California Call Out

Jake called me out on the lack of California initiative coverage on Public Musings. He is right. The problem - I just don't know much about California State Politics, Budget, and Initiatives. This is weird, right, because I'm a born and raised Californian. I couldn't even bring myself to leave the state for college. I love this damn place. I think it's the greatest in the world. And I don't know shit about how it runs. I know considerably more about national politics and foreign policy and the NBA. Why? I don't know.

My general thought on initiatives and propositions - they are bad policy tools and should always be voted down, unless, they are totally awesome ideas. So, I'm glad all the initiatives bombed and Californians rejected whatever type of new taxes they were trying to push down our throats.

But I also know this - California is bankrupt. We were hit particularly hard by the housing mess and subsequent stock market crash because the majority of our tax revenues come from the top 1% of property taxes and capital gains taxes. When everyone is losing money hand over fist, there ain't no rich folks to tax anymore.

I also know this - California is blessed with more natural resources than nearly anywhere in the world. We have ports, agriculture, oil, industries - Hollywood, Silicon Valley, Aerospace (to just mention a few), top universities, beautiful real estate, mountains, rivers, deserts. We should be the richest place in the world. And maybe we are. But our state government doesn't work well. We're taxing business to death and losing it to other states (film production is a good example), our real estate is bloated and middle class folks can't afford housing. Our public schools are among the lowest in the nation, even though they used to be near the top.

I don't know if things were always this way or not. It seems like ever Governor in Sacramento gets hosed and becomes impotent because the system is stale-mated. I hear tangentially about these various governing blocks and special interests in the state with strangeholds over any reform.

I suppose I should pay more attention because this is the stuff that actually matters to me day to day and will affect my life. Whether Mullah Omar controls some piece of farmland in Afghanistan or a piece of shit farmland plus some piece of shit mountains in Pakistan really does not, nor ever will, affect my day to day life. But whether I can work in Production one day in California or whether 75% of those jobs end up in Santa Fe or Vancouver or whether I can afford a house. Well, that matters.