[Bret L]

Who killed California? The Neocons.

[Patrick Cleburne]

"The liberal British newspaper The Guardian produced on Sunday Will California become America’s first failed state? Paul Harris Sunday 4 October 2009

California may be the eighth largest economy in the world, but its
state staff are being paid in IOUs, unemployment is at its highest in
70 years, and teachers are on hunger strike. So what has gone so
catastrophically wrong?

Back to the ‘70s! This was the sort of thing one got used to seeing in
foreign newspapers in the dark days between the Watergate coup d’état
and the Reagan rescue.

While colorful and fact-festooned, this article is quite useless as
piece of analysis. It has been carefully written not to offend the
fashionable Left, producing this gem:

But amid the crisis there are a few sparks of hope for the
future…. Take Anthony “Van” Jones, a man now in the vanguard of the
movement to build a future green economy, creating millions of jobs,
solving environmental problems and reducing climate change at a
stroke. It is a beguiling vision… Obama came to power and Jones got
the call from the White House. In just a few years, his ideas had
spread from the streets of Oakland to White House policy papers. Jones
was later ousted from his role, but his ideas remain…

Yes, that Van Jones (who was otherwise unidentified).

Well might thread commentator jmac43 say:

The author has “overlooked” the millions of illegal aliens that
have taken up residence in California that have bankrupted schools,
medical facilities, prisons, and social aid networks. If a person
wanted to solve California’s financial problem all they would need to
do is find the cost per illegal alien and multiply it per the number
of illegal aliens in California and the resultant figure will wipe out
the “Overpowering” debt the state is dealing with. But with the simple
answer of deporting all the illegals (President Eisenhower deported 13
million in the 1950s) the politicians are refusing to do to protect
American citizens…

The problems in California are ones made by politicians refusing
to deal with illegal aliens and not one of citizens not being taxed
enough…

While the invasion continues thousands of Americans are leaving
California each week to escape the invaders, however the ones leaving
are the responsible taxpaying workers which increases the financial
drain.

The politicians are on a slippery slope but it is one of their own
making.

Paul Harris does have the excuse that he is a foreigner needing to
make his way on the East Coast cocktail circuit.

That does not excuse the shockingly dishonest essay Who killed
California by Troy Senik, which just appeared in the “Inaugural Issue”
of National Affairs, the successor magazine to Irving Kristol’s The
Public Interest (the archive of which it carries).

A native of California, Senik

lives in Southern California, where he is writing on national
issues and working on a reform agenda to strengthen the California
Republican Party… He has referred to his views as neolibertarian,
embracing a strong foreign policy but minimal government interference
in domestic affairs

The blog Mangan’s instantly identified the problem: Neocons Ask: Who
Killed California? Saturday September 26 2009. With disdain Mangan’s
quotes:

And fiscal troubles are just the tip of the iceberg. California’s
percentage of adults without at least a high-school education is the
second-highest in the nation (and the fact that 72% of those without
diplomas are immigrants only fuels the state’s growing problem of
social stratification). The Commonwealth Fund has ranked the quality
of California’s health care lowest of the 50 states. The state has the
highest rate of criminal recidivism in the country…

and says

The (italicized) mention of immigrants above is the only place
that this issue is touched on in the entire article.

This is in over 6,000 words!

Of course, there is some good wonkery in the essay. Peter Brimelow
wearing his Worm in the Apple hat will doubtless be pleased to see
three paragraphs – 463 words – devoted to complaining about the
California Teachers Union. But significantly the extensive discussion
of the various policy-making referendums which shaped the state’s
affairs completely ignores Proposition 187, passed with 59% support in
1994 but murdered by Federal Judge Mariana Pfaelzer with the
connivance of the state’s political elite.

Proposition 187 would have had a profound impact on the state’s
illegal problem. It stipulated

1. All law enforcement agents who suspect that a person who has
been arrested is in violation of immigration laws must investigate the
detainee’s immigration status, and if they find evidence of illegality
they must report it to the attorney general of California, and to the
federal Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS).
2. Local governments are prohibited from doing anything to impair
the fulfillment of this requirement.
3. The attorney general must keep records on all such cases and
make them available to any other government entity that wishes to
inspect them.
4. No one may receive public benefits until they have proven their
legal right to reside in the country.
5. If government agents suspected anyone applying for benefits of
being illegal immigrants, the agents must report their suspicions in
writing to the appropriate enforcement authorities.
6. Emergency medical care is exempted, as required by federal law,
but all other medical benefits have the requirements stated above.
7. Primary and secondary education is explicitly included.

Prominent is marshalling stupid GOP leaders to oppose 187 was Irving
Kristol’s son, Bill. (He is a member of the National Affairs’
Publication Committee.)

Historical causation is intricate. Of course, having a Democratic
party owned by certain ethnic minorities deeply saturated in socialist
prejudices was going to be a problem. It has been in many US states.
But faced with the lethal threat of inundation by economically low
quality Hispanics, Californians reacted wisely. They were robbed of
the fruits of that wisdom by Neoconservatives, who proceeded to block
reconsideration at the State or Federal level for almost a generation.

The problem is still here – only massively worse. No wonder they don’t
want to talk about it."

http://blog.vdare.com/archives/2009/...a-the-neocons/