California
Burning yet promoted as the world’s “trendsetter in popular culture,
innovation, and politics”; boasting a $2.8 trillion economy that, if it were a
country, would be “the 5th largest economy in the world”
California
masked and unmasked is a state dogged by decades of homelessness, camps of
homeland refugees and battles against homeless people instead of providing
permanent shelters and the wherewithal to maintain them. A place dominated by the
Brown dynasty and a partisan twofer tyranny; and where a venture capitalist campaigns
to split the already human fragmented land into an actual governable geographical
divide.
Amidst this
is Sonoma County, Wine Country, comprising Santa Rosa Metropolitan Statistical
Area and included in the San Jose-San Francisco-Oakland Combined Statistical
Area; the northwestern most county in the nine-county San Francisco Bay Area
region. Entrenched Dianne Feinstein country!
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nconscionable
neglect
California’s
Sonoma County of 483,878 (2010 census) is in crisis. Supervisors in July declared
a “state of emergency” not aimed at solving the county’s decades’ long housing
problem; but to compete for a patch: a one-time chunk of money handed out by
California’s “new Homeless Emergency Aid Program.”
Soft money never solves problems. It
merely panders to passing fancies or momentary public outrage, or pads the
pockets of profiteering “nonprofits.”
Two years
ago Santa Rosa (Sonoma’s county seat and largest city) declared a “homeless
state of emergency” which, instead of fundamentally addressing and fixing what
is in fact a human right to shelter issue and a broad societal problem, the
preferred patch pushed or permitted homeless people to display their
homelessness “on public lands or private properties.” (Rochester, New York, is
also playing this game of human insensibility.)
And having effectively
patched and deserted, a segment of the population obviously considering
themselves “betters,” reeking of condescension congratulated themselves for
clearing waste that their policies had helped create. Sonoma news reported in the
spring of 2016 that “workers and volunteers” had set about clearing “more than
4,000 pounds of garbage” from homeless encampments, “damage inflicted by
illegal camps,” they said, on Sonoma County’s “oak-studded hillside.”
Sonoma County’s
largest city is Santa Rosa. Its neighboring counties are Mendocino (north),
Lake (northeast), Napa (east), Solano (southeast), Marin (south), and Contra
Costa (south-southeast).
Median household income (est. 2000
census): $53,076; median family income: $61,921; per capita income for the
county: $25,724; 4.7% of families, 8.1% of the population: below the poverty
line including 8.4% of those under age 18 and 5.7% of those over age 65.
And like
most of the U.S. citizenry it can’t or refuses to count above two.
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wofer Tyranny
California
maintains its status quo by taxing alternative voices: effectively denying them access
or silencing differing ideas, positions, voices. Under its “Proposition 34,” California
State government is allowed to charge $25 a word for publication of what is
called “minor parties” or non-corporate parties’ candidate campaign statements
in the state’s Voter Information Guide. This effectively prices alternatives
out of contention and of course obstructs or denies democratic choice to voters.
How does a
nation purporting to export “democracy” to other countries fail to allow or
practice democracy in the USA? Of course it can’t and doesn’t.
In his
article “Voters’ ‘Right to Know’ Undermined by High Candidate Statement Fees,” California
Green Party member Michael Feinstein raises the question of whether “we can really
say we have a democracy” when voters are allowed information only on candidates who “can ‘pay to play.’”
In the case
of fees imposed by county registrars whose offices often receive direction from
the secretary of state’s office, this imposition of what amounts to a tax can determine
who runs for the state legislature, Feinstein points to the conflicts of
interest. As the governor’s office “can veto bills,” including candidate
statement fees set by the secretary of state’s office, this entanglement or
conflict of interest can also determine who can compete effectively in a race
for the governorship.
Further
denying alternative party access and voter choice—beyond the tyrannical two—the
California legislature in 2012 bypassed voter consent and “removed the general
election write-in candidacy option” — a right that had been ensured to Californians
“since 1850.”
Preserving
the Undemocratic Status Quo
The Brown Dynasty: Edmund Gerald “Jerry”
Brown Jr. followed his father, Edmund ‘Pat’ Brown, the elder was California’s
governor from 1959 to 1967; the younger was California’s governor from 1975 to 1983;
and again since 2011.
California’s Washington
entrenched: Mayor of San Francisco in
the 1970s,
Dianne Feinstein has
sat in the U.S. Senate from California since 1992 ● Representative from
California Nancy Pelosi has sat in the House of Representatives since June 2,
1987. ● Representative from California Maxine Waters has sat in the U.S. House
of Representatives since 1991 ● Representative from California Barbara Lee has
sat in the U.S. House of Representatives since 1998.
Is there any
wonder people are pondering divorce?
This coming
November Californians possibly will have a chance to vote against domination,
dynasty, and the twofer tyranny.
They will be
considering “Proposition 9,” whether to “begin the process of dividing
California into three separate states”: a state in the north, one in the
Central Valley curving south and west to the coast, and a state surrounding Los
Angeles County. Depending on the election outcomes, the final vote will then be
subject to state and federal legislative consideration.
But even
before Election Day, the naysayers are hammering on the court door. The Planning
and Conservation League lobby has reportedly filed a lawsuit to have Prop 9 deleted
from the ballot. Proposition 9 is the brainchild of Silicon Valley venture
capitalist Tim Draper who in 2014 had proposed a ballot initiative containing a
six-state instead of a four-state division of California.
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alifornia may well be, in unmasked celluloid superficiality,
a state of masks; but in this, it is also a trendsetter. For California
reflects the unmasked superficiality of our USA from sea to shining sea.
Will we never see ourselves as others see us and, in honest self
reflective appraisal, set about the hard work of solving our problems together?
Sources
Wikipedia
California https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California
The Press Democrat July 12, 2018 “The new wave of
homelessness in Sonoma County” Editorial Board http://www.pressdemocrat.com/opinion/editorials/8523961-186/pd-editorial-the-new-wave?sba=AAS
“Voters’ Right to Know Undermined by High Candidate
Statement Fees, SoS Conflict of Interest” Michael Feinstein (2018 Green
candidate for Secretary of State; and former Santa Monica Mayor and City
Councilmember), January 10, 2018 http://www.foxandhoundsdaily.com/2018/01/voters-right-know-undermined-high-candidate-statement-fees-sos-conflict-interest%E2%80%A8/
California Greens “Got 10,000 signatures? Green Governor
candidate collects signatures to fight new rules to keep minor parties off the
ballot” http://www.cagreens.org/press-release/140218
Wikipedia
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jerry_Brown
Biographical Directory of the United States Congress
http://bioguide.congress.gov/scripts/biodisplay.pl?index=P000197
http://bioguide.congress.gov/scripts/biodisplay.pl?index=F000062
http://bioguide.congress.gov/scripts/biodisplay.pl?index=L000551
http://bioguide.congress.gov/scripts/biodisplay.pl?index=W000187
The Onion “Plan to Split
California into 3 States Earns Spot on November Ballot” June 29, 2018 https://www.theonion.com/plan-to-split-california-into-3-states-earns-spot-on-no-1827236296
Los Angeles Times July 9, 2018 “Environmental
group files lawsuit to block California's split-the-state measure from November
ballot” by John Myers http://www.latimes.com/politics/essential/la-pol-ca-essential-politics-may-2018-environmental-group-files-lawsuit-to-1531180698-htmlstory.html
KTLA July 10, 2018 https://ktla.com/2018/07/10/lawsuit-seeks-to-block-prop-9-initiative-that-would-divide-california-into-3-states-from-november-ballot
Sacramento, California-based Planning
and Conservation League lobby’s self description: a group that works “closely
with Legislators to promote environmental legislation that protects and
improves the California environment, making California a better place to live.”
http://www.pcl.org/about/
Insight Beyond Today’s News, CLB – © All Rights
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