Yesterday I think I understood why California is in deep trouble. Let me walk you through another day out here.
At 7AM I put a few letters in my armored, heavy-duty steel rural mailbox. Four thefts of mail in the last five years have meant my grandfather’s old light gauge unlocked box gave way to a quite impressive, smart-looking sort of locked safe — the armor is a tasteful forest green.
(Ah, you, say, “Well, what would they want with bills and such?” Answer: “they” take a check you wrote to the power company, copy its template, take the router and serial numbers, make new checks with their name on it, and start cashing them at rural groceries. You only learn this when the canceled checks appear on your online banking: perfect replicas except the name at the upper left is some one else’s, the numbers on the lower left unfortunately yours. This too has happened to me on occasion.)
So I bought this armored box after seeing a YouTube ad in which it withstood a barrage from an AK47-like rifle — just what I need in rural Selma. (I understand to suggest that isolated rural mail theft is ipso facto a sign of anything worrisome is methodologically unsound.)
Anyway, back to the roadside: suddenly a car whizzed by the farm when I was putting the red flag up. Out came a huge plastic trash bag of wet garbage, littering the road and bouncing into the vineyard row — bottles, cans, letters, paper, and plastic diapers.
Was it just a coincidence — or a sign of defiance, since the usual trash throwers (e.g., sofas, beds, strollers, even a dead animal now and then) are nocturnal and discreet? The theory is that the tosser saves money by I suppose living in a garage somewhere without paid garbage collection, and sees that most pick up trash, so that those who throw it can’t quite ruin the roadsides as is true elsewhere. This is an age-old truism: The miscreant escapes notice to the degree that there are few miscreants. When too many toss their garbage, then the environment is no longer so conducive to garbage tossing (the one 90 mph driver on the freeway gets away without killing himself or too many others because the others drive 65 mph).
I walked over to pick it up, but the raw food and mess convinced me to wait a few hours until it dried out. I will retrieve it tomorrow when the rain dries up, I promise.
Such unattended trash invites more, and is a health hazard. That the local ravens and blackbirds are feasting on it, is no reason not to pick it up. (No, one does not call the sheriff, the state EPA, or any agency for such incidents, even when the addresses of the bills of the tosser are quite often [I'll see tomorrow] found in the rubbish — been there, done that, no results.) (Yes, critics, I agree that anecdotal evidence like this means nothing much.)
At noon, I drove into the local warehouse supermarket. When I checked out (and I had written about such incidents like this a near decade ago in Mexifornia), the checker and the woman behind me were trying to communicate in Spanish to instruct a young man and his wife (with four small children) about how to use his food stamp card (an anachronism since they look more like ATM plastic).
But he spoke some sort of Nahuatl indigenous dialect. It did not sound that much differently in its pitched accentuation from modern Greek. No Spanish-speakers could really make out much of what he was saying — and believe me they tried.
I suppose there are indigenous peoples’ translators at the government office, since the quite smiling and friendly family had two full carts and an expectation of paying for it, and (as I saw later) a nice enough car.
But, alas, neither husband nor wife could speak English or Spanish. (Yes, again, I concede that the presence of a few from Mexico who can speak neither Spanish nor English proves little, much less is evidence of the problem of illegal immigration.)
By 2 PM, the air was loud with sonic booms. Local tree managers were trying to break up hail (I lost two crops in the 1980s to a sudden hail storm)— the current theory being that sonic waves will either smash apart, or at least divert for a few minutes, hail storms that can so scar the appearance of tree fruit to render it unsalable (but with absolutely no effect on its quality or tastiness — go figure).
In these environs, there are almost no more small farms as I knew them thirty years ago. Either they are like mine — now rented and dependent on off-farm income for expenses, since “rent” does not cover taxes and depreciation — or tesserae in larger vertically integrated corporate mosaics that need “product” (profitable or not) to fuel a vast investment in trucks, packing houses, cold storage, and brokerage.
I made the argument fifteen years ago, in Fields Without Dreams and The Land Was Everything, that the imminent final corporatization of family agriculture would not affect the appearance or productivity of farms, but only end the notion that these 20 and 40 acres homesteads used to grow citizens of a different sort that we see now (I think both prognostications were proven correct). (I agree again that the corporatization of my immediate environs proves nothing really without the latest statistics of corporate ownership versus family managed and owned farms.)
The good professor spells out clearly many concrete steps that could and should be taken to fix the broken state of California, and for that matter, the entire nation. One wonders if there are any men or women who possess the courage and strength to initiate those steps. Looking over the current crop of political parasites and looters does not spark a great deal of hope.
That is a discouraging thought indeed.
I do wonder though, the extent to which Dr. Hanson’s writing, and regular, multiple times a week articles from others – Charles Krauthammer, Thomas Sowell, Mark Steyn, Jonah Goldberg for example – actually influence the course of conversation and politics?
Mobile devices are becoming the norm. Nine million iPhones were sold last quarter. That connects people anywhere, all the time. It wasn’t long ago that MSM really directed and dictated the message. In the last several years, voices previously unheard, are accessible and with greater ease.
I’m optimistic that the message is getting out there, and I’m thankful for Dr. Hanson taking this on. The first thing I check when I connect is for Doc’s next piece, and all the comments. It’s the most refreshing and hopeful moments of the day!
The message is indeed getting out; One can see a slow,
grudging shift in viewpoint on the Web, as events such
as the Greek Tragedy unfold, and people begin to think:
Holy **** It _could_ happen here.
The Way Out, if there is one, is through nucleation;
Seeding the nation with small examples of successful
experiments in Reform, and replicating like mad.
This in turn requires Subsidiarity; If every attempted
reform, such as universal concealed carry, and tougher
enforcement of laws against illegal immigrants in Arizona,
is thwarted by the Federal government, then things will
keep on getting worse until the whole system crashes
at once, and the survivors find themselves living in
the Reunited States under an authoritarian regime.
Trust me: left, Right, or Center, _None_ of you will be happy living under that regime, so don’t go there.
It seems as if about 1/3 of the American population are content to live off the others, but demand that their standard of living equal those that actually PRODUCE the wealth. This will grow a little more until it becomes intolerable to the workers. We see evidence that the grifters realize they are reviled by the producers in the changing in the appearance of the welfare and food stamps appliances. They wish to mooch in in secret, but mooch none the less. Of course, this ridiculous course of events will not last forever. It is coming to s screeching halt. The moochers will realize they must settle for less, for doing nothing, or loose in a civil war after which they will receive almost nothing in it’s aftermath. I really do think the next 10 years will determine the fate of our Republic. Of course the irony is that if the moochers succeed in destroying our Republic, they will have destroyed the wealth engine that they rely upon to be moochers in the first place, and their standard of living will fall to that of South Africa. They should realize what every good viral pathogen does, it’s not good policy to destroy the host upon which you live.
Franciso d’Anconia from Atlas Shrugged
Francisco noted: “So you think that money is the root of all evil”.
“Let me give you a tip on a clue to men’s characters: the man who damns money has obtained it dishonorably; the man who respects it has earned it.
“Run for your life from any man who tells you that money is evil. That sentence is the leper’s bell of an approaching looter. So long as men live together on earth and need means to deal with one another–their only substitute, if they abandon money, is the muzzle of a gun.
“But money demands of you the highest virtues, if you wish to make it or to keep it. Men who have no courage, pride or self-esteem, men who have no moral sense of their right to their money and are not willing to defend it as they defend their life, men who apologize for being rich–will not remain rich for long. They are the natural bait for the swarms of looters that stay under rocks for centuries, but come crawling out at the first smell of a man who begs to be forgiven for the guilt of owning wealth. They will hasten to relieve him of the guilt–and of his life, as he deserves.
“Then you will see the rise of the men of the double standard–the men who live by force, yet count on those who live by trade to create the value of their looted money–the men who are the hitchhikers of virtue. In a moral society, these are the criminals, and the statutes are written to protect you against them. But when a society establishes criminals-by-right and looters-by-law–men who use force to seize the wealth of disarmed victims–then money becomes its creators’ avenger. Such looters believe it safe to rob defenseless men, once they’ve passed a law to disarm them. But their loot becomes the magnet for other looters, who get it from them as they got it. Then the race goes, not to the ablest at production, but to those most ruthless at brutality. When force is the standard, the murderer wins over the pickpocket. And then that society vanishes, in a spread of ruins and slaughter.
Here’s another sign of the times and evidence that government has gone crazy. After April 22, 2010 if more than six square feet are disturbed in a home built before 1978, the contractor must be EPA certified.
This all relates to the terrible pressing problem of lead-based paint.
The EPA has the authority to exact horrible fines for non-compliance.
What I want to know is: How large is the lead-based paint problem?
I suspect the EPA has a cost-benefit analysis on this, but it strikes me as crazy.
If lead-based paint was *really* a problem we’d have heard about it on CNN, CBS and NBC.
Lead based paint is as large a problem as Toyota accelerators and long undisturbed asbestos hidden in insulation of large buildings. There was a theory, never proven, that small children eating chips of lead based paint in poorly maintained old apartment buildings was the cause of lower IQ in those children as they grew up. As a surgeon, I have personally removed a one pound lead sinker from a child’s stomach. That is lead ! Lead poisoning is well known and the reason why we no longer have lead pipes for water.
With a nod to the professor, there is a theory that Rome’s decline was, in part, caused by excessive lead in their pipes and lead based colors in pottery. Lead levels have been done on skeletons (That is where lead deposits) from Roman graves, from modern Germans and from pre-Columbian societies that used no lead. Modern Germans have twice the lead level of Romans so the theory is unproven.
The short version is that it is one more modern hysteria, like vaccines and autism. Thimerosal, the preservative that used to be in multi-dose vials of vaccines, contains lead. Autism incidence has continued to rise in the decade since Thimerosal was removed from vaccines.
The elimination of lead in paint has cost billions to homeowners who have to paint and scrape their homes far more frequently. The fresh look hardly lasts 6 months here in the SE. Also, since lead can no longer be used to prime canvas for fine art, nothing painted recently will last past a century.
Why would the liberals want to get rid pf lead paint. Consumption of lead paint is one of the reason Democrats are Democrats.
I do not pretend to understand what what causes Democrat leanings.
Your theory about lead paint is as good as any.
I wonder what percentage of Democrats lick their feet, stare at the sun, date their cousins, etc.
The lead paint taboo came from the big projects in the big cities during the late 1800′s and early 1900′s. Little children were pulling flakes of old paint off of the baseboards and eating it. Think of the last time you have seen anyone child or not eating flakes off of a baseboard. It took years of landlord abuse for the paint to get to that stage and many more for the landlord to not paint over the flaking lead paint before it became a problem. Most lead painted buildings have either been demolished or renovated and the threat is gone. But the EPA is like and old elephant and never forgets anything and acts like it is an ever present danger. It’s the same with mercury. Most items that have any mercury in them pose very little if any health problem to humans but the EPA has determined that ANY mercury is forbidden. How many of you had a bottle of mercury when you were a kid and played with it daily? I know I did and I only have 12 fingers and eight toes.
Good job Cornhead. Now all of the commenters can disregard everything Dr. Hanson has written here and discuss lead based paint. How about talking about whom should replace Barack Obama at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue in 2012. I humbly suggest again, perhaps someone precisely like The Good Doctor himself? What’s your plan?
Chronic lead poisoning among children essentially is nonexistent in the USA. Lead was banned from gasoline, interior paints, plumbing (ironically, since the root ‘plumb’ means lead), toys, etc. decades ago. Chronic lead poisoning is seen among children with pica (an urge to eat nonedible items such as paint flakes, dirt, plaster, etc.) who live in a dwelling that contains peeling, lead-containing paint. That combination is now so rare that only a handful of cases are seen per year.
Transient, mild cases of lead poisoning occur among children who reside in or near dwellings that undergo improper stripping or sand-blasting of old lead paint. (The lead paint containing-dust gets inhaled or swallowed.) Almost all cases of lead poisoning in children are caused by improper removal of old paint. That’s the justification for the EPA rule.
Who knew? Lead-based paint is the source of *all* our problems.
EPA press release exerpt below,
“FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
April 23, 2010
WASHINGTON – The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency announced that renovations and repairs of pre-1978 housing must now be conducted using safe practices to protect children and pregnant women from exposure to lead-based paint. Almost a million children have elevated blood lead levels as a result of exposure to lead hazards, which can lead to lower intelligence, learning disabilities, and behavior issues. Adults exposed to lead hazards can suffer from high blood pressure and headaches. Children under six years old are most at risk.”
My wife works for a window company. These rules will add about $300 for every window replaced in that pre-1978 house if after the mandated 5 different incisions in your walls any lead is discovered. So, there will be two different kinds of contractors, those who will abide by the rule (as stunningly ridiculous as it may be), and those who will undercut the price and figure they can get away with it. And most homeowners will probably go for the “cheap” bid. More lawlessness by the normal law abiding in the face of a stupid law.
Cornhead: “”Almost a million children have elevated blood lead levels as a result of exposure to lead hazards, which can lead to lower intelligence, learning disabilities, and behavior issues. Adults exposed to lead hazards can suffer from high blood pressure and headaches. Children under six years old are most at risk.””
I love reports that use the terms “can” and “may” to justify outrageous expenses and massive increases in bureaucracy. Our government is an overstuffed, engorged, syphilitic Howdy Doody.
The reason that almost one million children have “elevated” blood lead concentrations is because the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) keeps lowering the criteria. When I started my medical training, it was 25 micrograms per deciliter; now it is 10. And, the CDC claims that no lead level is “safe.” What do that base that claim on? Absolutely nothing. There is no evidence of any kind of damage when levels are below 10. Epidemiologic comparisons of kids with lead levels of zero to kids with lead levels of 10 show no differences in IQ or behavior.
This pattern of lowering criteria and claiming a new epidemic occurs repeatedly. The CDC did this with overweight and obesity criteria, the CDC and the World Health Organization did it with diabetes mellitus, various cardiology groups did it with myocardial infarctions, and pediatricians and pediatric psychiatrists did it with attention deficit disorder, attention deficit-hyperactivity disorder, and autism. It’s mostly about greed: greed for funding, for medical payments, for attention, for public and political recognition. It rarely is about improved health care.
The EPA is a group of bedwetting nitwits.
Before 1974, just about every car in America was spewing lead out the tailpipe, courtesy of your truly. In terms of lead doses ingested, I’m sure everybody got his or hers simply by breathing. I don’t think anybody ever had a lead paint feast.
Long story short, I think I prefer the days when everybody had some lead in their system, unlike now when there is little or no lead contamination and everyone acts like a loon, if not an outright lunatic.
It is not just the top tax rate that is a problem. It is how fast the rate ramps to the maximum rate as well.
Liquid salt thorium reactors are one answer to power. They are cheap, safe, and easy to build. Surely someone at LLNL or SNLL can come up with a standardized commercial design given that working prototypes were built and operated at ORNL years ago.
Release all non-violent drug offenders. Decriminalize soft drugs and other victimless crimes. With tracking devices now being practical, perhaps release all non-violent offenders to home confinement/work. Of course, all this breaks the rice bowl of the prison guard union, so they are opposed to any reduction in prison population.
Impound any car that is not registered. This is actually common practice in other
jurisdictions.
Automate online many state functions, such as car registration renewal, as other states do (see, for example, Arizona). Make driver’s licenses for adults first expire
at age 65, and have DMV be able to issue them on the spot. The former is the rule
in Arizona, and many European nations have licenses that are good for life. The latter was the practice in Florida more than 30 years ago and in many other states now. Of course, automation breaks the rice bowl of the DMV employee unions,
so I doubt they would like it very much.
Drill offshore and increase oil production.
Make UC upper division and graduate level only, and let the community colleges handles lower division classes. Perhaps designate certain UC campuses as graduate level only. Give absolute preference in admissions to (legal) California residents with sufficiently high high-school GPA (as used to be the case under the Master Plan for Higher Education). Make foreign students tuition high enough to partially subsidize resident students tuition.
Make concealed carry permits “shall issue”. This has reduced the crime rate in
other states that have adopted it.
I am a big believer in nuclear power but the reactor type mentioned is not safe. It can extract much more power than the high pressure water cooled reactors we currently use but the trade off for this power is a real possibility of runaway and fire. Think Chernobyl even though it was of a different type the same risks apply.
Greetings:
You’ll feel better when more of California’s landscape is covered with wind turbines.
too funny …the dems wont let that happen “..not in my back yard”
What a delightful rural sweet & sour slapstick comedic stream of consciousness.
Too bad you have to qualify some things so as not to offend those who have skin as thin as a page in the Pauly Wissowa, Realencyclopädie der Classischen Altertumswissenschaft.
And in the ‘After all, in no particular order, we would have to…’ paragraph…who says that VDH doesn’t have ALL the answers to problems?!!!
A nice way to end the week with a little California dreaming.
“And in the ‘After all, in no particular order, we would have to…’ paragraph…who says that VDH doesn’t have ALL the answers to problems?!!!”
Agreed; I think VDH nails it here. Now who has the will to do it? We need statesmanship here, not politics. Somebody step up to the plate (this would include a whole lot of voters, of course) to solve this problem before it hits complete meltdown status.
What silly nonsense.
God forbid should the big one come or if the Library Towers gets hit, then I’ll be there for California. Someone from LA once asked if I had ever seen Limos in my midwestern city. One was truly surprised that an Indian restaurant had great food here. And what’s new about craziness at Berekley? I was touched by the piece above but for my experience, that’s California.
What a non-delightful — and non-contributive — post you wasted bandwidth on.
OK. Now we can go back to the same doom and gloom taxes, things are going to be horrible, doctors are going to quit, the country is ruined, enemies are going to get us…bad…that kind of post.
This essay seemed more to me like a type of resignation to the way things are…bad but not unbearable, a pain but not the last straw, a look at a few trees but not the forest or the forest without despair.
I thought the essay was a change of pace and I enjoyed reading it. I still have an idealistic image from years ago of 70 degree weather, the view from Mulhullin (sic?) Drive at night, Venice beach, Universal Studios, etc. so I choose not to cry for California.
I read it and felt relief.
Well, Doc, one hopes and prays that Mr Kaus can make a good showing in the Democratic primary. If so, that would indicate that California Democrats have some sense of survival left. Likewise, a county-by-county
analysis would show where some sense prevails and where
total fantasizing has taken over. (Ditto for precinct by precinct within each county.)
However, if Kaus proves to be a mere token of sanity, then the ruling majority will have its way until actual material deprivation takes over. After that, quien sabe?
Thank you for giving me an intelligence indicator to watch for.
Stepping back won’t happen. Sacramento doesn’t have the political will to gore the sacred beasts. Only after catastrophic financial disaster will we rebuild the golden state. And that we may not live to see.
…will they not follow a similar path when they rebuild after a collapse ?
I think the same things will happen and for the same reasons. Humans are flawed and they tend to follow the most flawed.
it is like the “Dog Whisperer” …you see his clients are generally well to do …supposedly intelligent and educated and they give the power to the dog.
They don’t want to establish human hegemony over “the other” species
VDH;
Sir; I was born and raised in San Francisco. As a little kid watched my maiden Aunt leave on a hospital ship for service in the Mediterranean. (WW2 doncha remember?) I left in 1957 to go to school in NYC. Since then the town has gone to hell. (Not the fault of my leaving). When my mother died in 1999, I sold the old homestead on the hill overlooking the bay and ran screaming back to New Jersey. (Itself, no paragon of virtue, but at least logical in it’s corruption).
Rebuilding your family homestead to the picture in your memory is “pissing against the tide”. I do understand it, however. It’s gonna break your heart. There comes a time when you have to walk away
Thanks for your thoughts,
New Jersey? IIRC it ranks even _LOWER_ than CA on the taxfoundation list.. Not to mention VDH would be on the hook for what, $25k/yr property tax if his homestead were in Bergen Co?
Naah, NV, TX, AZ would probably be much better bug-out destinations. Or perhaps some fertile land in South Dakota?
CA is done, unless we get a Pinochet in DC, and Xenu help us if it comes to that.
Thank you Dr. Hanson for tour de force.Entertaining? Yes.Prophetic? Not my call.A catalogue of how the world has turned ,economically arranged,cries out lovingly for remediation.What are we to learn from its message that return to better days not likely? Impossible, really.
“… The medicine would be harder than the malady …” occurs as a true statement, but what exactly did happen in 2008?
The employment figures are more likely to deteriorate for this year with 10%+ very possible. Jobs lost are unlikely to materialize again despite businesses improving (eg. Apple – their chips aren’t made in the US, and 50% of the Intel inside is employed outside America).
Income uncertainty or deterioration, is a very tough pill to swallow, but a remedy to weak decision making. It’s anything but one would hope for, but it’s going to make for some clearer choices. Let’s hope people wake up with a low bank account slap in the face before it gets more serious.
Please keep doing what you are doing. Your observations & commentary are like a breath of fresh air here on the east coast 6 miles from DC.
Maybe one of your children will realize the value of what you are doing to the family homestead and pick up the cause where you will eventually leave off.
Regarding the drive by trash tosser: What’s your guess? Democrat or Republican?
Non registered voter? Definitely not an Independent.
Environmentalist?
Quite possibly the trash did not originate w/ the tosser, but instead has been stolen from it’s rightful receptacle, pilfered for the same info as was your mail, then tossed.
Registered Party: TARGET for the scoped Mini-14 I carry when walking on my property.
“It was like this deputy. I was walking along the road on my property checking to see what pruning and mowing I’d do this weekend when this dirtbag threw a bag of garbage at me from his car. It looked like he was doing at least 50 m.p.h. I was just defending myself.”
I’m a neighbor in the foothills, the Mother Lode between Sacramento and Tahoe.
The coarsening of life hasn’t proceeded so far here. A trip down to Folsom, however, never fails to startle me — it has changed so quickly.
We are shifting into survival mode, ready for anything.
Ahhhh, the good old days. Yes it really was better back then. California nostalgia is getting to be a genre of its own. The only thing that was worse was crime, which was pretty scary back in the 70′s. Other than that it was as close to a paradise for the common man the world is likely to see.
Unfortunately it was discovered by outsiders who decided to improve it.
“how would we return to sanity in California”
About the only thing one might contemplate now is why their ancestors came to America and California in the first place. Those dreams and ambitions would no longer be fulfilled in state of California now. Did the Pioneers come across the Plains, Rocky Mountains and Sierra’s for this life we lead? We have no concept of what they endured to get here and we let all of what they cherished slip away. Meanwhile check out the latest and greatest in big screens at the MegaWarehouse then roll by the drive up window at your favorite junk food chain on your way home. Somewhere they are proud of us. I wonder what Leland Stanford would think of it all now?
Prof Hanson, it sounds very depressing, but never give up hope. I’m only a few years younger than you and I have seen much of the same here in N.J. Fortunately, we have both elected a governor willing to TRY to lead and do what’s necessary. More importantly, he’s gotten a positive response from voters at the school board elections, if not in the polls. I still have hope [and I'm a tenured inner-city school teacher that feels better about voting for him every month]!
And I am so ashamed to say, that before my “being mugged by reality” (9/11 and other sorts), I was a Democrat who actually attended 1 and only 1 “political rally” in my life. It was Boxer, Pelosi and Clinton (running for his first time) in 1992. It was held in the middle of Republican Orange County. Ugh, I am so so humiliated…
On the other hand, of the 3 other people I was with at the time at the rally, I’m the only one who has changed — although I’d prefer to say “grown”… but I suppose that would be bragging.
While the description of mindless students is one you’ve talked about many times — and one that I hear from *every* teacher I know from high school on up — the garbage bag throwing incident somehow shocked me more (and I don’t know why). Perhaps because whenever I’ve been in even a *remotely* similar situation (cross country trip, large garbage bag, where to put it?), I have *always* at least sought out a dumpster behind some restaurant.
I thought we “solved” this problem with that famous commercial in the 1970′s that had that proud Indian standing next some roadside garbage — and when the camera zoomed into his face, once could see a tear dropping from one of his eyes. I know that affected me… and I was about 7 years old!
The “proud Indian” with the tear running down his face was actually a man of Italian ancestry. Not a drop of “indigenous” blood in him. Isn’t that a hoot?
Yes… although not really surprising knowing the types of people they got to play *any* foreign-looking character in movies in the early 1970′s (and of course, the further – farther(?) — you go back in time, the more egregious it was…whites playing Asians… all the way back to black-face paint).
The movie “Dragon – the Bruce Lee Story” tackles the racial backdrop of the time. It shows Lee working to develop what became the “Kung Fu” series, but the part ultimately going to Carradine because the studios couldn’t bring themselves to cast a real Asian.
Still a great commercial though.
In my town, the police department has actually held “Dumpster stings” in the past. They’d hide in their cruisers a short distance away and just wait for someone to come along and toss some garbage in there, then they’d come out with their lights on and write you a ticket for a much larger fine than you’d expect.
The idea was to crack down on people that weren’t paying their (exorbitant) city garbage fees. But when I read that line about the dumping, my first thought was, “Well, if I HAD to get rid of some garbage ‘illegally,’ I’d probably do it on a rural road too, because the government’s made it too risky to attempt to dispose of it in the “lesser of two evils” fashion.
Sadly, my next thought was “Maybe the guy’s just so fed up with the California government that he did it purely out of spite.”
Like you I restored the old family home in Tidewater VA., but given my age, it was to somehow memorialize the 20′s, 30′s and 40′s, basically a quarter century that took us through active service (all volunteers) in WW II; and all the neighborhood guys are dead (many in that war). But, now it will have to pass to others, though I could afford to keep it, since it has no meaning to my own children, now in their 50′s.
So much for mobility and its uses in the evolution of what is our “society’ today.
Regarding the trash-thrower: Pull on some gloves and examine the remains. Extract an address. While still wearing the previously mentioned gloves, send them a series of anonymous, increasingly disturbing postcards. Use Google street view and be creative.
No, I would simply box up the garbage and send it back. Maybe a nice note “We know where you live !”
Except, I expect they have no legal address and the note would have to be in Spanish.
The simple fact is that (I think) Mr. Hanson is too polite a man to do something along those lines (not that I’m saying any of the “retribution” suggestions cross any “major” or criminal lines).
I’m merely noting that the ones involving the tiniest amount of an outward “threat” display (written or otherwise; anonymous or otherwise) would, be, in my estimate, something with which VDH would not feel comfortable (and I understand him on that score assuming I’m correct as I’m the same way).
There must be some completely civil ways or strategies to deal with this — perhaps similar to the ones you’ve suggested, but minus the “semi-threatening” or “weird” spooky stuff (the Google satellite picture in particular strikes me as a hair threatening).
What about boxing it up, sending it to the person with a polite note saying, “could you please not dump your garbage on my property anymore (with return address)? I am appealing to the better part of your nature, Sir or Madam.” And if you think it makes sense to include the message as translated in the top 2 or 3 languages spoken in SoCal, then that’s fine too – but there again, I wouldn’t *only* translate it into Spanish, it just implies too much – that is, *if* one is taking the polite approach.
But I’m undoubtedly deluding myself as I’ve not lived in So-CA since 1995.
Even better
“Excuse me, I think you lost this.”
*BEG* :-D
I don’t actually think it will help. I was once following a vehicle which had recently left a little convenience store. the driver (of the dealer plated car, not sure if that is relevant) tossed his slurpee cup, with straw out the side of his window). i who was in the left turn lane, pulled up beside him and told him, please don’t litter in my hood. If i was expecting a shamed apology, well, i didnt get it, I got the f-word fired at me as well as much other vitriol. i considered returning from my left turn to discuss this face to face, but i had my daughter with me and anyway, i had nothing to win, the lesson to me was F-you, period. Is how some people live their lives.
God, you people are creepy.
Our recycle bins are full because of a recent WA state Union strike. The strike ended but our bins are still full because we get our recyclables taken away on Thursday.
California here we comeeeeeeeeeee.
Unsustainable idiocy or greed or a little of both?
Amnesty for illegals? Between the blacks wanting ‘reparations’ and the mex-hispanics wanting ‘amnesty’, I’m fast becoming a ‘racist’ for wanting to protect my property/livelihood/country.
The large chunk of non-tax paying citizens will unfairly bloat the vote with amnesty and America can kiss her ass g’bye.
You want racism? You GOT racism. I’m so disgusted with the white idiots who voted for this douche that I give dirty looks and scowls to every white person I encounter who looks Leftist. Yes, I’m a Lefty Profiler now. Sad but true. I refuse to blame the minorities for this sh*t sammich. This crap was dreamt up by Leftist WHITE whackadoodles. I patently refuse to allow this admin to make me angry at non-white folks. BULLSH*T.
It’s OK, Delia, we profile you wingnuts, too.
This anecdotal recital of California quotidian calls for reflection on the quandary of how
the irresponsible can dump garbage with impunity and the children of the virtuous, despite great expenditure to their benefit, shirk reverence for their heritage.
From Socrates to you and me, we ponder why is it, as Thrasymachus put it, “that the life of the unjust is more advantageous than that of the just”?
Be thankful to have experienced one of those brief and infrequent periods in history, occurring possibly only in the Occident, when the preponderance of good over evil animated the hearts and minds of a community that grew into a nation.
Our country is now reverting to a primitive state of pre-civilization natural order, subdued by the primal savagery of self-serving tribal thugs, empowered by the usurpation of authority, under the vengeance of our historic first Islamic apostate president.
One of the more depressing articles of yours I have read
Great one, Doc! As a native California very familiar with the Central Valley from Tracy, I have to agree with nearly everything you say.
How you can stick it in Selma amazes me. Hats off to you & your courage.
My late uncle, who was a almond farmer for Ripon, could relate with nearly everything you shared about the dumping of garbage, mail theift, etc., on your former far.
How sad…
However, I’m pretty cynical about any hope of reform in CA. Frankly, no one has the will power to do it. Besides, where are the great statesmen & stateswomen we need to do this in our Assembly & Senate? What a laugh! None of these people could carry some fed like Henry Clay or Daniel Webster’s jock strap! They are small, greedy & power hungry weasel faced politicians.
But I digress…
CA, as wonderful as it once was is in a terminal state of decline. And, it will only get worse. Think 10 years from now & be afraid. I am.
People that want real reform will now be forever outvoted by the freeloaders on the gov’t teat & with all of the illegals coming in, will be able to vote sooner than later, it is over.
It is a sad thing, but our once wonderful state has become a slime pit in a continual death spiral.
It truly makes me sad & I feel grief for CA.
How did California go from a pretty solid red state to a totally blue state in such a short period of time? Was it motor voter registration?
Californian is NOT EVEN a totally blue state! It is only blue along the coast (about 30 miles) and in the inner cities (except San Diego). It just so happens that a BIG chunk of the population lives there, especially those “so-called” minority voters (in the cities) and the wealthy liberal-elite who control most of the media, and are ensconced in academia and political circles.
I’m sure it’s not BLUE where VDH’s house is, or where I live in the Inland Empire, or vast parts of Orange County and San Diego County…and it’s certainly becoming more “purple” everywhere else…
We shall see what happens when we elect a NEW Repuplican Governor this time and a NEW Republican Senator. Not that that will change anything much right away…but it’s a start.
California is proof that democracy can fail.
What a pessimist. What a realist.
Strange is it not? California has been run by Republicans for years, even some very conservative Republicans (Reagan), and it is in such a financial mess. But we must remember that some of the biggest tax and spend governments were lead by Republicans (Bush), I think that is why most now voters go by what they do, not what they say. The current Republican Governor is someone that is very popular though, “the terminator”. He may not be as popular amongst the voters in Caleeefowwrnniaaa, but across America he is a real Hoot !!.
Maybe gonna vote for change soon?…. who knows?
Yes, jhar…er PC, The Terminator is a real hoot and what we call a RINO. But he is twice as competent as that nitwit Dem Davis whom he replaced.
Isn’t that like be valedictorian at summer school?
Oh come one. California has been run by the democratic controlled legislature that has voted year in and out for big spending. Republicans have vainly tried to stop it as best they can. In 1999, Gray Davis increased union pension benefits in a manner that is bankrupting us today. The Legislature approved it. Arnold tried to undo it when he was elected–the entire state media and every telegenic union employee was enlisted to oppose those Propositions. Too bad they didn’t pass.
As a result of mismangement by the state’s democrats, we are now in way over our heads. We are told we “cannot cut vested” pensions, even though the taxpayers were not represented at the table when those deals were cut (unless you mean Gray (“Unions Forever”) Davis was a representative of the taxpayers, whic we all know is not true).
Poor (and Stupid) American wins the day. According to him, California is in a bad financial state because of Reagan’s governship. This surely beats Obama’s whine about the economy he got from W.
Just putting things in perspective – Reagan’s last term as governor of California ended in 1975, 35 years ago. And yet, Poor (and Stupid) American blames him for pathetic state of California’s economy. This reminds me of the Soviet excuses for poor economy – the commies always said that Russia was a poor country in 1917, and that the tsars ruined it. Amazingly, they were still saying this in the 1970ies.
Please do not mistake me. I am only pointing out the facts. Sorry if Reagan and this later Republican leadership has let you down. And by the way, I am from the midwest, we have suffered for many more years than you guys in california, but all the republican governors you had (Awwnie, Ca, Jinall (La.), Huckabee, Palin at least have kept the country well entertained over the years.
Also, one small (education moment) point for you and the alot of the other well intentioned, but less than educated…. pelosi and boxer are “federal reps” not state reps. So please stop blaming, mentioning them as scapegoats rather than the real (republican) leadership in Sacramento. On behalf of school teachers everywhere, thank you.
“California has been run by Republicans for years,”
Is this what they call ‘the facts’ nowadays?
Nope – you’re only pointing out your opinion (and a bad one, in MY opinion). Historically accurate, it isn’t. And why is a PROFESSIONAL teacher in a union. It was considered in very bad taste when I was teaching!
Professor,
An honest and somber piece I must say.
I too lived 1/2 my 34 years in California. Concord to be specific. Growing up there in the 80′s it was an ideal locale. Why it was even the ‘#1 City in the U.S.’ in ’86 or ’87.
Today and for sometime now it’s an armpit. Gangs, dollar stores, graffitti and other other forms of blight litter the area. Sad.
As for the ignoramuses in the library, my family went to Rome, Italy for Spring Break/ Easter. I am fortunate to gaze upon the Sistine Chapel. Though my fellow tourists gave me a feeling of contempt much like your library excursion.
Outside the Sistine Chapel there are numerous signs to not take pictures nor a flash camera in this particular section of the Vatican City museum. I’d guesstimate 85% of the group were taking pictures, with flash in this majestic room.
I dare not to for a variety of reasons. 1, the sign read not to. 2, the pictures have to get touched up from time to time. More often with each subsequent flash picture. Thus, imagine being a vacationer and the Sistine Chapel being one of the stops on your visit. How would you or I feel that we wouldn’t be able to see said Chapel due to the painting being touched up?
No, my wife and I stood in the middle of the Chapel and attempted to take it all in. For no picture(s) will do it justice.
I apologize; that was me taking a flash picture of the School of Athens. I had a new pocket camera used only one day before visiting the Vatican. Took numerous no-flash, slow shutter speed, pictures before getting to that part of the Vatican (have the blurry pictures to prove it). The room was crowded, my 12 year old daughter wanted a picture in front of School of Athens to show her teacher. Whipped out the camera as the crowd parted, hit the button – FLASH. Still can’t figure out how the setting changed on me.
mea culpa, mea culpa, mea máxima culpa
It is all about the type of citizen we produce. The tea party movement and the anti-illegal immigration movement arise from one single, evident sentiment that is nonetheless utterly ignored by the mandarins: fairness. When you are standing in the grocery store next to some woman with five kids, paying her grocery bill (and all her other bills) by fiat while she and her babies’ father(s) accumulate cars and electronics, you have every right to judge her behavior.
You’re not actually doing her, or her family, a favor by doing otherwise. It takes a great deal more faith in people to expect something of them: expecting nothing is the real prejudice. This is also something the mandarins don’t understand.
Intermarriage? Not only is it commonplace among the working class and dependency class — it has been commonplace for so long that it is not remarkable in any way, at least in poorer zip codes, which seem to be observed by the mandarins only when some outburst of violence may be blamed on the appropriate offender.
As I track hate crime cases, it seems to me that more and more of them feature young white offenders (who certainly deserve to be punished for their actual crimes) with relatives and friends and girlfriends of different races — peers and family members who come forward to argue convincingly in court that so-and-so isn’t actually racist, though they’re often oddly indifferent to the fact that he is actually a criminal. You also see multiracial gangs of youths charged with hate, with some members sharing the ethnicity or race of their victim (this is airbrushed as much as possible by the media). Criminal activity has been more convincingly multicultural than any college campus for longer than any well-reimbursed diversity czar would wish to admit. And yet, the mandarins see none of this as they push eagerly past the truly horrific intra-racial crime stats, searching for cases which can be grandstanded as “hate.”
In my town, which sounds a lot like Selma, the old farmer or veteran the mainstream media would depict as an old-school racist for his views on taxes and immigration is likely to be found on a Saturday morning towing his multi-racial grandchildren behind him in the WalMart parking lot. Are his feelings about this appropriately PC? Probably not, and I doubt he cares. The most important thing we can do is find a way for his voice to be heard. And that is utterly terrifying to the mandarins, which is why they set out to destroy his message.
VDH, perhaps it’s time to sell the farm and move to another state. Dmitri Orlov’s prediction of the US splitting into 6 nations is palpable. All you have to do is figure out which will resemble the way you used to live. Perhaps the South might be the spot. Maybe a farm in Georgia to grow Pecans and Peaches.
Cheer up Dr VDH. Life is getting shorter every day. The beautiful California golden state has become only a dream for those over 50. There is no going back to the “good ol days” of Greece or California. Manifest Destiny took the American dream to the Pacific coast and upon arriving began the process of destruction and perversion (personified by the likes of Pelosi, Boxer, and the Sacramento legislature) I would suggest, and I practice, when closing the gate to the family compound that you remain on the INSIDE to create a small piece of the dream that the world once was. I offer this humble advice as multiple times I have requested that you offer suggestions rather than descriptions to the country’s problems. Offering solutions has the effect of fostering optimism as compared to descriptions (your stock in trade) which take you to the despondent mood of your essay today. Again, cheer up. It will all be over sooner than you think and Obama has just the health plan for you. I think it is referred to as the death panel for elders from another age. In the interim think Paxil, Zoloft, Deseryl, Celexa, Lexapro, etc. etc. etc……..
Patriots, we start nationally to change this rising tide of leftism on Nov. 2, 2010….Our Independence day.
Locally, you must stem the tide in each and every local election. Free and reasonable states and localities will thrive, areas of decay like Detroit and other large cities, and some states will have to be left to their own devices.
Make a stand, quit crying and get ready for these elections. We are a free society who needs PATRIOTS to stand up.
Here here! Indeed. This message *must* be repeated endlessly to like minded people. There is ZERO excuse not to vote this November! We may not get everything we want in this year’s election, but we *all* must vote.
—Potentially IMPORTANT INFORMATION RE: Voting—
Allow me to relate an embarrassing story about voting so that others might not make the same mistake. In one or two recent elections, I was so whipped up that I voted (physically punched the hole[s] for) BOTH the “All Republican” slate AND, individually, all the Republican names as they were listed down the page.
Let me clarify: in VA, one can punch 1 single hole to vote for ALL Democratic, or ALL Republican candidates running for *every* office in said election from President down to dog-catcher. I (in a “momentary lapse of mental coordination”) punched this hole for the Republican slate AND also punched the holes next to EACH and EVERY Republican candidate on the ballot…
THUS NULLIFYING MY BALLOT!
One may NOT do this (at *least* in VA and I strongly suspect this is true in all states). They toss ballots such as these as being “invalid.” (the entire ballot, ALL your votes, are thrown away).
Even with a good post-grad education, I did NOT know this. I was woefully ignorant at best, stupid at worst. But the real tragedy is that “I” threw away my own vote!
So do not *only* vote this November, but please make yourself aware of the particularities (or idiosyncrasies) of voting in your state. That is to say, vote intelligently to ensure that your ballot is “valid” (and thus counted).
It still hounds me to this day that I threw away my vote in two major elections.
Hey, Volunteer, I’m with you – from the Old North State. We need to move Dr. Hanson over here to the hills and hollers where free people still live. He will feel a lot better. Then we must take back our country, beginning not in 11/2 but now, with every little thing we can do.
Does not history inform us that when a people have become overly taxed they look to rise up and overthrow the existing government? If so, then the next question is one concerned with foresight: When will this take place in America?
Your present thoughts, seem to me, concern themselves with this question: When?
I don’t know, but this I do know: It’s time to prepare for dark days ahead!
The fact that Barbara Boxer and her friends are many in number suggests this struggle will be long and very painful. The “angry woman” has been running our country for some years, both in the background and foreground.
Soon, but perhaps not soon enough, her days will come to an end to be replaced with something more creative and hopefully constructive!
Note how these “angry women” are aging? Very impressive!
It tells you in the Book: “Man cannot live by bread alone”
Welcome to reality
I think one thing mentioned by Dr. Hanson deserves particular notice, and that is his observation about the disappearance of the small family farm.
Our nation was formed when America was an overwhelmingly agricultural country, and the Framers ideas and attitudes—and the Declaration, the Bill of Rights and the Constitution–and our ideas of civic duty, citizenship and morality, as well, grew out of this largely agrarian mindset and experience—toughness, determination, hard work, honor and honesty, a fierce independence, keenness of observation, planning, frugality, caution, conservatism and realism; all these attitudes and ideas, of course, developed, implanted, encouraged and nurtured, not just by the nature of pioneering and farming, but also by religion in an America that was then overwhelmingly and fervently Christian.
That fervently religious and agrarian America—rapidly becoming just a distant memory and soon to become the stuff of legend, then, myth–produced some remarkable men and the hardy generations that built this country. But as those hundreds of thousands of small farms disappeared, they not only changed the lives of those who ran them, they stopped producing–as a byproduct—the kinds of people who were the backbone of America, and who set and maintained our course on the right heading.
I submit that the lack of such people today explains much of our current degeneration and devolution, back towards the “state of nature” that those past generations worked so hard to—for only a short time, it now appears–lift us out of.
Jefferson predicted it long ago: that once Americans leave the farms and huddle in the cities like the Europeans, we shall loose our liberty.
Even in Jefferson’s time, crooks like Aaron Burr were demagoguing the urban masses (Tammany Hall). The only difference then was that a far smaller percentage of the populace were dependent on the patronage of ward heelers.
great essay VDH ..the paragraph below that you wrote is a good start.
“After all, in no particular order, we would have to close the borders; adopt English immersion in our schools; give up on the salad bowl and return to the melting pot; assimilate, intermarry, and integrate legal immigrants; curb entitlements and use the money to fix infrastructure like roads, bridges, airports, trains, etc.; build 4-5 new damns to store water in wet years; update the canal system; return to old policies barring public employee unions; redo pension contracts; cut about 50,000 from the public employee roles; lower income taxes from 10% to 5% to attract businesses back; cut sales taxes to 7%; curb regulations to allow firms to stay; override court orders now curbing cost-saving options in our prisons by systematic legislation; start creating material wealth from our forests; tap more oil, timber, natural gas, and minerals that we have in abundance; deliver water to the farmland we have; build 3-4 nuclear power plants on the coast; adopt a traditional curriculum in our schools; insist on merit pay for teachers; abolish tenure; encourage not oppose more charter schools, vouchers, and home schooling; give tax breaks to private trade and business schools; reinstitute admission requirements and selectivity at the state university system; take unregistered cars off the road; make UC professors teach a class or two more each year; abolish all racial quotas and preferences in reality rather than in name; build a new all weather east-west state freeway over the Sierra; and on and on.”
….still I doubt that any of it will happen until there is a complete economic collapse, (where anything may happen and probably mostly bad things ..think Mad Max).
I travel a lot due to my work and spend a lot of time in remote places in third world countries and the basic problems are the same. and the problems grow faster then the solutions. I never see efforts to fix the original problems.
3-4 Nuclear reactors, 4-5 Dams and a all weather road to Reno.
Do you have any idea how hard that would be with a State government recruited from UC Berkley. Gov. Brown Sr built this state and we could use a Democrat like that again but we wont see it.
I’ll tell you what *will* produce the Nuclear reactors however (and not just in CA) — when gas prices at the pump rise to somewhere between $5 – $10 a gallon (either sooner due to Mideast unrest wrt Iran, or later, again due to some other type of upheaval in the Mideast).
It’s always *after* a crisis that this country has produced some of its greatest achievements — e.g. the entire rebuilding of our infrastructure during the WWII years that gave us a big leap forward in newer forms of technology and mass production and no doubt heavily contributed to the uptick in wealth during the 1950′s.
“In other words, we would have to seance someone born around 1900 and just ask them to float back for a day, walk around, and give us some advice.”
That’s exactly one solution, unfortunately. But I don’t think this applies just to California, many parts of the country have deteriorated as much. Our feeble hopes rest on the educational system and the influence of parents on their children (of any age).
I haven’t spent much time around here lately, but is this the same vivo we jousted with so vigorously on 2008-9?
It appears to me that you’ve been having a bit of a change of heart. Welcome!
Advice from an ancestor…
Respectfully beg to differ; We moderns know everything
our ancestors knew about human nature, we just don’t
want to admit to such non-PC insights, and the Ancestor
would have no idea about modern technology, which will
provide the Way Out of this mess, if there is one short
of socioeconomic collapse and population die-off.
Nice slice of a California morning. I appreciate the authenticity.
Life is what it is, as it was for Yeats when he wrote “Sailing to Byzantium” or “Among Schoolchildren.” For the sensitive, the aged, or those whose party is out of power, it is always the worst of times. Badness in OUR OWN time has to be the worst that there is, otherwise, we ourselves may not matter all that much. We may not.
People throwing garbage in your presence is, of course, disturbing; makes one think (irrationally, of course) of a firearm. I hope that you have moments that you do enjoy at your place, although you sound considerably put-upon. One is permitted to be happy no matter who is President, right? Having grandchildren running around, even raising some hell seems to help. But I doubt that PJM wants paeans to happiness and fulfillment in the Age of Obama. Woe are we, eh?
You could have tried harder not to sound condescending. Feigning lighthearted banter among “intellectuals” with “right?” and “eh?” doesn’t cut it.
Bringing in Yeats doesn’t help your “point” either. For one, poets are, notoriously, the least reliable when it comes to politics, as they’ve been known for looking for “preference,” patronage, a sponsor, an NEA grant.
Secondly, Yeats is the worst possible example you could have chosen. For all his poetic, well-maneuvered “above-the-frey” persona, Yeats was a deeply political animal. Check out his writings about WWI and the Irish “problem,” some scribbled while lounging in his London club. He spent Easter Sunday, 1916, at Sir William Rothenstein’s cottage in the Cotswolds–a heavenly place, if ever was one. Yeats was a frequent “guest” there, as was Ezra Pound. Yeats depended on rich benefactors througout his life.
As to “I doubt that PJM wants paeans to happiness and fulfillment in the Age of Obama,” you got that right. The “Age of Obama” is the age of overall idiocy/cretinism, as illustrated by Elizabeth Alexander’s innaugural poem:
“Praise Song for the Day”:
Each day we go about our business, walking past each other, catching each others’ eyes or not, about to speak or speaking. All about us is noise. All about us is noise and bramble, thorn and din, each one of our ancestors on our tongues. Someone is stitching up a hem, darning a hole in a uniform, patching a tire, repairing the things in need of repair…”
Hope you don’t gag when each one of your ancestors decides to come back and live on your tongue.
nice article…the progressives are progressively dragging us down and backward! One day i have hope the other i prepare for the worst….
Mr. Hanson – I really enjoyed reading your observations. If it helps, I could have written pretty much the same thing about New York. Which is probably why both states are collapsing at warp speed. I especially like the fact that you are restoring your home, come what may, because I too have been on such a quixotic quest for over a quarter of a century. Don’t give that part up. It might turn out to be your only source of sanity as things get worse. Any attempt to restore beauty and a sense of history is a commendable act.
I agree, as long as home restoration is your thing. It’s not mine, but being retired, once tending my own large garden is done, I enjoy going out into the land, not where I was raised, but where I settled. It used to be predominantly mediocre farmland, interspersed with glacial boulders and wetlands. My self-appointed task is to note and chronicle the ancient stone walls, quarries, and cellar holes; sometimes linking them to a particularly family, sometimes just to “Former Inhabitants.” It floats my boat and provides hiking and hunting as well.
I taught high school for many years, and often felt the impulse to judge my affluent students’ lifestyles, materialism, shallowness, vaunted ambition, self-centeredness, laziness (and pretty much all the combinations of being YOUNG in the last forty years). But they were what they were, and often better than they appeared to be. Some people need to grumble and judge and they too are all part of our diverse culture. I will take umbrage with some of the wild-eyed righties around here and their ramblings, but more for stimulation and entertainment, than true political passion. The two-edged meaning of Yeats’ “the best lack all conviction; the worst are full of passionate intensity” may reverse the essence of who the best and the worst are, but I’ll save some of my passion for the stone walls and the grandchildren. Onward.
“Any attempt to restore beauty and a sense of history is a commendable act.”
Scythe and VDH are focusing on architecture in this context but it makes me think of art in general. As a painter, I have often been in despair over the fate of the western tradition.
Although there are painters who currently practice traditional methods and home owners/prospective buyers who value restored houses, I am completely at a loss when I see myself agreeing with someone aesthetically when I am completely opposed to their destructive liberal worldviews politically.
fwiw, I started a FB group featuring Roman Republic Portrait Busts as an attempt to “restore beauty and a sense of history” while hopefully using this technology to direct minds to something constructive. A small attempt in this culture war…
http://www.facebook.com/?ref=home#!/group.php?gid=109556945751395
exactly right Delia: you can’t go with the racist meme of the left. because there are conservative minorities out there. its an uncivil war and its not about race. its about keeping our standard of living, sharing it doesn’t mean giving mine to someone else it means, others get an opportunity to work there butts off and get theirs. its an economic super market sweep where all contestants get to fill their own baskets.
California is kind of like a boat with only one control, the throttle. No rudder to steer it, no anchor to hold it in place. And the people who control the throttle are blind. But they sure know how to make excuses.
It was looking pretty bad for this Country in the Jimmy Carter era of the ’70′s, but the worst didn’t happen. A great leader, Ronald Regan, stepped up to the challenge and gave us back our pride and our sense of what it means to be an American. I pray that another leader of such stature will be created by the political climate of our times. It’s not impossible and actually a lot easier than it was in the ’70′s given the resources of the world wide web. The fact that people are made aware of all the little “anecdotes” of society with broad an speedy dissemination is a great sign of America’s ability to solve the problems of our political experiment. Keep us informed, Dr. Hanson!
Good article Dr. Hanson and the comments so appropriate about small farm rural living having to be propped up by outside income. It’s happening everywhere, not just in California and what’s even worse is the fact that much of our most productive farm land in every state has been paved over.
One comment about the Nahuatl speaking family and I have observed similar situations with Native Americans from other linguistic groups from Mexico and Guatemala. I think it a tragedy that members of native communities that have withstood the Spanish Colonial era, the wars of independence in the early 1800′s and the utter chaos of the Mexican Revolution in the early 1900′s have finally decided that life is no longer possible in their villages.
Help! I’m stuck in California and can’t get out. (I would miss my two grandchildren too much.) I would certainly like to be on the way to Montana with all my possessions. The first thing I would do is get rid of my California license plates, so I could get the local people to talk to me. Then, I would get a rifle rack for the back window of my pickup truck. (Anything to do with firearm ownership is frowned on in Liberal California.) Someday, I hope to be “Free at last, free at last”, with California in my rearview mirror.
What happens when a state goes bankrupt? Seriously.
I understand what bankruptcy does to the individual, but not a state.
I think perhaps Clinton, Bush and Obama are all on the same page and work towards the same goal. One world government. In fact I first remember hearing the term when George 1 was in office. If we are overburdened and collapse as a state, the federal government can come in and “save” us..
Government has destroyed many things that were one good in America. Look up the Woodman’s Circle House in Sherman, TX as just one example of how Democrats stopped Americans from pulling together…
I will be leaving California in less than two weeks for reasons parallel, if not absolutely identical, to the phenomena that Dr. Hanson describes. I pay more than the average Californian in taxes, and, as a single, childless man, I place fewer demands on state and local government than the average Californian, so I’m exactly the kind of person California’s government and people should want to stay. Greed, short-sightedness, and a lust for power have turned California from a wonderful place to live into a place where I no longer wish to live.
Dear VDH:
While Nancy, Diane and Barbra may well have lived within 50 miles of each other. From the wealth generation perspective it is more
interesting to note that their husbands also lived within 50 miles of each other.
Three words: online bill pay.
As long as we’re tilting at windmills here (figurative windmills; the lefties are all for windmills in theory, but actually building them seems to be bad), can we add breaking up California into 3 or 4 states (I like 4 — roughly greater San Diego, greater LA, the rest of the west coast up to the northern edge of the SF metro area, and all the rest of CA) to the list of quixotic endeavors? I mean, it’s quite possible LA wouldn’t do any better handling just LA’s problems, and the Bay Area wouldn’t do any better handling just the Bay Area’s problems, and the central valley wouldn’t do any better handling just the central valley’s problems (governments being governments) … but they wouldn’t make things worse for other areas either, and wouldn’t provide convenient scapegoats.
Oh, they can do it anytime they want, as long as the state legislature and Congress can agree on it. Article IV, Section 3, Clause 1.
If I recall correctly the period of Justinian, Procopius, and Belisarius was one when the Eastern remains of the Empire exhausted itself trying to reclaim the full glory of Rome. Trying to go back to the ‘good old days’. So exhausted that when the Islamists burst out of the Arabian peninsula the resources to counter them were too little, too late. Juxtapose that with the observation of what it would take to bring back the ‘good old days’ of California. Maybe there are times to just move on and commit resources where they will be effectively and efficiently exploited and husband for a greater storm.
Which is why L. Sprague DeCamp chose that point in time
to drop a 20th century history professor into the past,
and have him successfully fight ‘Against the Fall of Night’
by introducing modern technology: The stirrup, the crossbow,
the telescope (to extend the spacing of semaphore towers),
and the printing press.
We moderns have the Tech and the time to use it…if we will.
Memory aliasing is _really_ annoying: ‘Lest Darkness Fall’
is the Historical fiction I meant to reference.
Dr. Hanson, phew! After the foreign language incident in the warehouse supermarket, you got off track. Your third to last paragraph seems to have put you back where I think you intended to be. Recommend you write, sleep on it, then re-read your post before submitting. Sure was a lot of “wtf …” in between. The topic is ripe for the picking but you missed the low hanging fruit by looking into the knot in the trunk of the tree.
Once again Professor Hansen so aptly describes the miserable situation in which the former United States of America finds itself. The sheer ugliness , ignorance and venality which are the hallmarks of the New American World State are apparent everywhere. The neo Americas are a devoluted class of barbarians who will eventually destroy themselves. Meanwhile we need to do what was done at the Fall of the Roman Empire. monasteries where humanistic learning can be preserved must be built. Also the operative words are withdraw, defend and survive.
I think Prof. Hanson has reached the, “Get off my lawn!” stage of life. I pretty much agree with his prescriptions but… I agree that immigration must be controlled and amnesty is a very bad idea, but… Prof. Hanson fails to recognize that the immigration which has been most damaging to California is the immigration of people from back east not Mexico, e.g. Barbara Boxer, Nancy Pelosi. That is the immigration which is most responsible for the transformation of California from the idyllic paradise he remembers, not the increase in illegal immigration from Mexico.
You’re right. The reason illegal immigration is treated as such a primary threat (even though it can be argued validly that it is a threat in general) is because illegal immigrants are a weak opponent. Conservatives are frustrated with their leftist country men, and they are taking it out on the people where they may actually get some results for their anger and frustration. It’s like a man beating the dog that his wife bought, since it is part of the problems of the house, even though the real problem is with his wife. He can’t contend with her, and he will find a way to vent his frustration. Also, to make matters worse, people are worried that amnestied illegal immigrant votes, people who seem to come with their hands open to begin with, will be snatched up by the Leftists propaganda.
There very well may be a compounded backlash if Conservatives confront the illegal immigration problem first with their full frustration. But it is like the despairing in VDH’s article here. Is there time to do things right? Conservatives are panicking.
It seems to me that if you beat your wife’s dog then opposition will be set forever. Conservatives need to be cool. Take it a step at a time, and deal with the wife.
I don’t understand what you’re saying here. When you look at tax consequences and social consequences of high levels of illegal immigration, they’re profound. Also, the ethical consequences: we’re all essentially living a lie when there are sets of rules for citizens that, by fiat, do not really get enforced against non-citizens. People who follow the rules (including legal immigrants) are being sapped dry — financially and otherwise. Dr. Hansen has been describing these problems for over a decade — funny, my local library doesn’t even carry his extremely relevant books –and people I know across the political spectrum complain of the same, yet you won’t find a politician (including conservatives) courageous enough to stand up against the race-baiters AND the agricultural interests that benefit from imposing this crisis on the rest of us.
Sure, we have our own home-grown unproductive classes. That in no way minimizes the problem.
I too live in California, having moved here as a child almost 40 years ago. I live very comfortably. I have 3 children – 2 in university, 1 in high school. I earn a good living, at least on paper. But once my youngest finishes high school, I intend to leave California, and enjoy its bounties as an occasional visitor. Between taxes and our mortgage, I have to be reminded constantly why I should stay. And the sad thing is I have no reason to be optimistic about California’s future. I’ve traveled quite a bit, and there are plenty of places in the States and elsewhere where my wife and I can be happy.
Mark! Is that you, cousin? Would Ohio have been your home state? If so, this is stranger than strange.
Metaphor alert.
I’ll forewarn anyone thinking they can mourn, and then move to greener pastures. It won’t happen because it doesn’t exist. You may gain a reprieve for a time, but it will be more out of ignorance than real change.
California’s demise may be most visible, but the phenomenon of circling the drain is happening everywhere. I would suggest you stay and make a stand where you live. Move to Texas, Colorado, or the deep south and you’ll still find a vast armada, captained by rudderless leaders manned by ships full of fools.
Good people need to make a stand and do it now, while we can still right the ships. Time draws very short before we all find ourselves fools.
Thanks Dr. Hanson, for a glimpse into your history and your view of the future. I lived 47 years in San Jose, CA in the same house and moved to Oregon when I retired in 1999. We saw the Valley of Hearts Delight, Blossom Valley grow and expand and eventually become Silicon Valley. My five kids grew up, went to school and college, got married and had 14 grandchildren all during our time in our small house. We witnessed what you wrote about – changes in schools, neighborhoods, work situations and other changes. When we moved to Oregon we bought an old farm house and are doing what you write of – preparing a home for our children or grandchildren. We live on the outskirts of a small village and though the rush of advancement has not stop here, it has slowed down a bit. Your writing informs and as well as inspires. Please continue to be “salt and light” where you are and like Noah, keep building what is important for you to complete.
Conditions in California are dire enough, but pessimism solves nothing, and summary capitulation even less. We’re a republic, dammit! It’s not like having a bag of trash heaved onto your property is the equivalent of a Gothic army suddenly showing up before the gates of Rome. We need fewer whiners and more people like Bill Whittle. If you haven’t seen his speech at the Indy Tea Party, do yourself a favor and indulge in a little optimism for once.
I’m an optimist for good reason. The Tea Party movement is spontaneous. It means that civic virtue is still functioning in our great nation. The republic is rising in response to a crisis. It’s what republics are supposed to do. Please remember that our Constitution is more than a paper document. It’s a living document, all right, but not what the left means by the phrase. The Constitution represents a legacy based on Judeo-Christian morals, Greco-Roman philosophy, and English common law. It’s a mighty oak with deep roots. Marxism is a weed by comparison.
The fortunes of empire tend to be cyclic through history. Setbacks are frequently matched by renewal and recuperation especially so for republics. We’re talking about the United States here. We went from the destruction of a civil war to the world’s greatest commercial and economic power in one generation. We went from economic depression in the 1930′s to superpower by 1955. We went from ten years of stalemate in Vietnam to a hundred hours war in Gulf One.
Buck it up, people. It’s time to stop your whining and get in the game. Booyah!
All political moderation leads to what you have described in California, professor.
Any organization not explicitly right-wing sooner or later becomes left-wing–
Robert Conquest
18. Frumious Falafel ‘And I am so ashamed to say, that before my “being mugged by reality” (9/11 and other sorts), I was a Democrat….’
Yeah, if only a Republican had been in office, 9/11 would never have happened.
Joseph: That was hardly my implication — and somewhat of a cheap shot as well (unless my writing was so poor, that you honestly felt I was saying that a “Republican President makes us safe” from terrorist attack — in which case I apologize for calling your response a cheap shot — but given your phrasing, I find it hard to believe this).
I think irrespective of who was in office on 9/11 AS WELL AS TODAY, that this country is significantly vulnerable to attack of various natures. Furthermore I am in no way claiming that a Republican President “can make us safe” from a determined terrorist or terrorists.
On the other hand, what occurs *after* the next terrorist incident I think *would be* different depending on whether a Democrat or Republican is in office.
Last thing: I’m being straight with you, respectful, and not employing sarcasm. No reason why you cannot speak to me in the same manner.
It is disconcerting at the least to read this piece by Victor despite, or maybe because of, its truisms. The spirit of individual freedom combined with the old work ethic has given way to what’s in it for me today, and how can I keep someone else’s gravy flowing my way. A year before I left California, a young Boxer had won her seat in the House, and I recall the newspapers ran out of ink telling us how wonderful it was for a people’s candidate, a woman, to now help shape the proper priorities. Before her, there was Feinstein, with whom I first came in direct contact when she was on the California Coastal Commission. One of the above posters mentioned Manifest Destiny ending in California, and it immediately reminded me of the property rights conflict that Feinstein’s local commission foisted upon hapless owners of land near the Pacific, a fight I became embroiled over in courts for decades. Yes, these women have helped shape the new California, and it’s a disaster. They made lots of people happy by making a lot of people sad over the years. I sold and left because of the Boxers, Waxmans and Pelosis, and so many like them, because I knew where this was taking California and wanted no part of it. I didn’t have the strings of a great grandfather and his heirs to keep me tied to California earth as it does Victor, although I used to envy those who did. Perhaps we’re all destined to become like Gypsies or Nomads, tied to no geography, taking only what we can carry, searching for that distant greener pasture.
Yet, to give way to that sentiment is to commit suicide. We have to fight these bastards, beat them back with sticks and hunt them down with dogs, in a manner of speaking. I’m not willing to move any longer, and am backing every candidate who I know understands the Constitutional limits of government. I just hope my son and his heirs will not only benefit, but will preserve the meaning of that document with vigor every day of their lives.
I had the same experience at a much less distinguished library, the public one in Twin Falls ID (I moved from CA to ID in the mid-90s, I couldnt watch anymore what was happening to paradise).
I used to go there weekly and always enjoyed the quiet plus the rather excellent film periodical and big city newspaper selections.
One day I noticed that the library was quite loud with people talking on cell phones, eating and having loud discussions all about me. It was about the same time that I noticed that the ‘quiet’ signs were gone.
I asked the librarian why they were allowing the disruptive behavior and she explained that the library was now a ‘living library’, a much more inclusive establishment to foster community participation. When I asked her if they considered that libraries were thought of by many as sanctuaries to escape the loudness of home and ‘community’ where they could read in peace, she just said that more people wanted to eat, talk and be ‘communal’ than wished to read. I tried to explain that that described the exact same problems with the modern classroom and the resultant drop in student academic progress but she didn’t want to hear it, it was new ALA policy and that was that.
The last time I was in there I saw more trash on the floor than ever before, graffiti and even some street people sleeping in cubicles, in other words, a dump.
As DVH’s reverie reminds us, the tagedy is not that we do not know workable, proven solutions to our miriad modern problems. It is that we are unable to implement them. In my professional discussions with educators, I often point out the examples of the B29 and the Manhattan Project. The engineers involved in these projects went to high school and college in the ‘tees, twienties and thirties. They seemed to know what they were doing and we should look at those curricula.
But this June I will at least once more vote in the Democratic primary, largely for Mickey Kaus, whose online campaign seems to be reminding us just how absurd Barbara Boxer has become.
Why bother? ACORN and the public employee unions have already picked out the Democrat Party primary winners. Even Joe Lieberman – a hard-left liberal on economic and social issues – was headed for defeat because he was not pure enough.
When was the last time the Democrat/media complex got a nasty surprise in a Democrat Party primary? Even if a significant number of Democrat voters rebelled against Boxer, the party officials will just do what they always do – pull a Rocco (“Count up the votes over and over again, until they come out the right way!).
The change may be happening right under our feet, Professor. I went to the Tax Day Tea Party in Temecula (inland SOCAL) and was stunned by the relative quietness of the major suburban roads in the middle of a weekday. I had fortified myself in advance with a Starbucks beverage because I fully expected to sit through three light cycles at a minimum of half a dozen major intersections. Didn’t sit through more than one at any of them.
A good fourth of the restaurants and small businesses that used to line the route I took — 18 months ago, 2 years ago — were gone. Buildings empty, landscaping overgrown, “FOR LEASE” signs draped over windows. At the big regional mall I saw maybe a third the number of cars that used to be typical in the parking lot. Multiple car dealerships closed, their gigantic lots sitting empty, with weeds cracking pavement and lone security vehicles looking small and uninterested.
The Tea Party corner, at a city park, was boisterous and noisy. Everyone was there to demonstrate, but there were plenty of people handing out business cards, and I heard a lot of conversations about job-hunting, and maybe moving to Kansas or Montana.
I’ve moved around a lot, but have never lived in a place people were fleeing from before. The quiet is actually nice — but of course, that’s our tax base packing up and driving off. There is a lot of great infrastructure falling idle here. One thing is for sure: California can’t stay the same. This shift is tectonic.
What California needs to be cut off from federal pork. I hope we get a Repub Congress that will stop the pork that keeps our irresponsible state going.
“…build 4-5 new damns” — smile — reading about the decay of California gets 4 or 5 new “Damns!” out of me.
Professor Hanson, you write with the heart and soul of a Texan.
“The good professor spells out clearly many concrete steps that could and should be taken to fix the broken state of California, and for that matter, the entire nation. One wonders if there are any men or women who possess the courage and strength to initiate those steps.”
The people who are capable of this are in California. They may not be in a few years if it still manages to stay the course into oblivion, but overall it should be noted that there are still good people there. The problem with California is the same one with Sodom and Gomorrah. Every year there tends to be less good people within it, and with that, less excuse for God or anyone else to hear its cries for help.
“We have to sign the bill first before we can know what is in it.” Nancy Pelosi said before the signing of the “ObamaCare” fiasco. Pelosi, Feinstein and Boxer signed off on the most expensive money bill in the nations history with out knowing what was in it. Having a Congress that is able to do this with out being tarred and feathered is something that should be changed. We now have ‘legislator’s’ running the country that couldn’t pass a high school science test, we have dumb dumbs and gangsters in government, the electorate can’t allow this any longer or they’ll be behind barbed wire, the People have to take back control.
Do we ever-ever see the clip of the guy from Atlanta that replaced Cynthia McKinney? The guy actually telling the cheif of staff of the Pacific fleet that he was afraid Guam was going to tip over if they sent 8000 more personnel there? And this guy replaced Cynthia McKinney, whose name is synonomous with idiot.
Definition of a conservative-”a liberal that has been mugged”. I guess 60% of those in San Freak sicko , Oakland, or Los spanishlingo feel that theyve been mugged yet, even tho its the very people theyve been electing to office doing the mugging-doesnt Henry the Waxass look like a mugger?
Spelling:
“build 4-5 new damns to store water in wet years.”
Hmmm?
DAM those DAMNS! Ha ha.
I dare to suggest that the non-English/Spanish speaking couple at the grocery store actually could speak at least some Spanish, if not fluently. For some reason some people think it is to their advantage to ‘not speak English’. I suppose that if they do something wrong they can blame it on a communications error. I work in a hospital and often interpret between staff and Spanish speakers. Funny how many insist they don’t speak English but, well, it’s a small town and I eventually run into them some place else where they clearly have no problem speaking English. I’ve even had later dealings with some at the hospital where they seemed to have forgotten that just a month ago they told me that they didn’t speak English but now they speak English just fine. Don’t get me wrong, when a language is not one’s first language I know it is difficult to communicate during a crisis in that language. I am talking mainly about mundane instances of discussing insurance, setting up financial assistance or when their next appointment is. I have met a number of folks who spoke Nahuatl or perhaps a Mayan language (not sure which) but all of them did speak Spanish as well and I haven’t met any that did not, hence my suspicion that they were pretending.
A very interesting read on early 20th century California is The Paton Papers by Martin Blumenson. The good General would be upset to say the least with his home state.
“The theory is that the tosser saves money”
Nobody familiar with British slang can read this without chuckling :-)
(Hint: “It’s cheap, always available, and one doesn’t have to smile afterwards.”)
This conservative minority calls ICE on competing firms who use illegal labor.
Only the stupid and those who do business honestly try to beat my family on any bids.
Now that I think about it, I can’t name one Mexican-American who will refer to an illegal as anything but a “mojado”. We all dislike them thoroughly.
Ramirez, thanks for speaking up. Too many gringos are confused by the media’s lies that most Americans of Hispanic origin support mojados.
Prof. Hanson’s solution at the end of his article does not apply only to California, but to the rest of the country. However, we need the pols to wake and recognize that it is they who put us in this bind, not the citizens. I think many pols are starting to get it, such as Paul Ryan and Marco Rubio, but I don’t think other pols do get it (i.e. Sen. Richard Shelby working with Chris Dodd to expand financial regulation even after the last regulations failed).
I was not aware that Marco Rubio had taken a stand. Please do inform. I guess he’s very busy not doing any work for his $67K no-show public college kickback part-time non-teaching job. That I pay for, as he grandstands as a conservative outsider.
What a joke he is.
Heck, I’ll probably vote for him anyway. But please don’t pretend he’s anything other than the latest flavor of full-time graft-monger. And please don’t make up fables about his purportedly principled position on these issues. He’s had plenty of opportunities to take an actual stand, and what we got was legislative/debate doublespeak. In the legislature, where he controlled committee assignments and wielded absolute power over the order of bill passage, he used the calendar to help quietly kill reform measures, not even showing the integrity of admitting that he was doing so. Meanwhile, in public and in debates, he serially scolded conservatives for “language” about immigration.
How is this actually different from Charlie Crist? Well, at least Crist admits where he stands. What a failed opportunity.
Fortunately I read the comments before commenting. Like #69 Holly in Texas, I was going to say that the various levels of government create far, far more than “4-5 damns” every day, making one wish that the old adage was true — “Ignorance is Bliss”.
I enjoyed reading this piece. But how would a liberal respond:
–Check thieves: Society needs to get these people into drug programs and ensure everyone has a decent job. Unfortunately not everyone has the desire and skills to show up to work on time and sober;
–Trash throwers: Everyone has a right to decent housing so it is not their fault they cannot afford trash service. But really, they should have a little pride and at least find a dumpster behind a business;
–Food stamps: Obviously society is responsible for feeding everyone. Liberals are now arguing that the solution to obesity is to hand out more food stamps. Interestingly the rise in obesity might be linked to the increase in food stamps;
–Library as Starbucks: The books in libraries are filled with, as Obama would say, “old, tired ideas.” We can get all we need to know (political correctness)from the mainstream media. That way you can use your time more productively socially connecting on the internet and scoring your “medical” marijuana.
Victor, you need to re-register as a Republican.
You are correct about Mickey Kaus’ father being Justice Otto Kaus, who along with writer Bernie Witkin and Justice Robert Thompson were considered the top legal minds of California back 30 years ago. But by electing a Democrat, we got Rose Bird to run the judiciary.
California….
It was golden land. I arrived with my family in 1965 from South America. My pop had a job the next day, and supported six children working at manufacturing company machining precision parts for the navy at Alameda Air Station, back then you could work for any of the tens of thousands of smaller manufacturing companies spread from San Franciso to San Jose that worked for the military at Alameda, Moffet Field, Oakland, Richmond, and many points in between.
We could see San Francisco from 30 miles away and marvel at its boldness. We could visit friends in any city without worry…the Oceans and beaches were FREE and spotless…state parks were free, and camping was almost obligatory. Almost anyone could afford a House, my parents first house cost 23,000 and their payment was 179.00 including T&I with 2,500 down payment.
They were golden days and then the state began to believe its own BS…taking in everyone that knocked on its door, and going so far as paying the insurance and housing and food of people that basically showed up and asked to be taken care of.
IN the mid 90′s, Ron Dellums and Dianne Fienstein and Barbara Boxer no longer tolerated the Military and made their displeasure known. So the Military packed up their bags and they left the SF bay area, taking multi- billion dollar payrolls and contracts with them. When they left hundreds of businesses either left with them, or closed up. The deficits began to pile on after this point.
People that built the State are leaving / have left, people that suck the state dry are entering. That is the economic bottom line; nothing of value is being added, that which creates value is being subtracted.
California was the prettiest girl at the dance, they were fantastic times to experience and live though. Anyone that lived through the 60′s-90′s in California has stories to tell of Napa, Sonoma, Mendocino, Riding Harleys or driving from Oregon to Los Angeles on Highway 1, you didn’t need to crash parties in Hollywood, they were open to everyone that wanted to participate in the antics. People were pretty laid back but at the same time things were accomplished and deadlines met.
Today i live in China, on the north point of Bohai Bay. It is similar to California in the 60′s, although many people on this site will not accept that a nation such as China could offer what California no longer can. And i still ride my Harley along the coast, except now it is from Dalian to Qingdao.
Good for you bro. I gotta ask though– what part of South America is your family from? I know alot of expats in Europe. We are everywhere.
Dr. Hanson: Reality in terms of the current human condition sucks when it’s in your face. Some things haven’t changed much in decades;
I’ve seen people throw trash bags out on the pristine back roads of Vermont when it appeared to be a crime to young eyes. I see it now in Washington State; I’ve seen it in California too. But it seems that these trash throwers somehow get convicted and cease to repeat offend in most cases, maybe the trash thrower is seen by nature’s God as a disease that needs immediate correction, because someone or something comes along and cleans it up whether the Ravens, Black Crows the landowner, a citizen or even a Townie and most likely you will never see the same person dump there again.
I agree with your paragraph of solutions to fix your beautiful state and the rest of the nation. I share your sadness at the remoteness of the possibility of the people allowing this transformation back to saner days. In the event we do not correct what needs to corrected (and right now is our only opportunity) Natures God will enforce a solution that has been enforced by Him throughout history and that is to make men scarce in the land again. In His eyes, He filled it, He can empty it. Has this ever been easier to accomplish? You can wipe out more than half the population by turning off the power.
Try not to be too discouraged, as long as the truth is waging war in the streets there is hope. We have been given a choice. I hope we all make the right decision.
After reading this …
Excuse me while I go outside and kill myself.
Those damn pesky Spanish speakers … you’d think they once owned the place!
I think you speak truth!!! and “ONCE OWNED” is the operative phrase
…you need to add…THEY NO LONGER OWN IT, THEY JUST ACT LIKE IT and are running it into the ground as they did their home country……
Thank you for this opportunity to help you see past the rhetoric.
Sincerely, A pesky tax payer..
As an admirer of Dr. Hanson, I feel both sad and sympathetic for his frustrations. What he is experiencing is a catastrophic loss of his beloved California. I am reminded of Kubler-Ross’s stages of grief; denial, anger, bargaining, depression and finally acceptance. Dr. Hanson may currently be somewhere between anger and depression. He is bargaining that his last bit of paradise lost, the family homestead, will be left inviolate, while the everything outside the gates rots away.
He is the contemporary Don Quixote de la Mancha and in my sympathy, I am his Sancho Panza. We are both living in the past and attacking windmills of inevitability.
We raise our swords and we charge.
“why California is in deep trouble”
…why…
Because we forgot that God is Infinite Love ?
Because we forgot to stand in awe at the Creation ?
Because we forgot the joy of the Wonder ?
Because we forgot that spiritual life is what makes us human beings ?
Because we forgot that life is Sacred ?
And even now, now that we are making a hell out of all the Gifts that God has given to us, even now we forget…
Dr. Hanson and folks,
I couldn’t help but notice the pivotal paragraph in this piece: “After all, in no particular order, we would have to…”, followed by a daunting list of tasks necessary for a thriving economy. And the fact that it is such a daunting list of tasks is mighty depressing. Addressing these tasks directly is akin to using a teaspoon to bail out a sinking ship.
So instead, let’s talk about the meta-issue: Exactly what mechanism caused this to happen? How about addressing that?
It’s such a huge mess, you’d think a huge mechanism was responsible. But no, California wasn’t bombed or anything. It was a much more subtle mechanism. A viral mechanism. A small mechanism installed in millions of instances.
I’ll claim that the system of rewards and incentives at all state government positions (low level, management, upper management, executive, consultants, contracts, etc.) has a built-in bias that benefits waste, fraud, corruption, inefficiencies, and cripples the economy. And, in a lovely feedback mechanism, it also multiplies those rewards and incentives.
Let’s call it “the invisible hand’s evil twin”.
The huge irony here is that the entrepreneurial success of Silicon Valley is based on the exact opposite set of rewards and incentives, where employees of startup companies are rewarded with stock options, and failing operations run out of cash quickly.
I think the only solution to the sinking ship is to forget about bailing with the teaspoon (I’ve screwed the metaphor here, but just pretend…) and instead come up with a mechanism for reversing the flow of water. We need a state government system that rewards progress at every level, and provides some sort of disincentive for waste, fraud and failure.
— Don
I agree with that ! too long the incentive is the one then prolongs the agony and makes it an impossible to fix problem.
the new incentive should start with mass lay-offs/firings at all levels of government. (of course under the present circumstances only the good ones would be lost and we would still be stuck with those that made and perpetuate the problems).
Much of the lead that was in our society has been removed and is now residing in out gov`ns a**
…take unregistered cars off the road;
Why do we give the government the power to make us register our vehicles and even our dogs?
Both “registrations” are euphemisms for taxes.
“Registering” also implies a certain level of fitness. The societal good can be served if unfit or unsafe vehicles are banned. Registering is designed to implement this process. We may not like it and the state may stretch the point beyond recognition, but if the issue were properly enforced it could bring about huge benefits. NOTE: I said “properly”.
Nice article, but Dear God Man:
If you three times as many parenthetical statements as paragraphs, it is seriously time for a rewrite. Just saying.
Did you even read your comment? What is it with these commenters? Even Victor himself using “loose” for “lose”, “you” for “your”, “lead” for “led”? Social pathology on display.
And just to spice things up, here is something sent me by my ex-patriate brother: Chomsky’s view on the state of things these days. (It’s the worst that he has seen.)
http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/noam_chomsky_has_never_seen_anything_like_this_20100419/
If I want ‘spice’ I’ll stick with habanero peppers TYVM. ;)
Chomsky has some valid points and some not-so-valid points as do many high-brow, intellectual, OCD doomers. ‘Predictions’ are a dime a dozen. Mayan calender? Nostradamus? Aunt Matilda after a few sips of absinthe.
America is a unique place. Yes, America the mighty can fall just as history has shown us that any great society can destroy itself given enough rope and stupid, but, we aren’t quite there yet.
We have not yet begun to fight…and, now we are armed with the INTERNET, babyyyyyyyy!
This part was especially interesting:
“The United States is extremely lucky that no honest, charismatic figure has arisen,” Chomsky went on. “Every charismatic figure is such an obvious crook that he destroys himself, like McCarthy or Nixon or the evangelist preachers. If somebody comes along who is charismatic and honest this country is in real trouble because of the frustration, disillusionment, the justified anger and the absence of any coherent response. What are people supposed to think if someone says ‘I have got an answer, we have an enemy’? There it was the Jews. Here it will be the illegal immigrants and the blacks. We will be told that white males are a persecuted minority. We will be told we have to defend ourselves and the honor of the nation. Military force will be exalted. People will be beaten up. This could become an overwhelming force. And if it happens it will be more dangerous than Germany. The United States is the world power. Germany was powerful but had more powerful antagonists. I don’t think all this is very far away. If the polls are accurate it is not the Republicans but the right-wing Republicans, the crazed Republicans, who will sweep the next election.”
“I have never seen anything like this in my lifetime,” Chomsky added. “I am old enough to remember the 1930s. My whole family was unemployed. There were far more desperate conditions than today. But it was hopeful. People had hope. The CIO was organizing. No one wants to say it anymore but the Communist Party was the spearhead for labor and civil rights organizing. Even things like giving my unemployed seamstress aunt a week in the country. It was a life. There is nothing like that now. The mood of the country is frightening. The level of anger, frustration and hatred of institutions is not organized in a constructive way. It is going off into self-destructive fantasies.”
“I listen to talk radio,” Chomsky said. “I don’t want to hear Rush Limbaugh. I want to hear the people calling in. They are like [suicide pilot] Joe Stack. What is happening to me? I have done all the right things. I am a God-fearing Christian. I work hard for my family. I have a gun. I believe in the values of the country and my life is collapsing.”
I gave up on California, packed up, and moved out.
This one has a deep sadness to it.
There was a time, you know, when change seemed like a good thing.
Now it seems like a club wielded by an angry thief.
VDH for governator. He’s one Democrat that could get my vote.
“After all, in no particular order, we would have to close the borders; adopt English immersion in our schools; give up on the salad bowl and return to the melting pot; assimilate, intermarry, and integrate legal immigrants; curb entitlements and use the money to fix infrastructure like roads, bridges, airports, trains, etc.; build 4-5 new damns to store water in wet years; update the canal system; return to old policies barring public employee unions; redo pension contracts; cut about 50,000 from the public employee roles; lower income taxes from 10% to 5% to attract businesses back; cut sales taxes to 7%; curb regulations to allow firms to stay; override court orders now curbing cost-saving options in our prisons by systematic legislation; start creating material wealth from our forests; tap more oil, timber, natural gas, and minerals that we have in abundance; deliver water to the farmland we have; build 3-4 nuclear power plants on the coast; adopt a traditional curriculum in our schools; insist on merit pay for teachers; abolish tenure; encourage not oppose more charter schools, vouchers, and home schooling; give tax breaks to private trade and business schools; reinstitute admission requirements and selectivity at the state university system; take unregistered cars off the road; make UC professors teach a class or two more each year; abolish all racial quotas and preferences in reality rather than in name; build a new all weather east-west state freeway over the Sierra; and on and on.”
Careful Doctor Hanson, that’s the kind of stuff that might blow a good old boy from Selma into the White House. Please Lord, let a draft begin. Soon.
First Sacramento, then DC. That’s the path another famous Californian pioneered.
Mickey Kaus IS the son of the late Justice Otto Kaus. You don’t have to conjecture that he is.
Tillman, your metaphor is right on. It’s the goal, yours and the Professor’s that needs more thought. Specifically, the definition of progress. Are not you complaining about the Progressives? Fraud is becoming easier to agree on. Waste, remains in dispute. Failure, still too easy to fudge.
The best and the worst part is that today those in power, both parties, have to distort reality in both directions (in the name of a “robust economy” and in the name of “saving the planet”). The giveaway is that the same NGOs and corporations appear on the list of highest contributers to both parties.
So what is progress? In the short term it will be when the Tea Party figures out that it is indeed a part of Paul Hawkins’ Blessed Unrest and the Blessed Unrest figures out how much it is being hoodwinked.
As a lifelong New Yorker, I find Dr. Hanson’s observations eerily reminiscent of pre-Rudolph Giuliani New York. The underlying problem is the easy availability of public welfare. In 1977 (the “Summer of Sam”), NYC had a power failure, which gave the welfare recipients in their welfare hotels the excuse to loot all the local businesses (especially the minority-owned businesses-they “went too high”). The pre Giuliani population was 6.8 million, with 1.2 million on welfare. The murder rate, especially among African Americans and hispanics, was at a record. Subway ridership was at a low point, and the streets were deserted at night. But Giuliani and now Bloomberg have made welfare truly temporary, with real work requirements and transition to work. The police concentrate on preventing crime by picking up low-level offenders before they can graduate to worse. The state penitentiaries constantly shuffle the inmates back and forth to prevent gang organization. Now the population is up 20% to 8.2 million, with 600,000 on welfare, down 50%. Crime is at record low levels, and the streets have never been cleaner. Welfare work requirements work! The “broken windows” theory is correct! And all this in one of the most “Liberal” places in the US!
Note how many of the solutions to California’s problems relate to the changing nature of the library and to 1870s historical revival. Or, for that matter, count the answers that would come from restoring the anachronistic and inefficient family-farm model of food production. That’s right, none of them.
It’s too bad that conservatism — which, let’s face it, is really just the preference for grown-up attitudes, policies, and methods over childish ones — gets mixed up in nostalgia and reverence for the past, even when there’s little practical role for some parts of that history. It’s hard to relate conservatism to younger people when the link to the past isn’t based on reason, but is instead based on a feeling that a younger person does not share.
Conservative solutions can’t be “let’s have the schools we had in 1958″. They need to be “let’s not have government schools”. They can’t (just) be “close the border”, they need to (also) be “end government (so-called) charity”.
The past isn’t coming back. But we can still mold the future into something worth anticipating. We need to look forward when we do it though.
I couldn’t agree more with your conclusion even though, from the solutions you use, we most likely have a different idea of conservatism. But in the beginnings of movements the details of the outcomes can not be seen and need not be argued much. What I write about is your lead premise. The return of localism is not as far fetched as you assume. Early writers in search of a mature, as in grown-up,” economy thought people would be smart enough to elect it themselves. The latest ones, such as Jeff Rubin, Mike Nickerson, et. al paint interesting pictures of what really produced the Great Recession
Nickerson:“The short story is that in our present debt-based economic system, money is created when banks make interest-bearing loans. Such money must always be repaid in greater measure than was created, since the interest component is not created at the time the loan is made and must be gathered from money put into circulation by other loans….After 9/11…when the response to low interest rates was insufficient, sub prime mortgages filled the void… The economy was saved, for a while. With the oil price shock and interest rate hikes in the Summer of 2008, however, the subprime mortgage bubble burst… Enormous pyramids of wealth were found to have no basis in material reality…. While money has long been scare when needed for education or health care, trillions of dollars are suddenly available to try to inflate the passing order.”
Rubin: The temporary “save” produced the oil shock/interest rate hike, which made long distance air and sea transport of heavy goods non-competitive with local production. And will occur again every time the global economy is “saved”. How’s that for a future forth anticipating?
“Immigration Reform” is just socialist doublespeak for you can break our laws and suffer no or little consequence. what caqn you say about Obama who takes the side of the invaders.
As a long time Californian I’m mighty unhappy with the state of the state, but I’m almost amused that Hanson can write his diagnosis without noting the role of Prop 13 and the infamous two-thirds vote rule for the budget. One could also add the baleful effects of initiative, recall, and referendum, which were supposed to make government more democratic but have only managed to increase the political power of money and turn the California constitution into a complete mare’s nest while giving veto power to crazy guys from Riverside county. (I can do the “get your ball out of my yard” bit, too!) The screwed up system encourages irresponsibility from both Republicans and Democrats since the former can hold out for outrageous pork by preventing a two-thirds majority and the later can promise pie in the sky precisely because they are perfectly aware that the promises will never be embarrass them in a legislature that can’t really do anything one way or the other.
If you bother to look at the California budget and make an attempt to see where and how money could be saved, you’ll quickly find that the simple solutions promoted by eccentric classics professors don’t make a huge amount of real-world sense. The rather obvious fact is that the state tax rates are simply too low to provide the services people demand. I’m certainly not crazy about paying additional taxes, but I’d rather do so than continue to watch the decay of absolutely crucial assets like the U Cal system–ruining those jewels makes about much sense as cutting the balls off your only bull, something you’d think Hansen would understand. I’m afraid that the basic problem is the political system, which prevents any serious attempt to deal with the state’s problems, liberal or conservative.
“This one has a deep sadness to it.”
Indeed it does. I feel much the same way as Dr. Hanson. Maybe I’m just getting old, but I don’t see anything really changing until the whole thing collapses and we have to start again at the bottom and work our way up.
As I read this piece I was reminded of a scripture, the parable of the wheat and the tares in Matthew 13:
“Another parable put he forth unto them, saying, The kingdom of heaven is likened unto a man which sowed good seed in his field:
“But while men slept, his enemy came and sowed tares among the wheat, and went his way.
“But when the blade was sprung up, and brought forth fruit, then appeared the tares also.
“So the servants of the householder came and said unto him, Sir, didst not thou sow good seed in thy field? from whence then hath it tares?
“He said unto them, An enemy hath done this.”
Trying to fix our current state is like trying to tell the weeds from the wheat before it gets ripe. When things start hitting the rest of the country like they are in California and Michigan, there’s going to be a lot of anger and blaming each other.
The time to have stopped this was before we started down the path of the New Deal. Some time after World War II, Americans seemed to forget that life was tough and you had to work hard and save. My generation grew up thinking that retirement was our right, like life and liberty, and that it was better to take a government handout than accept “charity.”
How stupid were we to think that we could set up a welfare state here, with minimum wages and free medical care and expect others not to come in to enjoy it? When did we come to believe that it was our right to turn down those “jobs that Americans won’t do?”
We’re living in what looks like Disneyland to the rest of the world, but then night falls and the park closes, and in the end everybody has to go home and face real life. But our President and Congress are still riding their float in the parade and don’t seem to realize that The Magic Kingdom is too expensive to live in every day.
I work in your area several times a year and have probably driven by your home many times during the last 20 years. I live in the desert and bought a cast aluminum mail box that would require a major effort to steal from; it was mounted in concrete and took at least half a day to install. A week later, during a large weekend rock concert, someone dropped a large industrial type M80 in the box and blew it all to Hell along with my mail. The next morning I drove my truck to the end of the driveway to pick up the remnants and was stopped by a sheriff, he told me a bomb squad was on its way to look for evidence. I thought it was funny and asked if they were going to waste so much time on petty vandalism. He then told me that it was no longer considered vandalism, if they could catch the buggers it would be the same as planting a bomb and the poor b@stards would spend some time in the big slammer. I shook his hand and told him I thought they were liberals like Bill Ayers and that the bomb squad had my permission to investigate all day. The sheriff appreciated my attitude and helpful information; he explained that several mailboxes were destroyed that evening in the spirit of anarchism.
I now receive my mail at the post office.
It’s a good thing that Obama’s good friend Bill Ayers is retired, because of these new tougher laws against bombing; but of course when you write books for the President, you have a special immunity, maybe he isn’t retired!
Professor, you fought the good fight. It’s obvious that your home state, California, is being dismantled bit by byte, and given that your are 56, and are on the wrong side of the political divide in California, you have a two sentence, five word solution to your problems.
Sell up. Move to Australia.
They would love to have a REAL scholar of your calibre there.
Then you could write sunnier notes (still with that bittersweet tone of exile) about a country that works.
Am I stupid or is that sentence as unreadable as it is unnecessary?
If those are the only two choices, you may be stupid. There is a potential link there between then and now.
All I ask of you is that if you find the name and address of the trash thrower, that you publish it right here on this blog. If they won’t get any other justice, how about public shame?
The only hope for California is to get conservatives to move here in droves and take over the legislature ala the Bhagwan Shree Rashneesh in Oregon.
If the ‘grown-ups’ outnumber the ‘youngin’s’ by all social security backsliding ponzi-scheme collapsing, ugly-grandpa truth-tellin’ in-the-red accounts…
Are not the ‘grown-ups’ to blame for this?
Plenty of youth ‘bought’ 0bama’
Plenty of youth were ‘raised’ on the same crap ’0bama’ was raised on
Plenty of older folks let their children be ‘babysat’ by Leftists aka ‘teachers’
Plenty of older folks rode the gravy train to the end of the line
There is a lot of ‘greed’ and finger-pointing to go around, in other words.
The greed, sloth and indulgences of the LEFT will ruin our country with their theft of the producer’s pockets.
Starve the beast.
I am native Californian from a family which was been there since before 1820. The best thing I have done for my kids is leave San Diego in 1991 and never look back. They will have an inheritance in my adopted state which I could never have provided them in CA in my wildest dreams.
My advice is leave while you can. There are other nice places to live, and some of them have culture–art, music and theater–where you can afford a ticket as well as buy groceries that week. A constant temperature of 70 degrees is highly overrated.
Thank you Hansen. I feel the exactly the same and so do many many others. That is why this is a hopeful article to me .
I feel a bit of a ground swell.
One could blame the 60′s, white, arrested developement, marxist, democrats, progressive, liberal, leftist, but it makes better sense to just DO Something. VOTE, speak- out, send this article and more. However, it would be nice to have a leader. I vote for Vic to be the intellectual part, but who is the political person we need to lead.
Lets try to change things in November 2010
P.S. Nice finale Davis–cramming all the solutions into ONE paragraph, after a slow drifting ride through California. I had to stop and rest half-way through that rascal, it was so smack full-o-truth.
Superb article. I live here in Mexifornia as well. I also think your answers on what it would take to return us to sanity is EXACTLY right. Those late 19th and early 20th Century folks are among us & can and will help return America back to the right path. Some of the strongest American Patriots are also LEGAL IMMIGRANTS. There is hope.
I am married to a LEGAL IMMIGRANT from Thailand. She has more in common with my American parents’ generation who were born in the late 1920′s than she does with Americans born in the late 1970′s as she was. My wife grew up very very poor on a small family farm in the Northwest border of Thailand near Burma. Her family moved their when she was very young because of draught, hunger and the instability of Cambodia and cross border raids (sound familiar) by Khmer Rouge following the Vietnam war. Her childhood and young adult years were impacted by periods of hunger, poverty and upheaval. She never had health insurance and the Kingdom only provided for her education to the 6th grade. Despite this my wife is the last person to blame anyone for her condition of life, in fact she’s VERY thankful, warm loving and appreciative for her life. She worked on the family farm and later in a garment factory in Bangkok to provide for herself and her family and at night put herself through a private high school. She is a devoted wife, mother and daughter. She expects no handouts from anyone and has no expectation that anyone but herself is responsible for her own well being. She is devoted to being a good citizen of the United States, flies the American flag outside of our home and shows up to Tea Parties with me and our son.
My mother grew up during the depression in the Ozarks on a farm that my grandfather bought by working 2 jobs: one for $1/day on the Rail Road and another as a farm laborer when RR work wasn’t available. His parents in were desperately poor immigrants from Germany and Scotland. They were so poor and isolated in the late 19th century rural Missouri that they hung themselves in their cabin and left their 7 children to be raised by friends and family. My father’s family were a mix of English that have been in the US since before the Revolution and 2nd generation Norwegian who immigrated as Engineers. Growing up we were proud to be American but never arrogant as our current President seems to believe. We were naturally color blind in matters of race. My brother and I were taught and shown that there is good in all people and that their actions were always the best way to measure the quality of their character. We were also taught that we were responsible for our own well being and that our actions and efforts would determine the quality of our lives.
Our son is a mix of our blood and history and is dearly loved by both sides of his family. I have been struck by the similarities between the village culture of Northwest Thailand and that of rural Missouri. There are red white and blue flags flying, dusty red rural roads and cattle. The community is the center of life, and young boys can still chase chickens until scolded by old women. People orbit the village freely and show up without plans or invitations for dinner, to socialize or talk politics. One of the most common topics is always the local government’s maintenance of rural roads.
My wife works hard cares about her family and community. She takes responsibility for herself and could not imagine taking a handout. She wants nothing more than to be a contributing member of her adopted country the United States of America. She expected when she moved her that her English skills would have to improve and worked hard to accomplish that. She is supportive of me and my role in working to provide for our family, we share everything we have freely with each other.
There is hope for America because America is more than a piece of land to be fought over. America is an Idea, a Dream it is the shining city on the hill. Each of us can still chose to resist the march of the statist and the corruption and soft tyranny coming from big government and the corrupt crew pilfering the treasury today. There are millions of stories like ours out there and we are the people that go to work everyday, that raise children, that keep the wheels of progress turning. We do in fact run the machine and we won’t turn over our lives or those of our children to the corrupt and powerful like Pelosi and Obama. Their time in power is I believe limited. The have awakened a sleeping giant.
JIm, the problem is that the more taxes you pay, the more politicians beef up their salaries, public employees beef up their pension plan and all sorts of progressive activists demand—and get—programs for whatever their pet project is, be it global warming, free everything for illegals, teaching dolphins to sing, making their home town a sister city of Gaza, what have you.
The money never seems to get spent on schools,universities, infrastructure, libraries, and they’re always coming back, hat in hand, to demand more. Don’t blame Proprosition 13.
It’s too bad that they only use Mercury in the CFL bulbs. I would get great satisfaction in throwing away a few Lead-using bulbs along with those which are Mercury-based. Yes, of course I recycle. From the earth, to the earth .. DIRECTLY!!!
To make things even more precarious, of the 38MM people living in California, 144,000 are paying nearly 50% of the state’s personal income taxes. Guess who the Dems in the legislature are targeting with more taxes? Guess who have the resources to just pack up and leave?
Dear Professor Hanson:
I cannot tell you how hard I cried after reading “The Remains of a California Day”. I was born at Mather Field (just outside Sacramento) while my Dad was serving in the Korean War. We returned to Montana (my where my Great-grandfather homesteaded) while my Dad finished his Air Force duty on the DEW Line (Distance Early Warning-to spot the Soviet Nuclear Bombers coming over the North Pole). He served in Frobisher Bay Greenland and then returned to Montana and put all four of his kids through college and then we all went on to graduate school. My siblings all became lawyers while I became a college professor. I often laugh at the reality that I could have had a lucrative career, but choose instead to “help” others via education.
I now live and work in Arizona and every time I read your great insights about California (or any other topic) I realize it will soon be here in my little town. I have the same armored mail box for the same reason. My little town only has 30,000 people, but we are victimized by the illegal alien invasion. The Center for Immigration Studies estimates that Arizona has been violated by 112,000 illegal aliens per year for over thirty years; I don’t think the word invasion is out of bounds. I have all but stopped talking to my colleagues about this since their response is to call me a racist, sexist, homophobe, xenophobe, nativist, racist (always twice-since it is their favorite charge), gender-pig and oh yea a capitalist. I guess a lifetime of resisting the dogma of academia has not endeared me to my colleagues. The fact that I teach business, deny anthropogenic global warming, teach the Constitutional basis of free enterprise and have spoken at the Tea Party events (to praise the values of Liberty and the inalienable nature of rights) does little to win friends on my campus.
I must have been crazy when I thought that the college campus was place where ideas could be thrown around and the “truth” would be open to debate. My God when I write it down like this it seems so impossible to think I ever imagined that I would be allowed to express anything but the dogma of the institutional setting. I still wince when I think of my first presentation to the Faculty on what causation actually meant and how the Anthropogenic Warming Theory didn’t conform to the statistical or research methodology rules that would allow the use of that term. I was shocked when they just stared at me and didn’t ask any questions after 30 minutes of slides and lecture. In retrospect it was a miracle I was ever granted tenure!
But now I just do my teaching and research and spend as much of my time in my wood shop as is possible. My personal sawmill and constant advocacy for wise use of timber resources isn’t interpreted as being a good steward of the earth, as I think it should, it just makes me (to my peer group) an environmental rapist. But I often imagine a time, say a hundred years ago, when a man could have worked with his hands, cut timber and been respected for his efforts, even admired for his work ethic or craftsmanship. When I look at this society, at what my students think, say and do. When I see where my students must be headed due to their distorted view of reality, I do despair for our future. How could we go so wrong in such a short time?
When I ask my students about working summers or part time work, almost none of them speak of doing manual labor, the hard work that made us all “men” when I was young. Hod carrying tending the needs of five brick masons helping to build a ten-story hospital. I can’t believe they paid me to do that job. Looking back at it, I would pay for the privilege of improving my old home town with a new hospital that 35 years later still looks great (last time I visited Montana I stood at the base of the west wall of that building and thought of how I marked the last brick of each day with chalk, so at the end of the next day I could see exactly how much we accomplished in eight hours of hard work.). That job taught me so much. I learned the value of showing up early and always being prepared-virtues I had been taught in the Boy Scouts-but they were imprinted permanently on this project. Stacking and re-stacking 200 tons of blocks and bricks is all about getting to the job-site early, wetting the mortar boards, mixing the mud and filling all the boards, getting all the stacks topped-off and stacking the old yellow Morgan scaffolding pieces to be built-up as we ascended to the top of the designed build. How you always strove to keep the mixer full of sand, cement, lime and water so the masons would not be left unproductive. But the real reward was at the end of the day when you went home tired, sweaty, stinking of work and you showered and ate and then slept the sleep of the just, the just plain tired. At the time I never imagined how I would miss that hard work and the limitless rewards of that backbreaking labor and the beauty of the taste of an ice cold Coke on the way home.
Today my male students work in offices or day care centers or pizza parlors or some other non-labor job. They do not sweat or strain or get in fist fights. They wear make-up and have ear rings; tattoos (without military service or Biker Affiliation or even a hitch in the carnie circuit) and they just don’t seem to be on their way to manhood honorably or otherwise. It breaks my heart. On occasion I still get students from the real rural America, who hunt fish and work; say Yes Sir and No Sir and hold the door open for female students and say pardon me mam. But they are fewer and fewer and when they go to work construction in the summers the illegal aliens have all the jobs and/or have depressed the wage rates to the point where it won’t pay tuition like the old days.
Jesus I sound worse than my Granddad. At any rate I agree fully with your list of how to fix strategies, but also agree with your assessment of how likely it is to be accomplished. I find myself more and more withdrawing into my craftsmanship, as if cutting the perfect dovetail joint by hand on a drawer for a chest destined for my son or daughter will somehow preserve some part of a heritage that I secretly know and yet cannot admit is already lost. I find myself more and more in the forest harvesting the trees that the ranger has marked for me, cutting them down and then dragging them into the truck to be hauled home to the my little saw mill (another small act of defiance) to be milled, transformed from timber to lumber by the magic of hard work, patience and the power of the mill and then stickered and stacked in the solar kiln. Months later they are reborn as beautiful wooden furniture. Always stained, never painted, I want the grain to show, forever.
I hope you are wrong, but I know that it is too much to hope for today. So I will go back down to the shop and cut dovetails, mortise and tenon and box joints and think about lecture on Monday night. I have two left this term, the penultimate lecture on the “Moral Defense of the Equity Markets” (a tall order given what the Goldman gang has been up to) and the last lecture on “Is Capitalism Still the Answer?” I can hardly wait for my two favorite questions to be asked “Is all that Constitutional, Founding Father stuff going to be on the Final and Can I sell the text book back?” VERITAS!