David Craig, on May 26th, 2023Friday/weekend blog
California Dreaming
Hopefully readers will be aware of the Mamas and Papas 1965 song “California Dreaming” (link at the end of this blog). Back then this was the image many of us had when thinking about California:
And there was also “California Girls” by the Beach Boys, also released in 1965:
The nightmare begins
But since 2011, California has been ruled by Democrat governors – first Jerry Brown from 2011 to 2019 and then Gavin Newsom from 2019 to today. Then the problems started – rising drug addiction; crime out of control; homelessness at 10 times the level of the USA average; streets awash with makeshift camps, drugs and human excrement. Here’s a list of the worst garbage on San Francisco’s streets:
(left-click on image , then left-click again to see more clearly)
At the top of the list is broken glass. Human excrement comes a close second.
And here’s what many streets in Los Angeles and San Francisco now look like:
Moreover, since Governor Gavin Newsom took office in 2019, companies have increasingly left violent, crime-, drug- and homelessness-plagued California and every year more are relocating to states like Republican-run Texas or Republican-run Florida. In 2019, 11 of 22 companies exiting California relocated to Texas; 19 out of 37 in 2020 and 26 out of 49 in 2021. And for each of the last 3 years more than 130,000 employed, tax-paying workers have left the state reducing the amount of income tax revenue by around $8bn.
In addition, now that Governor Gavin Newsom has banned oil extraction in the state in order to save the planet from non-existent anthropogenic climate change, California has been forced to buy energy from nearby states and California has some of the highest energy costs in America.
The situation in San Francisco, for example, is so bad you could write a book about it. In fact somebody just did – “San Fransicko: Why progressives ruin cities” by Michael Shellenberger:
The Left marches boldly onwards
Undeterred by the total catastrophe they have caused the once great state of California, the progressive left have come up with yet another genius idea – pay reparations for slavery to California’s African Americans. California’s Reparations Commission has determined that slavery, as opposed to disastrous policies advanced by the political establishment for decades, is the real reason for present-day black poverty in the state. In just a few weeks, the legislature that created the task force will take up the commission’s proposal, which calls for payments to black residents of upwards of $1.2 million each. The Reparations Commission claims it wants to provide the public with an accurate record of slavery in California and get California to issue a formal apology for what the task force calls the state’s “perpetration of gross human rights violations and crimes against humanity on African slaves and their descendants”.
A noble aim indeed. Perhaps I can help?
Maybe I can help “provide the public with an accurate record of slavery in California“? California joined the Union as a free state in 1850, with a state Constitution that expressly outlawed slavery. This didn’t mean there was no slavery in California. It’s estimated that perhaps 1,000 African Americans were taken to California by their owners and there are (I believe) three documented examples of African/American slaves being offered for sale. But the progressives are using these three cases to ‘prove’ that slavery was widespread in California. But hey, who cares about the truth when you’re on a virtue-signalling crusade using other people’s money?
The real slavery scandal in California was actually against Native Americans and not African Americans, Between 1846 and 1855, the Native population decreased by two-thirds and in order to craft California’s own code of labour, the Act for the Government and Protection of Indians was passed in 1850 which “legally” curtailed the rights of the Indigenous. Within this Act, Native children could be obtained for indenture, convicted Native Americans could be hired out of jail and Indians could not testify for or against whites. This legalized a form of slavery, of forced labour in California. An estimated 24,000 to 27,000 Californian Natives were taken as forced labourers by settlers including 4,000 to 7,000 children.
But today’s Democrats clearly realise that there aren’t many votes to be bought in the Native American community by giving them the reparations money. So, much better to throw $1.2 million at each of the state’s African Americans to buy their votes.
It seems that California’s African Americans, very few of whose ancestors ever experienced slavery in California, can expect handout of $1.2m each from California’s remarkably generous but dwindling number of taxpayers.
I wonder if I should move to California and self-identify as a transgender African American. After all, maybe in Gavin Newsom’s woke, virtue-signalling Californian paradise I could get $1.2m for each of my genders – my birth gender and my self-identified gender?
And here are the Mamas and Papas to distract us from Governor Gavin Newsom’s latest idiocy:
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The UK under liblabcon is effectively a satellite island of California. We have all the same issues and soon the frequent power cuts which parts of California have will be here too.
I am guessing that the average black person will not see the money themselves of course. It will be given to a fund and controlled by the usual corrupt group for the benefit of all black residents. They may receive a few grants and maybe the odd free Beyonce concert whilst huge chunks of money disappear out the back door.
I’m not opposed to settling i have to say although i am sure that is not on the agenda. new zealand settled and of course once its done then there is nobody else to blame for all the social problems which of course continued and in fact got worse. So expect any funds to be an interim payment to ensure the snouts can continue to feed.
I’m surprised that the compassionate Meghan and Harry haven’t sorted this out yet. It’s a long time since I saw the MSM talking about conditions in California. New York doesn’t seem to be far behind, and neither is London. Too much is being ignored by politicians and the MSM.
You raise the issue of American Indians and I was reading recently about the treatment of them by European settlers. The data seem uncertain but it was suggested that as many as 100 million could have been killed or died of starvation.
I am seeing more quotes from philosophers who say we can only get the future right if we understand the mistakes from the past, but as you show here we don’t even want to see the mistakes of the present. We have had levelling up, building back better and now it is a high skilled, high income economy. It is all meaningless. How can everybody have high incomes when we have to compete with lower income countries for exports, and with our high energy costs?
I saw a Churchill quote this morning: “The inherent vice of capitalism is the unequal sharing of blessings; the inherent virtue of socialism is the equal sharing of miseries.” I think that we should be putting the emphasis on free trade and for me that also means competition. We don’t have those conditions because governments interfere in trade and they have supported big business to take over smaller ones, eliminating completion.
As you pointed out recently the period in the late 20th century when we seemed to have an improving life is most likely an aberration. The biggest issue now is that the future is being determined by crazy ideas being generated by people who think they are saving the earth and humanity. Just Stop Oil were at Chelsea demonstrating at an event that supports the environment. If they had their way in the past we would have no fossil fuels and every tree would have been cut down for fuel or building.
Canada too! Check out ‘Canada is Dying’, a documentary: https://aarongunn.ca/watch/.