Well, there is no song – that I know of – entitled “I Got the Blue State Blues,” but someone ought to write some lyrics because the old “California Dreamin’” has become bluesy indeed, somewhere along the lines of Billie Holiday’s “Stormy Monday.” It’s that bad. This has become a lousy place to live and everybody knows it, even when “all the leaves are brown/and the sky is grey” elsewhere.
There are many reasons for this but William Voegeli has put his finger on one of the major ones in “Golden State isn’t worth it” – an op-ed that appeared yesterday in the Los Angeles Times. I wonder how many of its readers (or editors) read it, because what Voegeli is saying goes against the policies the paper has taken since I moved West in the era when Mama Cass & Co. sang “California Dreamin’” and ” Go Where You Wanna to Go.” (Oh, man, do the lyrics of that last one make me sad.)
But back to Voegeli. He writes in the LAT:
In America’s federal system, some states, such as California, offer residents a “package deal” that bundles numerous and ambitious public benefits with the high taxes needed to pay for them. Other states, such as Texas, offer packages combining modest benefits and low taxes. These alternatives, of course, define the basic argument between liberals and conservatives over what it means to get the size and scope of government right.
It’s not surprising, then, that there’s an intense debate over which model is more admirable and sustainable. What is surprising is the growing evidence that the low-benefit/low-tax package not only succeeds on its own terms but also according to the criteria used to defend its opposite. In other words, the superior public goods that supposedly justify the high taxes just aren’t being delivered.
Voegeli goes on to back this up with facts and figures, adding more in a lengthier piece in City Journal. But to those of us who live here those facts and figures are just so much garnish. We know without opening the papers that Cass’ lyrics have gone sour. It’s almost as if we are living in Friedrich von Hayek’s posthumous joke. All our best intentions have gone to mush in a welter of competing, greedy interest groups. Now, according to Voegeli, and as every California commuter knows, even the state highway system in low taxes Texas is better than the world’s fabled first freeway system. Those great songwriters Lieber & Stoller remain unreconstructed liberals, but even they must be worried about the black denim clad hero of their song on Highway 101.
Which brings me to my conclusion. I thought about sending Voegeli’s article to all my (modern) liberal friends – the remaining ones anyway – because I thought it would get them thinking, if anything does. But I stopped. In this era, nobody’s talking.
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104 Comments
1. Mike_K:One factor that he did not mention is that Texas funds its state government largely with sales taxes and this includes illegal aliens. They don’t get the free ride they do in California.
Nov 2, 2009 - 8:37 am 2. Instapundit » Blog Archive » ROGER SIMON: “California Dreamin’” becomes “I Got the Blue State Blues.” “It’s almost …:[...] SIMON: “California Dreamin’” becomes “I Got the Blue State Blues.” “It’s almost as if we are living in Friedrich von Hayek’s posthumous joke. All our best [...]
Nov 2, 2009 - 8:56 am 3. D. Ch.:Everybody who has even a nodding acquaintance with political theory and economics has heard of Adam Smith’s “invisible hand”, used to describe how the self-interested actions of free economic agents produce growing wealth for everyone. I have often thought that the actions of government, when based on supposedly good and altruistic intentions, seem always to involve an invisible foot, a foot that trips and treads under what it is trying to produce. Sometimes it seems like the overall career of these government programs and regulations resemble all too closely the cut-out cartoons of the original Monte Python series, the ones that end with a big descending shoe…
Nov 2, 2009 - 9:10 am 4. monkeyfan:Mr. Simon you should just send it on out.
We may not be talking but everybody has their ear to the ground and a finger in the wind.
Nov 2, 2009 - 9:11 am 5. HSC:Why doesn’t Ca bipass the unions and vote in limits on benefits for state employees?
Nov 2, 2009 - 9:11 am 6. Bill:Adam Smith’s “invisible foot” … that is priceless. What a great concept D. Ch., I am using that from now on.
Nov 2, 2009 - 9:17 am 7. spool32:Lord above, please stop talking up Texas! Austin is already awash in Californians from the tech boom a decade ago. We sustained our employment rate until deep into the recession… what we don’t need is more people with no tradition of independent spirit migrating here because they think the grass is greener.
In fact, the grass IS greener but you have to plant it yourself and cut it twice a week.
Nov 2, 2009 - 9:23 am 8. gk1:What would it take for this state to reform itself? I ask myself this as I watch Jerry Brown’s march to the governorship unopposed. Maybe there is some kharmic justice in him as governor revisiting the programs he saddled the state with back in the 70’s? We are so screwed!
Nov 2, 2009 - 9:37 am 9. K:OTOH, California is a great place if you’re covered by a government union, or want to indulge in a little worker’s comp fraud. Before the collapse, it was a veritable worker’s paradise for the teacher’s union and edu-crats. Everybody else? Not so much.
What surprised me the most about the op ed was that he mentioned freeways. The lack of outrage or even interest of the typical California commuter at the state of California freeways, especially in SoCal, almost makes me believe in mind control satellites. It’s like they’ve been brainwashed to believe that wasting a significant portion of their waking lives (over 4 years* for a one hour daily commute!) sitting daily on a giant linear parking lot is some kind of natural state. Whereas in truth, it’s a direct reflection of Sacramento’s teeth nashing hatred of people who use those ugly polluting vehicles instead of public transport, like good little socialist comrades.
*assuming 35 years of having to commute. This doesn’t count weekend traffic jams.
Nov 2, 2009 - 9:40 am 10. jeanneB:“Golden State Isn’t Worth It”
I got a good laugh when I read that. I left in 1994. When folks asked why I was abandoning California, I told them: “California’s no longer worth what we pay for it.”
I was apparently ahead of the curve.
Nov 2, 2009 - 9:42 am 11. Blather. Wince. Repeat. » Blog Archive » Loadin’ Up the Truck and Movin’ Out of Beverly. Hills That Is.:[...] Roger Simon comments on the same [...]
Nov 2, 2009 - 9:44 am 12. Austin:Speaking of roads, you can do the 70 mph posted speed limit most days on the Toll Roads in and around Dallas. Its the Texas Autobahn.
Nov 2, 2009 - 9:48 am 13. Ennis:Oh, joy!
All we need is another flood of bleu state refugees here. We already have a third of New Orleans here, half of Michigan and judging by the license plates I am seeing in places that no “tourist” would be we are getting alot of people from New York, New Jersey, Ohio, Massachusetts, Florida, Minnesota and Washington state.
The problem with them is that they are like cargo cultists-they move to decent places to live and try to recreate the liberal nanny state hell holes they just left. See Arizona, Washington state and Colorado for examples of that.
There are a couple of things that Texas does have in it’s favor, though. One is that there is no way there will ever be an income tax here. The other is that the native Texans won’t put up with their liberal nanny state crap-they will eventually get fed up with the bleu state refugees and either smack them down or run them off.
Nov 2, 2009 - 9:50 am 14. glenn:So what’s the sales tax rate in Texas? Mine in Central Cal is 8.75%.
And a point of interest. I moved to California in the early 1950’s. Went to school through the 8th grade in Texas. When I got here I was at least one grade level ahead of all the kids who went to school in Cal in all the subjects that count. Math, science, English, reading comp. You know, all that boring stuff. So the only thing that really happened is that the California pols spent everything that the gold miners and farmers and lumbermen, and aircraft makers and movie makers made. And then some.
Nov 2, 2009 - 9:52 am 15. 24AheadDotCom:What’s hilarious about this is that neither this post nor the CJ article mentions – even once – anything relating to immigration. And, that’s why you can’t trust this post or the CJ article: neither are in any way intellectually honest. They’re just living in a libertarian fantasy world.
Nov 2, 2009 - 9:58 am 16. Pablo:I made the same calculation about the state of New York, where I served a term in the county legislature. When I tried to contrast the woeful levels of state income tax, property taxes, and other taxes that we paid in the Empire State with the no-income-tax, low-property-tax, somewhat-higher-sales-tax model of Tennessee, I would often get one or both of the following responses:
(1) Who wants to live in Tennessee?
(2) They don’t enjoy the same government services we do
I would respond that I lived there, and I can’t remember, except for snow removal, the availability of a government “service” in NY that I didn’t have in TN that mattered one whit in my life. After banging my head into that brick wall (with a frisson of GOP-hierarchy-backing-the-good-ol’-boys), I lost my reelection bid and moved back to Tennessee. A friend from California has made the same calculation and left Orange County for friendlier climes.
The Empire State and The Golden State: their days of preeminence are ending. I hope that lessons are learned so that the experience is not duplicated elsewhere. I’m not so sure they will be.
Nov 2, 2009 - 9:59 am 17. Andy Freeman:> All our best intentions have gone to mush in a welter of competing, greedy interest groups.
What “best intentions”? The proles were told that good things would happen and hoped for said good things, but what evidence do we have that “the powers that be” actually had good intentions?
Besides, the argument for considering good intentions doesn’t apply to CA’s problems. That argument says that we should treat people with “good intentions” kindly if they’re less likely to reoffend and the results were somehow surprising. For example, we don’t give them a pass for chanting “I want to help you feel better” while they keep hitting you in the head with a hammer.
Neither of those excuses apply in CA (and remember – both are required). The results were entirely forseeable and the miscreants will happily do it again and again. In fact, they’re still trying.
We have labels for folks who happily do bad things, which describes CA’s governing class. One of them is “evil”.
Nov 2, 2009 - 9:59 am 18. Wondercat:Hmmm. So what state should I move to? Can’t be Texas. The place is fine, great even, but all my relatives are there. No way am I moving there.
Nov 2, 2009 - 10:03 am 19. roadgeek:So what state are Californians bailing out to?
The state sales tax rate in Texas is 6.25%; in Austin, where I live, the City tacks on 1% as does the transit authority for a total of 8.25%.
Nov 2, 2009 - 10:04 am 20. GAS:Keep your thoughts to yourself please.
And keep your liberal freaks away from my Texas. It isn’t the dirt on the ground that made California what it is today, it’s the dirt between the ears of the liberal residence of the failed state of California.
Nov 2, 2009 - 10:04 am 21. masstexodus:I ditched blue state MA for TX a few years ago. No personal income tax and a much lower cost of living. Services here are just as good or better than MA. My only regret is not leaving sooner.
Nov 2, 2009 - 10:05 am 22. cfbleachers:You know, Roger…it’s funny (not in a ha-ha sort of way, but in a way that makes you shake your head…and sigh)…I moved from Chicago several years ago.
In Chicago, there was a stranglehold on the political process…so deep and so complete, that it invented its own language, its own tune, its own lyrics. Mike Royko made the term “clout” more nationally recognizable, but in Chicago…it was immediately understood without further explanation.
The Democrats were in “charge” of Cook County, the City…and all the wards within it. You had a voice and could be heard…as long as your voice sang the EXACT same lyrics as everyone else.
Being an “independent” meant that you were a Democrat, only you wanted to be more liberal than the blue collar Democrats.
This “machine” ran the City and County…as a fiefdom. There were serfs and lackeys and hangers-on…hoping for a tiny piece of the pie that was always carved up for the back room clout holders.
“Downstate” meant everyplace outside of Cook County…even if it was north..or west…of the City. Corruption and graft were the order of the day…and it seeped sometimes “downstate” into the Governor’s Mansion in Springfield. We could form a pretty solid 11 man football team in the Governor’s Penal League…if we included bagmen, staffers and judges.
In California, the big cities of San Francisco and Lose Angeles dominate the “impression” or “persona” of the state…much as Cook County did for Illinois.
Orange County and rural California…or exurb California…are actually quite different, but simply don’t make up the “persona” of what people across the country see here.
And California works less on “clout” than it does on lockstep liberalism…not so much dominating with an iron fist, but rather, with an invisible vapor. Flowery sophistry formulate the lyrics here, as opposed to the smashmouth headbanger’s ball of Chicago.
In Chicago and Cook County, you count heads, smash heads and operate by patronage first, patronage last and patronage only. You make victims out of anyone on the OTHER side…anyone who dares to cross the machine. You get caught, you plead not guilty in front of a judge “in your pocket”.
In California, you form victim groups, you count grievances against you and your group, and you try to get as much guilt-trip legislation passed in your favor as you can. You make victims out of everyone on YOUR side, and try to guilt trip anyone who dares to cross the victim parade route. You get caught, you say its a frame job BECAUSE of your particular “victim status” in life.
You don’t plead anything, but rather…you sue based upon the “bad intentions” of those prosecuting (read “persecuting”) you.
Guilt trip legislation then attempts to “apologize” to each and every “victim” group. This is a state that operates not as a “machine”…but as a machine REPAIR shop.
Because it is always apologizing and repairing…it never works properly. It’s always broken.
Cook County and California have some things in common though. You can’t fight City Hall.
Nov 2, 2009 - 10:06 am 23. Assistant Village Idiot:New Hampshire has Gone Blue, Gone Broke over the last few years. It takes a while to squander the social and financial capital of centuries of conservative management, but the Democrats are getting there quickly.
Nov 2, 2009 - 10:08 am 24. KHorn:To answer Glenn, the state sales tax is 6.25%, but local taxing authorities can add up to 2% more. Houston has the max, so we pay 8.25%.
Nov 2, 2009 - 10:09 am 25. glenn:Thanks roadgeek. I suspected as much. Point being it’s not revenues it’s spending.
The Gov’t guys in Cal remind me of the Christian missionaries who arrived in Hawaii to do good and wound up doing very well indeed. And the really funny part is that so many of them take early retirements and depart for Oregon and Washington where the social programs they burdened California with aren’t degrading the “social environment”
Nov 2, 2009 - 10:18 am 26. Hogarth:Go read the SF Chronicle account of the 15 year old girl who was gang raped for 2 1/2 hours at her HS homecoming dance. While at least 20 of her fellow students and “others” cheered the rapists on and took pictures. And the school administration, fully aware that they had a “problem” with the area where the rapes took place did nothing.
During the campaign, I saw a YouTube of some poor, deluded woman that said she was voting for Obama “cuz he gonna pay my mortgage.” I laughed at her, thinking that there was no way that I, as a Federal taxpayer, would be forced under threat of government enforcement to pay even a small share of her ill-thought debt.
Who got the last laugh?
Sure, it’s easy to look at California and think “Well, maybe that will be a lesson to them and other high-tax Socialist havens.”
Guess who’s going to get the last laugh when instead of their much-deserved utter and complete fiscal failure, California will come out smelling like a rose when Federal tax dollars are used to bail them out. And, more importantly, completely cover the symptoms of their fiscal malfeasance and insanity to the degree that they learn precisely nothing.
Nov 2, 2009 - 10:22 am 27. Clyde:Blue State America:
“Mene mene tekel upharsin.”
Look it up.
Nov 2, 2009 - 10:35 am 28. Paul:Now why should Texas get a bunch of liberals from California, the same ones that CAUSED California to get where they are now?
Can’t they just move to the ’safe havens’ cities in California and act as if they were illegals?
Nov 2, 2009 - 10:38 am 29. ThatsMe:My former company is going to relocate from LA to Texas next year. They’re very successful on a national level in their field, but the CA business environment is killing them. (I’m thinking or rejoining them and moving out too).
The really funny part is that the CEO is a dedicated Democrat, as were many of the employees. They voted against many of Arnold’s proposition in the past simply because he’s a Republican (not really, but that’s another topic…).
It’s the Democrat’s economic policies which push them away, but I’m quite certain that they are not questioning the party line. CA Democrats abuse them, chase them away and they still looking longingly at the Party.
I’m absolutely certain that they managed some incredible mental acrobatics in order to justify the move without putting the blame where it belongs.
Nov 2, 2009 - 10:49 am 30. LCP:I left San Diego in ‘99. I still dearly love what California was…and what it could be. But, it’s impossible to buy a house, the schools are abominably awful and you have to wonder, “where does all my tax money go?” It can’t go to the highways….I-5 is a nightmare from Yreka to San Ysidro.
The vast majority of Californians don’t want to have anything to do with politics. There’s too much other great stuff to do than waste your time with those dorks. And that’s the problem. Those dorks figured out that they could get away with basically anything their high-school-class-president-wannabe dorkselves dreamed up. They’ve been working for literally 3 decades to fully co-opt every end of the state with their corruption. California is going to need a full-blown Prop 13 style citizen revolt to get their state back.
Nov 2, 2009 - 10:57 am 31. Boyd:Can’t recall where I read it (I think maybe it was in this article) but the most telling symptom of this particular rot was the anecdote about how SEIU members are so confidently combative as to wear their union colors (T shirts) behind the counters at the DMV. Does it get any more ominous than that? I left California and its oppressive business climate for Nevada 20 years ago after 5 generations of Californians (I was born at Queen of the Angels Hospital). Not pleasant to leave that kind of history but I have not regretted it. The financial and spiritual success I gave up on ever finding in California has been my and now my daughters blessing to acquire here in Nevada. The moral – don’t think for a minute that people are so wedded to California’s many attractions that they won’t hang it up and leave if pushed hard enough.
Nov 2, 2009 - 11:05 am 32. Richard Reeds:Fix California. Pass an initiative.
What would this initiative do?
1. Make it illegal for state/local officials to engage in collective bargaining with unions. (Many states do this already.)
2. Make the state Right-to-Work. (Private sector unions aren’t the concern; this is to hit the public employee ones. Many states do this already.)
3. Make it illegal for the state/local governments to collect dues or collective bargaining fees on behalf of the unions. (Many states do this already.)
4. Make public employee strikes illegal (including serious enforcement teeth). (Many states do this already.)
5. Make it illegal for California politicians to accept campaign donations from organizations that represent public employees, including in-kind contributions. (This is tricky since it only has weak precedent, but you can design it both as protection for public service employees from being pressured into political activity and as an anti-corruption measure.)
With the power of the public employee unions ended, California can make tax-and-spend decisions on its own. It very well might overtax and overspend on stupid enthusiasms anyway, but at least there won’t be a huge political machine dedicated to funneling money from the public into the pockets of the public’s employees.
Nov 2, 2009 - 11:05 am 33. David Thomson:“And keep your liberal freaks away from my Texas.”
Oh my goodness, some seventy years ago Californian officials illegally prevented so-called losers from moving into their state. We Texans may currently have to do likewise. I can see the road signs now: “No Californians allowed. All will be shot on sight.”
Nov 2, 2009 - 11:08 am 34. Pedrosito:Man I can still sing that tune , “Now go were you want to go” , sad but it’s not that California anymore, the statists (marxists) rule. I went for staging at Camp Pendelton in the late 60’s before Nam ,I thought California was heaven.
Nov 2, 2009 - 11:09 am 35. Mkelley:In the same vein, Boeing is going to put their new 787 Dreamliner assembly line in South Carolina instead of Washington State: http://www.seattlepi.com/local/411628_boeing28.html
Nov 2, 2009 - 11:18 am 36. Dougger:They blame high labor costs, especially worker’s compensation, for the move. Nobody is going to start a business in the “blue” coastal states or Michigan these days.
The sales tax rate in McKinney TX is 8.25% (6.25% state + 2% local)
Here in Los Angeles it is 8.75%
But here in CA we have 10% income tax on top of that!
Moving to TX is a no-brainer if your skills are mobile.
Nov 2, 2009 - 11:20 am 37. Jooch:Califirnia gets a return of .78 for every federal tax dollar, texas 1.07. Stop subsidizing “Them Cowboys”.
Nov 2, 2009 - 11:21 am 38. Over50:Raised in Ohio, lived in California in the mid 80’s, settled in Texas in 94 after turning down offers to return to California. We had several kids and the house prices, the commutes and a lack of family friendliness compared to Texas made our decision easy. So Texas got a hardworking couple, raising several smart, hardworking kids, that vote against every tax or benefit increase. California lost out on getting us. I’m sure there’s thousands like us – and that’s one of the reasons California is sinking and will continue to sink. To fix it, they would need to eliminate their income tax, allow property development to reduce housing costs and reduce the government footprint. Won’t happen in our life time – if you want to work hard for private business and vote against government expansion, and devote your extra time to raising a family, we’d be happy to see you. Otherwise stay and enjoy California.
Nov 2, 2009 - 11:23 am 39. Don51:Ah…Hotel California by the Eagles.
And to my neighbors in Texas, don’t fret too much. The housing collapse has locked many Californistas to their land. They can’t sell it to cover what they’ve obligated themselves to. Abandoning the property crushes their ratings for the next abode. Like serfs they’re tied to their lands.
Nov 2, 2009 - 11:41 am 40. Jack in Silver Spring:Several thoughts on Roger’s piece:
1) Elections usually matter; the citizens of CA keep electing for the same tax & spend and “environmentally friendly” (but person unfriendly) legislature time after time; is there any surprise the state is in the toilet?
2) Sometimes things are not what they seem — Arnold was elected governor because he seemed better than the alternative; and, indeed, for a bit he looked like a new Reagan; but alas he has turned out to be a bust; time to ditch him and try someone else; but if you vote for Jerry Brown and the same legislators, then you get what you deserve.
3) California’s problem will now become other states’ problems; that will happend because many Californian will vote with their feet and move to other states, but when they get there, they won’t vote with their heads; they’ll continue to vote just the way they did in California. I say that based on the New Jersey experience and the current New Hampshire experience. New Jersey at one time was a low tax state, and New York across the river was a high tax state. New Yorkers voted with their feet by moving to New Jersey to escape New York’s high taxes. But when they got to New Jersey they continued to vote in the ballot box just the way they did in New York, and voila, today we have a high tax New Jersey and a high tax New York, with New Jerseyans now voting with their feet to infect other states. In New Hampshire we are seeing the same events unfolding. Escapees from Taxachusetts are voting with their feet by going to New Hampshire, but when they get there they continue the way they did in Taxachusetts. New Hampshire is slowly turning Taxachusetts North.
Nov 2, 2009 - 11:53 am 41. NJclosetconservative:Roger, Billie Holiday recorded a memorable version of Harold Arlen’s “Stormy Weather” but T-Bone Walker’s “Stormy Monday” was popularized by BB King and The Allman Brothers among others.
Nov 2, 2009 - 11:56 am 42. newton:I’ve lived in TX since ‘98, after moving from the DC/NY/MA corridor, in which I lived for eight years. No regrets.
CA? Who needs it? The “takers” may live comfortable lives over there with all the benefits packages, but who wants to live in a state where too many people have been overpriced out of buying a house, or where taxes are way too high to open a business? I know there’s Silicon Valley, but HP has offices at five miles down the road from my house. Not even Silicon Valley will last forever if the CA tax climate continues to go from bad to worse.
I say, if you want to open a business, develop a product, or just live in peace with your family, come over here! There’s plenty of coastline here! You can drive your car close enough to the shore at Padre Island or Mustang! Lots of countryside. A few places where you can cross the border and shop in Mexico. Plenty of places to live here. Food is cheaper. Sure, property taxes are something else, but the house you get for the money…
But, if my talk doesn’t convince you, maybe this will.
Nov 2, 2009 - 12:00 pm 43. ben:Warning to Californians and other yankees about Texas. It is freakin’ and humid during the summer (April-October). Expect 50 days in a row of 102 degree highs and no rain. The 51st day will be a golf ball sized hailstorm that totals your car and home roof. Expect $800/month summer electric bills. Never walk outside without shoes and socks. If the fire ants don’t get you, the scorpions or snakes will. Everybody carries a gun. Drive friendly and wave with all your fingers. My florist and kids’ piano teachers carry a handgun. You can’t buy liquor on Sunday. Texas has the similar problem as California with gangs of unassimilating illegal aliens, so at least that is something that may welcome Californians to Texas.
Nov 2, 2009 - 12:12 pm 44. Roger L Simon:#41, NJclosetconservative – thanks for the correction, although I think Lady Day also recorded T-Bone’s tune.
http://www.scribd.com/doc/16880838/Aaron-Walker-Call-It-Stormy-Monday-Billie-Holiday
Lou Rawls as well, if memory serves. Nevertheless, it’s those lyrics that seem to fit California so well these days: “They call it Stormy Monday, but Tuesday’s just as bad,” etc.
But think on the bright side, the way things are going you may soon be able to shed your blog moniker.
Nov 2, 2009 - 12:14 pm 45. Pajamas Media » ‘California Dreamin’ becomes ‘I Got the Blue State Blues’:[...] Read the rest of the story here. [...]
Nov 2, 2009 - 12:19 pm 46. NJclosetconservative:Fingers crossed for exiting the closet
Nov 2, 2009 - 12:20 pm 47. Richard:When I got on a plane in London to move to California I got a copy of life magazine. The screaming cover headline over a spectacular sunset was:
Nov 2, 2009 - 12:27 pm 48. Thomass:CALIFORNIA: THE DREAM IS OVER. The DATE: OCTOBER 1962
I read the LA times article and wanted to post on it… the author goes too EASY on California at times. I live there and visit a brother in Texas. The roads and infrastructure are MUCH nicer there. California is falling apart with old infrastructure that is too expensive to upgrade due to all the rules… The power is bad too. We can’t do projects to get more water… lame.
We always were a trend setting state (we’d do it ten years before other parts of the country)…. so in this case, watch out… don’t do what California did…
Nov 2, 2009 - 12:35 pm 49. Thomass:28. Paul:
“Now why should Texas get a bunch of liberals from California, the same ones that CAUSED California to get where they are now?”
This is the third message along these lines. Remember, us conservatives need a place to flee too. We didn’t mess up California. I’ve voted against every spending initiative on the ballot for my whole life.
Nov 2, 2009 - 12:51 pm 50. PacRim Jim:Lived in CA for 50 years. The decline has been as precipitous as it has been predictable, given Democrat largesse. Once Democrats take power and enough voters turn to state government for their living, the state is doomed. Look for these moochers to move to other states and repeat the process. Sad. America once had so much promise.
Nov 2, 2009 - 12:51 pm 51. glenn:Tell you what, would be Texans, if a little heat or cold or hail or whatever bothers you don’t even think about moving to Texas. Just having to be polite to the people you meet is gonna kill you.
Nov 2, 2009 - 12:54 pm 52. Mike C:It would be nice to think that California emigres might learn their lesson about bloated government, overregulation, and high taxes in the process of relocation. If fiscal and constitutional conservatism could be combined with the California live-and-let-live cultural ethic, a powerful synthesis of two very valuable small-government elements would be achieved.
I’m not optimistic, though.
Nov 2, 2009 - 12:58 pm 53. Delia:Bad for business
Bad for luck
It’s really all bad news
We’re left to cry
Oh why oh why
We’ve got the blue state blues
We were warned
‘Head o’ the storm
‘Fore that fateful day came true
Now that day is here
Sob in your beer
We’ve got the blue state blues
Farewell to jobs
Taxed to the teeth
And losing money too
South they head
Our state is dead
We’ve got the blue state blues.
Living in WA state ain’t much better than Cali.
UGH. Hubby is already talking about leaving this state for good.
:\
Nov 2, 2009 - 1:14 pm 54. Tcobb:#40–Jack in Silver Spring
***SIGH–you’re right. I’ve lived in Texas for most of my life. The last thing we need is a horde of “coasters” coming here to remake Texas into the image of that from which the “coasters” fled from.
Its already happened to Austin, now the “bluest” patch of Texas in existence. It used to be a wonderful place. Now its not. A huge percentage of the people who live there weren’t born in Texas, and they seem to have contempt for the people who were. The city government is, to put it mildly, dysfunctional. Nancy Pelosi would fit right in there.
And now you can’t even find any decent Mexican restaurants there anymore–its all been dumbed down for the “coasters” little delicate palettes. Sad. Truly sad.
If you can’t fix that which is broken, it is a sure indication that you cannot fix that which isn’t.
Nov 2, 2009 - 1:16 pm 55. Exactly!:Californians ruined Oregon, Washington, working on ruining Colorado and Arizona. The California state of mind is “you have, I want”. If you go back in history you will see what Calfornia is now started with the gold rush, get rich quick trash who settled the state. Compare it to states settled by farmers and ranchers working the land and building communities. Pretty simple and inevitable.
I suggest they re-settle Michigan.
Nov 2, 2009 - 1:16 pm 56. furious:Some “OTOH” comments from a native Texan who spent 18 years in CA (Bay Area) before returning to TX…
Texas “package deal” is a stark one — the welfare state here is less than generous, forcing people to either work or get by on very little public assistance. Good luck being an indigent defendant in a Texas Criminal Court.
The court-ordered public school funding scheme is less than optimal — we have a “Robin Hood” scheme that transfers property tax funds to poorer districts from wealthier ones. And, absent a statewide income tax, we have high (relative to other states) property taxes to compensate. Toll roads proliferate (at least in the DFW area).
Texas also has a revenue stream dependent on petroleum extraction royalties (part of which goes to fund higher education), so the Regents root for higher BBB prices vs lower. Cost TX dearly in the mid-80s oil bust.
OTOOH, we have a part-time Legislature forced to appropriate based on a limited funding options. While there may be waste/fraud, there are fewer options (deferring income tax refunds, raising income tax rates, etc.) onto which the wasters/fraudsters can glomm.
We get fewer welfare immigrants than California or Wisconsin. The toll roads are self-funding — the abuse occurring when, e.g. San Antonio and US 281, greedy pols propose converting existing paid-for roads into toll roads.
The sales-based taxation and oil-royalties schemes appear to be serving us well vs. Cali’s (and NY’s and NJ’s) boom-and-bust income-tax dependency.
Cali was delivering poor roads and dysfunctional public education even before the downturn began. The downturn only exacerbated the weakness of the Cali governing model and the apparent strength of Texas’. Economic refugess welcome, just check your failed governance models at the state line when you come.
Nov 2, 2009 - 1:30 pm 57. Koblog:How can anyone say Texas funds itself on sales taxes when I’m paying 9.75% in California now?
Nine point stinking seventy-five percent!
Talk about disincentive. Believe me, I buy everything I can elsewhere to get around that tax.
High ticket items like a new TV? Power tools? Cameras? Even big stuff like washing machines? You think I’m gonna buy at Home Depot or even Costco? Ha.
Amazon.com, here I come.
Nov 2, 2009 - 1:50 pm 58. Locomotive Breath:If only California had oil like Texas they could get revenue from that. What? OK, never mind.
Nov 2, 2009 - 2:19 pm 59. Banjo:We decamped to Montana in 1998 and were told to get rid of our California license plates pronto so strong was the feeling against our kind. The local rag the other day had a story about a wolf killed by a hunter. Reintroduced by the federal governnment, they are flourishing. A former Californian wrote a letter to the editor saying the people moving to Montana from there will put an end to that practice within 20 years. I don’t think she realizes how the tanking California economy has withered the real estate market in Montana. The coin has two sides, I guess.
Nov 2, 2009 - 2:24 pm 60. Ruebacca:CA has the most expenive gettos in the country. We need the dirt poor to leave the State. We move billions of Gallions of water across the state for south central LA. SCLA just milk the state of money. These communities also fill our prisons with young men. The getto culture is a paracite culture that is too expensive for the rest of us.
It’s too expensive to support those people determined to be poor in CA. We need stop the welfare suport system for communites determined not to contribute. If your gonna be poor atleast live someplace where it rains.
Nov 2, 2009 - 2:24 pm 61. Micha Elyi:Lord above, please stop talking up Texas! Austin is already awash in Californians (…) what we don’t need is more people with no tradition of independent spirit migrating here because they think the grass is greener.–spool32 (7)
You Texans owe California billions in reparations for having sent Willie Brown over here. Pay up or shut up.
Nov 2, 2009 - 2:29 pm 62. Poor Citizen:Heck, Im from Detroit and in Detroit nowadays…they are actually jealous of New York and California…nuff said there..ha ha…look out southern states here comes Michigan .. again.
Nov 2, 2009 - 2:35 pm 63. Micha Elyi:To all you Texans moping about Californians moving to the Lone Star State: think of it as penance for having sent populist dust bowl-broken farmers, Willie Brown, and your 1980s-era Oil Patch losers from Texas to wreck the once solidly Republican Golden State.
Nov 2, 2009 - 2:39 pm 64. Richard A.:California is the perfect laboratory for Liberal politics. No one anywhere close to being conservative has been in charge here for a very long time, not since Pete Wilson.
So here we are, all the ideal Liberal policies are in place. We are way beyond broke, we are losing jobs, losing skilled workers, companies are moving away.
And yet, here we are surrounded with abundant natural resources, and it is illegal to avail ourselves of them.
Let the whole damn thing go bankrupt, cancel all the outrageous pension ontracts with the retirees and start all over again.
Nov 2, 2009 - 2:49 pm 65. ben:California sent whiny liberal Molly Ivins to Texas. Sorry about Willie Brown, but we are even.
Nov 2, 2009 - 2:50 pm 66. Marc Malone:#56 furious – I support the “Robin Hood” scheme for schools. I think the authority over schools should be decentralized. There should be no bureaucracy above school district level. The State should collect all the revenue for schools and distribute it evenly on a per child basis to the school districts. That number is to include private and home schooled kids. The district takes out admin expenses, the gives the rest out on a per head basis as well. That should include private and home school kids, too.
This way, there’d be more private and home schooled kids. More competition forces public schools to shape up, as the most recent study has determined. Just the existence of alternatives improves the public schools, but only if you trim the fat and bureaucracy.
Nov 2, 2009 - 2:53 pm 67. ricpic:The biggest lie of all is that the Left’s agenda is based on “good intentions.”
Nov 2, 2009 - 3:23 pm 68. Whitehall:“Texas – where else can one see so far and yet see so little?”
– Mark Twain
Seriously, I’m sticking it out here in California and fighting the bad elements all the way. I moved my family here in 1977 and am now the family patriarch for 17. My sons’ business here is going strong and is on INC’s list of fastest small growing companies. My own career is going strong designing a nuclear power in (where else?) Texas. It remains a great place to live and I’m not going to let the looters screw it up without a fight.
Part of the problem is the notion of “stakeholders.” Allowing government employees and their unions to be at the table for new spending ensures that the unions get a cut bigger than the free labor market would allocate.
Nov 2, 2009 - 3:24 pm 69. ben:Marc Malone, “Robin Hood” is stealing by any other name. Austin is considered a rich school district, even though it has a high percentage of poor, minority, and spanish speakers, and under achieving schools. Austin still has to send money to other districts. If I skrimp and save to buy a small house in a good school district, it is not right that my money goes somewhere else. Robin Hood is wrong.
Nov 2, 2009 - 3:28 pm 70. LarryD:Jooch: How about this, both Texas and California quit receiving and sending money to DC.
Then we’ll see how they do.
Nov 2, 2009 - 3:40 pm 71. Delia:57. Koblog:
“Amazon.com, here I come.”
Not to burst your bubble, but Amazon.com is required by law to collect state taxes and they do and have been for quite a long time. There are some lesser known websites that don’t collect state taxes but by the time I pay shipping it really isn’t much better of a deal if I can get free shipping from amazon.com (yes, I’m a cheapskate ha-ha).
Nov 2, 2009 - 3:46 pm 72. marymcl:A note about public employees unions -
If you live in a state that doesn’t recognize “right-to-work”, then you just don’t have any choice about joining the union if you want to work in certain fields. I went into nursing after 9/11 (because of it, in fact) and chose to work at the county hospital because that’s where I thought the need would be greatest. I didn’t know public employee unions from a hole in the ground, but soon found out plenty. The union is a second boss – the primary one, really – and there is no negotiating with it. The only way out is a religious exception that lets the Muslims off the hook (don’t even get me started on that score…)
Delia – You live in WA? Somehow I’d gotten the idea you were a New Yorker. Small world anyway – I’m from NY but live in Seattle
Nov 2, 2009 - 3:56 pm 73. AnitaHope:# 13 Ennis, You sound like a true Texan and if you look back in history your state was considered annexed and wanted to be it’s own country,& of course
Nov 2, 2009 - 4:06 pm 74. Delia:it never happened. While the rest of America over the years opened their states to people from around the world as settlers, Texas kept a tight lasso around it’s border’s. Well the tide seems to have turned and even Texas must accept new “settler’s”, but I agree, the settler’s need to live according to your state law’s, only wish our other states would demand the same. An example of Caiforians moving to southern Oregon and southern Origonians moving to northern Oregon, then northern Oregonians moved into the State of Washington, leaves one to wonder where displaced Texans will go. We may laugh at this crazyness if it was not so tragic. I wonder why we in this wonderful country which gives us such freedom’s can not control our state and national greediness, yet we feel we can dictate too other countries how they should be run.
If you look at how education in this country started to go down in the fifties and you look at the age of many political figures running the state & national government’s, is it a mystery why our country is in this situation, schools stopped creative writting, political sceince was offered in college, even
social studies in the public school system was cut. We need to retrace what education was and get back on track.
72. marymcl,
Yeppers! WA state native but hubby is originally from Chicago. Small world indeed! I’ll take it as a compliment that you thought I was a New Yorker.
I hope you’re enjoying the ‘gloom’ today. We had a whole 3 weeks of Summer this year. YIPPEE!
Nursing eh? You are one brave woman! I’m such a wuss but I know I couldn’t stomach that kind of career. I’d probably be more of a hindrance than a help. lol But, seriously, I commend you. The ‘union’ thing is way out of control and boy does it get ugly for people when there’s a strike.
We are in the Construction/Carpentry/Building [ha-ha] business and it’s dog-eat-dog right now. People are working for insane prices just to survive. My husband just had a major shoulder injury and is going in for surgery in about a week and that is going to halt everything for at least 6 weeks unless his employees can manage some of the jobs without him. He’s freaking out because he’s never barely taken more than a week off at a whole time and now he’s going to be out of commission.
At least he can get surgery and fix his rotator cuff rather than have an injury that is far worse. I have to remind him of that but he’s so damned stubborn and I worry he’s going to try and work after his surgery.
ARGH!
Nov 2, 2009 - 4:15 pm 75. marymcl:@74 Delia
Well I’ll take it as a compliment that you took it as a compliment that I thought you were from New York (I think I’ve been reading buddy larson’s posts at BC too long!)
Anyway all the best to your husband on his surgery.
Speaking of failing blue states, Boeing just announced they’re going Galt and setting up shop in right-to-work South Carolina – good for them
http://biggovernment.com/author/agunn/
Nov 2, 2009 - 4:40 pm 76. Mike K:Here’s an interesting post another blog about the golden state. Note the lefties showing up to complain about Prop 13. Actually, I think the Laffer curve works in California real estate. If the property taxes were as high now as they were in 1978, the housing prices would be far below even the deflated value that we see now. I think the fixed tax rates contributed to the high housing prices.
Nov 2, 2009 - 4:43 pm 77. Delia:75. marymcl,
Thanks, hon. Did you keep your NY accent? My hubby used to have a Chicago accent when I first met him but it’s long gone now.
Yes, Boeing is fed up. It’s going to be ‘interesting’ how that plays out in the coming years. My husband and I had the same sentiments as you too. He’s fed up with trying to run a business in this State. WA is chasing away business with all of their taxes and regulations and Union crap.
“The Blue State Blues” indeed.
Nov 2, 2009 - 5:04 pm 78. Janice:Left central CA 7 years ago for TX. Never a regret. Paid high taxes and still had to pay for private school because the local inner city school was not safe. Too busy mainstreaming non English speakers to worry about my on-grade level kids. First thing we noticed in TX was the quality of the school facilities and the roads. Even the country roads are graded and re-graveled every year! Small and large school districts take pride in their schools and it shows. Visited CA in June of this year and could not believe how neglected I-5 was. Pot holes, ruts, it was dangerous! Where does the Federal road funding go? Fellow CA natives, come on down here… Texas is big enough for everyone!
Nov 2, 2009 - 5:58 pm 79. DavidN:One issue that everyone’s not mentioning is *why* we’re in this fix in California. The reason is simple: the public employees unions in the state are big, very wealthy, and very active politically. I don’t just mean that they contribute to campaigns (everyone does that) but that they run their own commercials. When Schwarzenegger was elected in the recall election that ran Gray Davis out of office, the public employee unions ran commercials attacking him. They typically used groups of “workers” who occupy jobs that the public admires: school teachers, firefighters, police officers, nurses. Schwarzenegger ran for office promising reform, and immediately upon entering office he tried to get some referendums passed reducing the power of those unions in the state. The unions ran commercials *constantly* on TV for a year. I literally saw at least one every day, and I don’t watch TV much except in the evening. The unions were later reported to have spent in excess of $100 million. The referendums were all failures, of course, one narrowly and the others all by large margins. So when you propose changing the rules so that the unions have less power, remember: they have the power to challenge your attempt, and in their minds the problem isn’t that they have too much power, it’s that they don’t have enough. Our DMV workers staged a sick-out recently because they aren’t getting Columbus Day off as a paid holiday this year.
Oh, and while I agree that if Prop 13 were repealed, property taxes might keep property values lower, that wasn’t why it was passed in the first place. Once everyone discovered how cool a place Southern California was to live, you had developers coming in, buying up property, and putting in housing or apartment buildings and making a profit. It was alleged that one of the ways they cleared property and wound up owning enough land to do this was by getting houses reassessed upwards in value, so that the homeowner wouldn’t be able to afford the taxes on their house. Then Mr. Developer would appear, offer to buy the house (below market value, of course), flatten the house, build whatever he planned, and make a killing. Think of Prop. 13 as the equivalent of rent control for the government. Your rent shouldn’t skyrocket til you’re forced to leave your apartment; your taxes shouldn’t skyrocket til you’re forced to sell your house.
Nov 2, 2009 - 6:11 pm 80. Greenberry:#5: Arnold (our spendid gov) (and I mean it–you should have seen the other guys) tried in 2005. Gave us four ballot measures that citizens could have enacted that woud have done just that.
But the “best” citizens and our newspapers opposed them. Not needed. Too drastic. etc. The unions outspent the supporters by at least 2 to 1, maybe 4 to 1. TV ads featuring a cops wife (”My husband was shot and now they’re tying to take my pension”). Of course they weren’t tyring to take ehr pension but who can figure all that out. All the desk jockeys tht never come near a gun get thier pensions too.
They were all voted down. Limits on pensions. Limits on debt. That was our last chance.
Say what you will about the Governator. He tried.
Nov 2, 2009 - 6:43 pm 81. marymcl:@79 DavidN
Like many others who came of age in the 60’s, I always thought the notion of an international communist conspiracy was the fantasy brainchild of John Birchers and the like. The stranglehold these unions have on certain occupations and the political power they’ve acquired with our money has made me reconsider. Even if they’re not part of a deliberate conspiracy, they may as well be, the end result is likely the same. You know, a public employee can make any number of grave mistakes on the job yet in all but the most extreme cases can’t be fired. That’s no secret. What is less commonly understood is that the usual way of dealing with incompetence in any field of public service is promotion. I’m not kidding. On the other hand, any failure to follow a union directive is grounds for immediate dismissal. Go figure
Nov 2, 2009 - 6:45 pm 82. marymcl:@77 Delia
Funny you should ask, I tried to shake it off at one point when I was younger but to no avail. As it turns out, I’m glad it stuck with me
Listen if you’re ever in Seattle look me up
Nov 2, 2009 - 6:46 pm 83. greenberry:benevente4@gmail.com
One more thing: kudos to the Los Angeles Times for even running that piece. Its still a soft-headed newspaper full of slanted opinions and near useless news, but I fell flat when I saw they had excerpted this one.
Maybe roving reporter Steve Lopez can try for an interview with one of the union big wigs to ask why they deserve cost of living increases when a huge percentage of the state is losing jobs. Or pensions backed by taxes from people trying to save their house and skimping on clothes for their kids.
How about it Steve? I am not knocking the time you devote to everything else, but California won’t go broke and its hospitals won’t clsoe because of gay marriage, grass, etc. This union cost and pensions is not a subject for laughter or finger food in the garden. Ready to tackle something really important?
Nov 2, 2009 - 6:50 pm 84. RWE:I lived in Calfornia for 10 years, getting there in 1978. I owned two houses there, one in the LA area and then one in a pretty rural area 60 miles north of Santa Barbara. At that time it seemed like everyone was moving to California and it was The Place To Be. Occasionally I felt like that, too, but then the feeling would go away if I swallowed a couple of asprins and took a nap.
Houses were terribly expensive compared to almost anywhere else. People who moved from there to say, Texas, were faced with the problem of how to avoid large capital gains without buying a impossible large place, like, say, a county. Serious discussion groups appeared on TV on Sunday afternoons discussing how to explain to newcomers that a townhouse with a 100 sq ft “lawn” in California was better than a 3 bedroom home on a half acre in North Carolina.
California has never gotten over that impression of itself, one of being impossibly popular. It seemed that they could not do anything to screw up their attactiveness. Build freeways, not build freeways, stop with them half completed, see the price of houses go up 20% plus a year one year after the other, have an earthquake now and then and set a good part of it on fire every year, raise taxes (sales tax in Santa Barbara in the early 90’s was 10%). Nothing worked. The fools still flocked there, as the residents continually congratulated themselves at how lucky they were.
I still recall one news item on an LA TV station circa 1980 on the homeless. The bubbleheaded bleached blonde anchor added “But at least they are homeless here, and not somewhere else. Think how terrible that would be.”
And today California still can’t get its collective mind out of those Prom Queen Head Cheerleader Local Beauty Queen Top Real Estate Agent For Five Years Running thrilling days of yesteryear. It’s like something out of a movie.
Nov 2, 2009 - 6:59 pm 85. J. H. Colter:Just listenin’ to the news
Gives me the Blue State Blues
It’s lookin’ like a rout
Blue staters movin’ out
To any red state they choose.
We’re not talkin’ a few
Blue staters becomin’ blue
There can’t be any doubt,
Cause ya hear ‘em shout
When their tax bill comes due.
As for the clues
Nov 2, 2009 - 8:54 pm 86. Mutnodjmet:To the blue staters’ views
Spending they do tout
Corruption they seem to flout
It makes blue states look like zoos
According to Bryan Bloom of Priority Moving, a San Diego business man whose business has been adversely impacted by the draconian diesel-fuel emission rules promulgated from CARB based on bad science, over-regulation is wiping out state enterprises:
Everyone gets taxed, and its like losing blood. It is unpleasant, but survivable. Over-regulation is a cancer. It is slow, painful, and often not diagnosed until it is too late. It kills businesses.
http://templeofmut.wordpress.com/2009/11/02/you-seem-to-regard-science-as-some-kind-of-dodge-or-hustle/
Nov 2, 2009 - 8:57 pm 87. SukieTawdry:I came to California straight out of college in the late 60’s (the Summer of Love was my first). Ronald Reagan was governor and despite all the craziness of the era, life was not only good, it was great. And then the liberals took over. End of story.
I’m hoping we’ll be able to rebuild from the rubble.
State Treasurer Bill Lockyer (a Democrat) spanks the legislature: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JWOoqmrOCH8
Nov 2, 2009 - 9:29 pm 88. ic:26. Hogarth: And, more importantly, completely cover the symptoms of their fiscal malfeasance and insanity to the degree that they learn precisely nothing.
Lesson learned: You can wreck your state for personal gains, but as long as you can put your politicians in Washington, the rest of the country will pay the price. Win-win for you.
Chicago’s sales tax, I believe, is over 10%. Income tax used to be 3%, rumored to become 6%. Property tax: in my neck of the wood: our new neighbor paid $570,000 for their house, “raising” our property value. If I sold the house now, I’d be happy to get $400,000. Anyway, the tax is over $9000 a year. It was $4000 when we moved in in 1993.
I have been looking at San Francisco’s real estates: in 1999, a crappy 2000 sq ft house, near Golden Gate Park, built in 1924 was sold for $300,000. In 2004, it was sold for over $900,000, now it’s listed over $1.2 million. In areas closer to downtown, single family homes were turned into condos: 3 stories (actually 2, and a “garden” apt.): 1500 sq ft top flr listed at 800,000 to over a million. If you are rich enough to pay a million for a 1500 sq ft high rise in Lombard St, you will also pay over $1000 per month assessment, and over $11,000 property tax. Anyone wonders why the real estate market is not recovering?
Nov 3, 2009 - 12:44 am 89. henriyardy:That’s primarily why political parties “balance” their tickets. Kennedy, as example, would never have been elected president had he not had Johnson as a running mate.
Nov 3, 2009 - 2:28 am 90. Martin Owens:Same reason Johnson picked Humphrey in 64.
Absolute Acai Berry
Nobel-winning author V.S. Naipul once defined the welfare state as the whole country in a conspiracy against itself. California, which often compares itself to a sovereign nation, is a perfect example. The root of California’s decline is simply this: the California voter believes it is government’s job to get him whatever he wants, Right Now, and make somebody else pay for it. It’s a bottomless pit.
Nov 3, 2009 - 3:48 am 91. Donna V.:I used to love the song “California Dreamin.” It summons up a particular place and a particular time better than any other pop song I can think of.
Now we know that the man who wrote that lovely song slept with his own daughter and introduced her to heroin. I can’t get that out of my head when a Mamas and Papas song comes on the radio now. Beauty masking a rotten core does seem very Californian indeed, though.
Nov 3, 2009 - 5:06 am 92. Mike2:Which brings me to my conclusion. I thought about sending Voegeli’s article to all my (modern) liberal friends – the remaining ones anyway – because I thought it would get them thinking, if anything does. But I stopped. In this era, nobody’s talking.
Totally true with me. I have long time friends that I don’t even communicate with anymore because they live in this haze of left wing rage. I refuse to talk politics with nearly half of my family because they are Obama maniacs although several are beginning to admit they now have buyer’s remorse.
My main worry about California is that the rest of us may have to pick up the tab.
Nov 3, 2009 - 5:55 am 93. Mike2:27. Clyde:
I agree 100%!
Nov 3, 2009 - 6:14 am 94. Bilgeman:Californians:
You have a respectable number of oil deposits sitting right off your coasts, unexploited, that would make you some nice coin AND fuel your automobiles.
Sacramento wanted to build a high speed rail link between LA and Frisco when you can use high-speed ferries right off the coast and move as many people at FAR less cost, (and not tear up your farmland).
You have some of the mos fertile farmland in the world, but you’d rather let it revert to desert for the benefit of the Delta Smelt.
You oppose every power plant proposal within your borders, yet demand that other states export you their generated electricity at rates you dictate.
You tolerate civil servants belonging to unions and withholding labor and services that you have already paid for.
You support a vast underground economy based on illegal immigration that sends millions of dollars of wealth out of the country in remittances. Your municipalities actively oppose assisting Federal Immigration Law enforcement.
You have made your home state unlivable for yourselves, so you flee your handiwork, and yet as soon as you arrive like refugees wherever you end up, you begin campaigning to recreate anew the disaster you just escaped from.
And…
You send the single largest state delegation to the Congress so that the rest of the states have to pay for your folly.
Nothing personal, but do he rest of us a favor and sink into the sea already.
Nov 3, 2009 - 6:27 am 95. Allston:#27, Clyde:
They have indeed.
Nov 3, 2009 - 6:41 am 96. TheMightyMonarch:“One factor that he did not mention is that Texas funds its state government largely with sales taxes and this includes illegal aliens. They don’t get the free ride they do in California.”
Actually, sales taxes are approaching or exceeding 10% in California, depending on the county (9.75% in Alameda County where I live). So no, illegals don’t exactly get a free ride here. They also get the benefit of gasoline and energy bills well above the national average and higher overall prices for goods and services.
Granted, that only serves to illustrate how out-of-control Sacramento is. 10% sales taxes, 10%+ income taxes, 2% property taxes, DMV fees tripling since Ahnold took office, IOUs issued as currency…and California still runs a budget deficit.
Income taxes were just increased this year as well. A very telling scenario…my wife works HR and payroll for a small tech company in the Silicon Valley and has started receiving the brunt of complaints, as if the company were responsible for the increased withholding. She’s been really tempted to suggest that maybe they pay attention to the people they vote into office next time.
Nov 3, 2009 - 9:00 am 97. James in Austin:Roger,
A liberal but worried Californian friend posted this article on Facebook. One of the responses was that “of course Texas can do more with lower taxes. They have all that oil money.”
It was useless to explain that Texas’s economy (like California’s) is far more diversified than that. Also useless: Asking why, if this is true, Calfornia doesn’t do more to encourage on-shore/off-shore drilling and refinery construction.
Nov 3, 2009 - 9:55 am 98. James in Austin:One more thing. Here is how Texas could get better.
#1 End the pension system among state workers. It is sooo 1960 and it is unsustainable among an aging populations. It also creates an uncontrollable line item in the state budget.
#2 Make it illegal for state workers to be unionized. It creates a super-insider lobbyist group within the government. I realize that pricing market wages and benefits are difficult even for private sector jobs, but big companies still manage to do it. And getting a union’s help on this problem does not seem like a reasonable fix.
Nov 3, 2009 - 10:04 am 99. TheMightyMonarch:“#1 End the pension system among state workers. It is sooo 1960 and it is unsustainable among an aging populations. It also creates an uncontrollable line item in the state budget.”
A-freaking-men. Pension programs are proven to be unsustainable even in the private sector. Add government shenanigans to the mix and you have an ever-looming budget disaster that tends to get gamed. CalSTRS and CalPERS, two of our state pension programs for government employees, are in serious trouble and has shown evidence of massive mal-investment and even fraud.
Expect a second financial collapse as the Baby Boomers retire and they transition from investors to consumers. In order for someone to withdraw from a retirement account, assets must be sold. Imagine for a minute what that does to the various funds’ value when you have millions upon millions of people suddenly needing to withdraw money instead of depositing it. Forget government confiscating your 401(k), they’ll be made worthless just through market actions.
Nov 3, 2009 - 11:10 am 100. California Dreamer:Thank you, Roger, for articulating the disorientation I was feeling when I first visited your blog and chose my screen name. It being election day here in sunny CA, I’m not feeling any less unsettled. It may have to get even worse before it gets better. As several bloggers have noted, Arnold started on the right track and I even thought he would stay there since he’s immune to attack (no upward political mobility and a good bank account). I think he may have made a tactical error going for all four reforms at once. Better to try to eat the elephant one bite at a time. But now he’s lost his appetite.
One wonders what Jerry Brown might be like after having dealt with the State of CA’s pickpocketing in Oakland. There were days when he almost made sense as mayor, but then again, I’m just a California Dreamer.
Nov 3, 2009 - 2:15 pm 101. BlueCal:California is not for PANSIES. The fight for a living may be hard but the rewards are great. I’m glad that all of those who left for Texas are there, it’s far enough from blue Cal.
There have been mistakes made by government and legislators, but also we have been victims of the housing, Silicon Valley and stock market bubbles.
Population is 37 million. TX is 24 million.
Big dreams cost money.
Nov 4, 2009 - 6:08 am 102. whyyeseyec:The sales tax in Alameda County Calif ( on the east side of SF Bay ) is 9.75%. Yes, that`s not a mistake. It`s 9.75%.
Cities all over Calif yesterday voted themselves a `utility` tax increase. For cable, cell phone, land line phone, gas/electric bills. On Monday 11/2 the State of Calif began confiscating an extra 10% of everyone`s paycheck as a `loan` to be paid back next April as a tax refund. This is what the state is calling an interest free loan to the state. We`ll probably get this money back in the form of an IOU or not at all.
Voters in the 10th District of Calif had a chance yesterday to vote in a conservative candidate ( David Harmer) to replace the departed Ellen Tauscher. Who do they choose? THe State`s Lieut Gov John Garamendi. A career leftist politician who specializes in raising taxes and he doesn`t even live the in the 10th District.
There is no hope for Calif. It is stuck on liberal stupid….
Nov 4, 2009 - 10:45 am 103. Paul -Indiana:#101. LOL
Nov 4, 2009 - 1:02 pm 104. Tresco:My family came California in the 30’s from Oklahoma and Texas looking for a better life. Those who arrived a few years before us despised us as “Okies”. Now, every family has its blacksheep but the vast, vast majority of us have been law abiding, industrious, tax paying people who fought for their country, paid their bills and took care of our own. We have worked hard and paid far more in taxes than we will ever get back. Right now we are looking to relocate out of state. We will take our old folkes and kids with us. We will be good, hard working, tax paying, responsible people who obey the law. I look forward to giving a good old fashoned Okie curbstomp to the first fool who disparages me or mine for the “crime” of being from California.
Nov 5, 2009 - 10:43 am