Posted on 11/08/2010 11:54:22 PM PST by freespirited
OK, riddle fans, here's a toughie: What's the difference between California voters and the passengers on the Titanic?
The passengers on the Titanic didn't vote to hit the iceberg.
Most Americans understand that California is sinking. What is almost incredible is that it has voted to sink.
On Election Day, 2010 Californians voted Democrats into every statewide position (one is still undecided). This is the party that singlehandedly has brought one of the world's greatest economies to near ruin. There may well be historical parallels to what Californians did -- but I cannot think of any.
A listener called my radio show two days after the elections to tell me that his business is booming -- thanks to Californians. His occupation? He's a real estate agent in Phoenix, Ariz.
The middle class has begun to leave California. It is, of course, impossible for most members of such a large group to leave a state; few people leave their family, their friends, their job and their home except under the most dramatic circumstances. But this fact makes all the more noteworthy the exodus from California that has been taking place.
You have to wonder how many businesses and individuals would leave California if their friends and family could also leave, if they could find a comparable job elsewhere and if they could sell their homes without losing money. What you don't have to wonder about is who would stay under those conditions. The state of California would eventually be left largely with those groups who voted Democrat in this election: rich liberals (such as those who live in Nancy Pelosi's Marin County, in the bay area and in West Los Angeles); state and municipal workers (who vote Democrat in as direct a pay-for-vote scheme as a law-based society allows); those who rely on state and city governments for entitlements; and those Latinos who either fall into the last category or who unfortunately identify the Republican Party with anti-Latino sentiments because it opposes illegal immigration.
Those who believe in individual responsibility, the free market and personal liberty are a minority in California. We greet each other as Americans would greet each other meeting in a foreign country.
We watch as one of the greatest places in the world -- with its extraordinary natural beauty, almost uniquely beautiful weather and agricultural abundance -- wastes all of this as a result of having become a left-wing experiment. What is particularly saddening is to see a state whose success was achieved because it was a Mecca for the adventurous in spirit do everything possible to crush that spirit and drive away those who have it.
There is a silver lining here: clarity. Americans living elsewhere need not elect liberal Democrats to know what will happen if they do. They only need to look at California if they want to see what happens to a state governed by the left (and, for that matter, they can look at Texas to see what happens to a state's finances when governed by the right).
The left and its teachers unions have ruined public education in California. The left and its public service unions have saddled the state with $500 billion in unfunded pension liability. California's left-governed cities have set themselves up as "sanctuary cities" for those who have come into America illegally. And the left passes more and more rules governing the behavior of California citizens. Two examples: San Francisco just banned McDonald Happy Meals because they come with a toy and therefore entice children to eat fattening food; and the Democratic legislature has made it illegal for a California employer -- even in a retail operation -- to ask a male employee who comes to work wearing a dress to wear men's clothing while at work.
And to render the Titanic analogy even more accurate, Californians voted to retain a law that was described by George Will as one "that preposterously aims to cool the planet by requiring a 30 percent reduction of carbon emissions by 2020."
That law will ensure that California taxes energy use more than any other state. That, in turn, is guaranteed to increase unemployment and the cost of living in the state -- one more reason businesses and productive individuals are leaving, but rarely moving, into California.
Environmentalist true believers have free reign in California. They have convinced a majority of the state's voters to believe the increasingly absurd notion that human carbon dioxide emission is heating up the planet to temperatures so high that humanity and the earth will suffer cataclysmic consequences.
To return to our Titanic metaphor, the great difference between that ill-fated ship's crew and California's crew (its voters and the California Democratic Party) is that the Titanic's crew did everything possible to avoid hitting the iceberg; California's crew did everything possible to hit it. Perhaps they believe global warming will melt it before they get there.
I live in CA. Bay Area. The large upper middle class here simply doesn’t mind taxing itself because it can afford to do so and then think itself virtuous. It also thinks “diversity” and “environmentalism” is virtuous and there you have it. I have 30 coworkers (in SF) and as far as I can tell there are only about 2 who vote GOP.
I’m mystified why so many companies remain here—hopefully all who can’t take the Atlas Shrugged stuff have already left, and those who remain will choose to stick it out for whatever reason. I’m hoping the wave of exodus of productive companies and people is slowing and will not escalate. Guess the companies left REALLY like good weather above all else.
The NEW ballad of Jed Clampett for 2010
Come and listen to a story ‘bout a man named Jed
Poor oil entrepreneur barely kept his family fed
Then one day he was working for some food,
And up through the town come a bumbling clown
(Brown that is, take a toke what a joke)
Well the first thing you know old Jed’s taxes are to much to bear,
Kin folk said Jed move away from there!
Said Kalifornia is no place for you to be
So they loaded up the truck and they moved from Beverly
(go’n back to the Hills they are, fish’n holes, country and western stars)
Well now it’s time to say goodbye to Jed and all his kin
They would like to thank you folks for kindly dropping in
You’re all invited back again to their new locality
To have a heaping helping of their hospitality
(Redneck Hillbillies, is what the press call ‘em now,
Clingers of bibles and guns and to Obama no bow!
Nice folks Y’all come back now, ya hear?)
Colorado too.
The same is true Colorado.They’re so stupid that when they destroy these states like they did CA. Where’re they going to run next?
And Delaware is the Emperor without any clothes.
Witness:
1. GM plant - closed.
2. Chrysler plant - closed.
3. Valero refinery - closed.
4. Bank of America - corrupt, incompetent, cheat. Take your pick.
5. Governed by RATs for 20 years - and counting.
6. This election the RATs INCREASED their hold on the state legislature.
Crew members confused port - starboard directions since they were different because of the differences in sailing and powered vessels. Many of the crew had a sailing background....
How Ironic, California is veering left when it should veer right, and a tragic conclusion will also occur as it goes broke, the problem is it will take us all down with it....
Find a cold state that just swung right, MI, WI, MN come to mind...
“They are hell-bent to do to Oregon and Washington what they have already done to California.”
They just did it in Colorado in this past election; Colorado has become “California Lite”, and will soon be California II.
If I recall correctly, Gov. Wilson left the state with a surplus. Now it’s one big circle- jerk. A circular firing squad if you will.
“Why are Californians sending disproportionate income taxes to DC? Because they support the graduated income tax that nails states with high cost of living.”
This is one of the strange things about the NYC area; incomes are inflated due to the high cost of living, but this also screws more people with the Alternative Minimum Tax. Yet they consistently vote in the biggest socialists in the country...
Cold states have plenty of problems; besides housing, feeding, and schooling the permanent underclass (think Buffalo, Cleveland, Chicago), you also get to pay a ton on heating your home...
California republicans need to become very still and quite in the next few years. There is a dem congress and a dem governor so just sit back and wait. You’ll still suffer from their decisions, but it will be quicker if no republicans run at all. Let them turn the cities into sewers and let the sewer rats go after the uber rich liberals. You can rebuild after it is over.
It is my understanding that we just eliminated the 2/3rds majority needed to pass tax increases with Prop 25, correct? If so, it will negate the reason to have any conservatives in the assembly.
The Titanic had a better band and paint job.
Not if Palin is president.
On the Titanic, the rats jumped ship.
In California, the RATS keeps steering into the iceberg of socialism thinking that repeatedly striking it will lessen the damage.
The Titanic wasn’t filled with fruits and nuts.
The Titanic wasn’t destroyed by an earth quake.
On a Clear titanic day, you could see forever
On a clear LA day you can see the palm of your hand
The Titanic had no Freepers
California has lots of great FReepers
No Californians eliminated the need to pass spending bills with a two-thirds vote. Revenue bills still require a two thirds vote.
In a Democracy you get the government you deserve....
When I think of California, I think of an older teenage girl I knew. Her parents raised her in prosperity, but in isolation. Everything she liked was theirs: their home, their music, their history. Like Rapunzel, she knew every tiny facet of her ivory tower, and nothing more.
This changed in a radical way when she finally had to leave home to attend a public high school. For the first time in her life she met poor people, unhappy people, violent and self destructive people. And in short, it blew her mind.
It was so alien to her that she was compelled to investigate it, to learn the truth that had been denied her.
She quickly linked up with some “gutter punks”, and went on a road trip with them. After even a short time, one of the punks confided in me that her path was obvious.
“She has to lose it all and end up in the gutter. Hopefully, she will hit rock bottom soon, before she is hurt or killed. Only then will she get her act together.”
He was quite prophetic. After months of grunge, filth, alcohol and drug abuse, fights, etc., she finally hit rock bottom. But unlike everyone around her, she picked herself up, got a bus ticket home, and was never seen again.
As well, today California is on her path of despair. And like her, they are going to keep at it with rare determination, until they either hit rock bottom, or are injured or destroyed in the process.
It will serve no one to try to get in California’s way, either. Some things just have to happen.
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