edwards AFB. Voted in my first election here last week.
The results are that we are hosed. I make pretty good money. And I do earn it. Believe me on that.
But I figure that with Moonbeam and the idiot locker we have for a legislature, my state income taxes will go up considerably. And coupled with the Bush Tax Cuts being allowed to expire at 0001 on 1 January 2011 it is going to hurt. I do not own a home as I still have one in Wichita. My Daughter and her family are renting it. Lucky there.
And having recently turned 56, I was hoping to be here until 2019 and call it quits. My Navy Retirement, Civil Service Retirement and Social Security should do us just fine. Now things have changed. I will be enrolling in the Thrift Savings Plan after the first of the year. Delayed do to having surgery to fix a hernia this past week. But other than that we are doing just fine.
And now thanks to the idiot lefties here in what used to be the golden state, I have no idea. I may see if I can find an opening in Arizona or Texas. And I hate the idea of having to move now.
And Ivan can come up with solutions for me. Yes Ivan, take care of me. It is your job to do that for those of us who have given the minimum of twenty years of service to the country.
@ Skookum, As you know in this life there are Sheep, Wolves and Sheepdogs. There are Politicians and Statesmen as well. I aim to keep the Sheepdog population big, support the Statesmen and keep the Sheep safe from Wolves, Politicians and occasionally from themselves.
It is a thankless job at times but legitimate employment and a worthy challenge.
@ORPO1:
With Ivan it is never the glass being half full or half empty, he just dumps it out and slams it against the wall. 😉
@Old Trooper 2:
I know you have huge herds, just worried that an elk may stray onto your place. Per the article, this isn’t the first time for his ranch either.
We once tried cattle years ago and are not ashamed to admit that we don’t have the years of knowledge we believe is required to take that on again. It’s not something you learn as you go. 😉