August 3, 2009

California v. Texas

Ross Douthat follows up my old California v. Texas theme in the NY Times.

The key point that he leaves unsaid is that you can afford a huge Hispanic population a lot more easily in a conservative state than in a liberal one. But, can you stay a conservative state once you have a huge number of Hispanic voters?

My published articles are archived at iSteve.com -- Steve Sailer

40 comments:

Anonymous said...

You are in an elite group of thought criminals who the elites like to read.

Douthat and Brooks also like to crib material from Charles Murray.

So consider it something of a privilege to have your ideas stolen.

Anonymous said...

I saw Ross Douthat on Charlie Rose last week. One point of interest is that he said Republicans need to get between 35 and 40% of Hispanic votes and Bush did get that, part of Bush's success was due to the housing bubble.

Unfortunately, the comment was not followed up.

Steve C

outlaw josey wales said...

I think he needs to read your analysis more closely. Isn't yours concerned with land use (and Hispanics)? He seems to willfully ignore the many reasons that California is in the state it's in (i.e. Prop 13, 2/3 majority for a budget, etc.)

So how come you're in California, anyway? Why don't you live in Texas?

Also, NYT has a new article about education and Bloomberg. Perhaps you can comment. Maybe this can be a Gates-free week.

PRCalDude said...

Since you and I are both Californians, Steve, we know the answer to that, don't we?

Dutch Boy said...

California was not so liberal before the Mexican invasion. Millions of conservative white people have left the state and been replaced with a state-dependent Mexican (and other) population.

Anonymous said...

I saw Ross Douthat on Charlie Rose last week. One point of interest is that he said Republicans need to get between 35 and 40% of Hispanic votes



Of course the only reason why Republicans need to get between 35 and 40% of Hispanic votes is because Bush added about five million illegals and several millions legals to the Hispanic population in the US.

At some point you'd think that even Republicans would realize the flaw in this math.

testing99 said...

Outlaw -- The problem with the State of California is not Prop 13 or a two-thirds majority for a budget and raising taxes.

It's spending too much on people: mostly welfare, crap political patronage, and growing the size of the state employee payroll, and not enough on THINGS.

Things such as roads, bridges, tunnels, water treatment facilities, electrical grids, telecom grids, universities, and so on add to a state's productivity. Growing a monstrous and pork-ified political patronage budget with massive welfare outlays (California spends a lot on education, almost none of it reaches the average student in the classroom -- nearly all of it is political patronage pork) REDUCE productivity.

California is a high cost, low productivity state coasting on the revenues of a relatively thin band of Dot-com, real-estate, Hollywood, and Silicon Valley billionaires during boom times, and crashing down (like every other state in the Union) when times are bad.

Every other state has this structural problem, because the incentives to build a patronage network are nearly irresistible. However, California is the worst off because it's amplitude of boom-bust is magnified by the humungous amounts of wealth generated in boom times by just a few, and destroyed during busts.

Anonymous said...

He seems to willfully ignore the many reasons that California is in the state it's in (i.e. Prop 13, 2/3 majority for a budget, etc.)



You are doing some willful ignoring yourself, if you think that those are the reasons for California's problems.

can't believe my eyes said...

California is a high cost, low productivity state coasting on the revenues of a relatively thin band of Dot-com, real-estate, Hollywood, and Silicon Valley billionaires during boom times"

California "low productivity?" Practically all the produce and domestic wines grown in this country and shipped to other states appear to be grown in California. They grow almost all the commercial almonds and atichokes, just to name items offhand. I'm always hearing of crops whose prime producer, indeed only producer sometimes, is California.

testing99 said...

Cant -- Agriculture is being driven from California over ... yep SWPL Water politics. Mainly the Delta Smelt, which has put much of the San Joaquin Valley into what amounts to desertification. Including wine (there goes the surplus production that created Charles Shaw aka "Two Buck Chuck" for Trader Joes) and raisins and almonds and a lot of other crops.

This is because the politics are that SWPL coastal yuppies don't like Agriculture and want it gone. For the "good of the environment." There is almost no manufacturing left in LA County now, and hardly any in SoCal. What amounted to business in the Inland Empire was mostly, warehouses.

Manufacturing runs afoul of the Air Quality Board, office buildings in LA are capped at power usage and efficiency, there are myriad niggling details to which make up California along with New York and New Jersey as one of the worst places to do business. Which leads to a lot of under-the-table Craigslist personal services (no accident it was created here) and big-capital firms like Hollywood and Silicon Valley (which does design and prototyping only -- manufacturing is done in China).
------------
FWIW, McCain said he will vote no on Sotomayor. He must be scared -- his phone must off the hook and with constituents mad as hell and he's looking for the exits.

Cat Patrol said...

The wife and I spent this last weekend at the "garment district" in downtown LA. It looked very much to me like the side street bazaars of Tijuana Mexico.

Since when does importing poverty make a nation rich?

A few years ago, Bear Stearns did a study that claimed that up to 30% of all workers in LA county were being paid with cash, under the table. I'll bet most of them are also getting WIC, food stamps, section 8, Medi-Cal, and all the other welfare freebies, since, supposedly they show no income.

Anonymous said...

I am all for ending Mexican immigration tomorrow. However, let's not forget who originally brought this mess onto us: the cheap labor lobby which consists of white businessmen.

Steve, the enemy runs the GOP as it does the Democratic Party. Why are you always trying to give them advice? George W. Bush, Karl Rove, etc. are the scum of the Earth. The right needs a new party.

anony-mouse said...

If California is such a hellzone, and doomed to stay that way, why does Steve and lots of his commenters live there?

"... and such small portions.'

Anonymous said...

"Practically all the produce and domestic wines grown in this country and shipped to other states appear to be grown in California. They grow almost all the commercial almonds and atichokes, just to name items offhand. I'm always hearing of crops whose prime producer, indeed only producer sometimes, is California."

Almonds and Artichokes -- the staple diet of all Americans! Are you trying to give California a down-home Midwestern patina? This is why California needs to be broken into two or three states in order to be rational -- the artichoke 'industry' is not supplying welfare for greater Los Angeles.

Kurika said...

Sockstand - I doubt that is the point, but, like Portuguese and Latin I have to thanks your words. I even remember to see a American movie about the Discoverie (of America)where the Spaniards have already Indian blood...And the disease is spreading; few time ago I saw a newspaper reporting street fights(in Madrid) between Spaniards and Latins... If South-americans are Latins, why Blacks are not Anglo-Saxons? And since I born in Africa, I also can state that they are what we call Mulatos, not Blacks(Negros).
Greetings!

Mr. Anon said...

"outlaw josey wales said...

He seems to willfully ignore the many reasons that California is in the state it's in (i.e. Prop 13, 2/3 majority for a budget, etc.)"

Prop 13!? Why not blame the repeal of the stamp-tax? California's problems are not due to it's citizens being taxed too little. Prop 13 indeed!

"So how come you're in California, anyway? Why don't you live in Texas?"

I've tried to explain this to southerners (for example) numerous times to no avail. The weather is nice. Not just nice.....perfect.

People in the southeast will spend nearly every waking minute of the day between May and September cursing the infernal heat and stickiness, and then from November to February cursing the damp bone-penetrating chill, and yet still not understand why someone might want to live somewhere where you could get by with just a windbreaker and no A/C.

William1066 said...

At some point you'd think that even Republicans would realize the flaw in this math.

Old joke - stop me if you've heard it.

Political adviser to George Bush:

Mr. President, you can't keep letting illegal immigrants enter the country - they usually end up voting Democrat. Your party is losing market share with every new Hispanic.

George Bush: Yes, but we make it up on volume. rim shot.

Anonymous said...

"Steve, the enemy runs the GOP as it does the Democratic Party. Why are you always trying to give them advice? George W. Bush, Karl Rove, etc. are the scum of the Earth."

Don't worry, it's lost on them.

Anonymous said...

"I've tried to explain this to southerners (for example) numerous times to no avail. The weather is nice. Not just nice.....perfect."

Yep, the thing is humidity. Temperatures in other parts of the US are similar to Southern California but there are no other places with a nice temperature AND low humidity.

not anonymous said...

California dominates in agriculture, technology, defense, education, research, entertainment, energy, natural beauty, etc. finance is pretty much the only area in which it is not a leader.

Anonymous said...

Steve, the enemy runs the GOP as it does the Democratic Party. Why are you always trying to give them advice? George W. Bush, Karl Rove, etc. are the scum of the Earth.

I would contend that it was more of a literary device employed by Steve rather than a real attempt at guidence.

Agreed about the scum of the earth btw.

Schwinn said...

California can get away with nazi behavior because everyone with money or the hope of ever having it wants to live in it. The ecumene of the state is a strip from San Diego to Sacramento and 30-40 miles inland, that's a small strip. The weather is great, and despite the tax and enviro crap and high real estate there are jobs-skilled people can always find work, unlike the Midwest or Deep South where the lack of high specialization, aerospace, Hollywood, etc means it's min wage for non-professionals. Beleive me, there's more juice to be squeezed yet. Look at New Jersey...

Fred said...

New Jersey is the most densely populated state in America. Why do so many people want to live there, with its high taxes and regulations? Because of the weather (humid summers, freezing winters, with two or three pleasant months a year)?

lurker said...

High IQ people desire to be around other high IQ people which is why people move to New Jersey. Sure you can raise a family much more cheaply elsewhere but then you'd be surrounded by proles.

Truth said...

"... and such small portions.'"

Quite possibly the greatest moment in Woody Allen's career; and I like Woody.

Kevin B said...

The law of unintended consequences, utterly unpredictable, yet completely dependable, is what will save California.

We live in one of the few Mediterranean climate zones of the world. Every other Med locality has sky high real-estate values and is essentially too pricey for the poor to live in. Southern California is a holdout to the model because of different vectors that have acted on population growth: massive utility projects meant cheap water and electricity, the displacement of wealthy conservative WASPs who built the those projects with wealthy liberal Jews who put a halt to further investments, the ground zero cultural upheaval of the sixties (and all its spin-offs), proximity to Mexico and absolutely filthy air for decades that drove as many people away from the region as did the collapse of aerospace.

The air is now cleaner, the border with Mexico--hardening, the water and power more expensive, the mid-range jobs fewer, the welfare state is collapsing and the land values here are, even with the meltdown, still very high compared to the rest of the country. And we keep legislatively sequestering scarce private land for state parks and other statist purposes, while refusing to build new power and water facilities for the growing cities.

Progressives predict with a twisted grim satisfaction that Los Angeles will turn into Rio. Ghettos of high rises, slums and right next door, the walled in rich. Perhaps. But the land in our thin coastal strip is too valuable to accede to such low returns.

I think climate gravity will do a population reshuffle, forcing NAMs into the desert and beyond, perhaps into Bush's Texas, that is if we don't explode in an orgy of multicultural violence first.

Anonymous said...

But the dominant traditions won't be white European ones.


I won't consider homosexuality as a dominant tradition of the Europeans. It's more like it was forced upon us. Liberals don't consider the endgame; if they would they would stop denigrating conservatism and Christianity. For them it's just about trashing conservatives and traditionalists. It's like a lot of the liberals in South Africa who were screaming for and agitating for black rule, only to get onto the next planes out to Australia, Canada, Britain and the US once Mandela took over. Some of those stories are just hilarious in their hypocrisy.

Dennis said...

"New Jersey is the most densely populated state in America. Why do so many people want to live there, with its high taxes and regulations? Because of the weather (humid summers, freezing winters, with two or three pleasant months a year)?"

Some people like having four seasons. They can enjoy NJ's beaches in the summer, it's parks in the spring and fall, and ride a sled down a hill in the winter. Plus, NJ has some of the best schools in the country, great restaurants of every conceivable type, proximity to New York City, and high-paying jobs available in the pharmaceutical industry, finance, technology, etc.

John Seiler said...

It depends what you mean by "conservative." The fiscal matters are taking care of themselves, as the revenue collapse is bringing massive budget cuts. Latinos and blacks oppose same-sex "marriage" (an absurdity) more than Anglos. Leftist Cardinal Roger "Pervert Coddler" Mahony's replacement could be a tough Latino who challenges the pro-abort views of Latino legislators.

The next gov likely will be Jerry Brown redux. He's a screwball, Democratic machine politician who's unpredictable, and now in his 70s, with his head in the '70s.

California is less and less Republican. But it might develop liberal and conservative wings of the Demo party, like the Old South before the 1970s.

harkin said...

Douthat sure is a puzzle. He gently treads on progressive ideas, hoping (I guess) not to end up like W Kristol.

His points on LBJ/medicare and CA/greenhouse don't really seem to make sense, I doubt either knew what sort of economic peak they were riding.

And this line:

"Obama is still broadly popular, and the public is still broadly sympathetic to his administration’s agenda."

seems to less and less true by the week.

C'mon Ross. The Times gig can't be that precious.

However, his link to Kotkin's piece made the entire column worth reading.

Anonymous said...

In breaking news, LiveScience.com discovered a solution to many of the problems Steve raises: urban crowding, high real estate costs, excessive welfare government, crowded schools, yada, yada:

Save the Planet: Have Fewer Kids

Anonymous said...

Almonds and Artichokes -- the staple diet of all Americans! Are you trying to give California a down-home Midwestern patina? "

oforcryingoutloud. They were just two examples. There are quite a few other fruits, nuts (not the human kind), legumes, various food oil crops, grains, wines, etc. And almonds are extremely important and will become more so as the alternative health movement accelerates--almonds in various forms play a big part. There are many crops--fruits, vegetables, grains, even oils, that come from California. You don't know this?

El Gringo said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Anonymous said...

let's not forget who originally brought this mess onto us: the cheap labor lobby which consists of white businessmen.



I'm pretty sure that nobody at this blog has forgotten it.

Anonymous said...

Currently in Texas, a state senator is promoting a mandate to cap state taxes, expenditures at the rate of population growth plus inflation. The overall point is to freeze the size of gov't. This is a reaction to the expanding % of GDP of the national gov't and the failure of states like California and New York.

As for Hispanics in Texas, many really are Spanish and have been here over a hundred years, some for over two hundred years. They are significantly different from new immigrants who come from the lowest echelon of society. The bottom in the US is still higher than the bottom in Mexico and Latin America. Texas aims to be as stingy as the fed gov't will allow with its welfare and medicaid. This de facto makes people work or leave.

Noteworthy is how Hispanics in Texas perform better on standardized tests than they do in other states.

Also, gangsta's prefer other states because Texas executes more people than any other state, and its prisons have some of the highest homicide rates as well as high attempted homicide rates. As one warden once put it to a reporter, "Hey, not everyone is a professional killer." Basically lamenting that so many prisoner on prisoner homicide attempts were unsuccessful, without actually coming out and saying so.

Anonymous said...

In breaking news, LiveScience.com discovered a solution to many of the problems Steve raises: urban crowding, high real estate costs, excessive welfare government, crowded schools, yada, yada:

Save the Planet: Have Fewer Kids

_______________


Alternatively could have been called

"Liberal Cultural Suicide Pact"


Ah, for the good old days when we lived in huts and died of opportunistic disease.

silly girl said...

California "low productivity?" Practically all the produce and domestic wines grown in this country and shipped to other states appear to be grown in California. They grow almost all the commercial almonds and atichokes, just to name items offhand. I'm always hearing of crops whose prime producer, indeed only producer sometimes, is California.

-----------

You got that right.

Unfortunately the fed gov't is turning the water off on farmers there. As if the state isn't crippled enough with insane regulation.

http://newsbusters.org/blogs/brad-wilmouth/2009/03/31/abc-judge-cuts-water-california-farmers-save-endangered-fish

If we love imported oil, how about imported food?

corvinus said...

As for Hispanics in Texas, many really are Spanish and have been here over a hundred years, some for over two hundred years. They are significantly different from new immigrants who come from the lowest echelon of society.

In the 2000 Census, 40% of the Hispanics in California called themselves "white" (4.35 mln out of 10.97 mln). The same figure for Texas was 58% (3.87 mln out of 6.67 mln). Many Texas "Hispanics" undoubtedly speak in a Texas drawl, wear cowboy boots, hate Obama and love guns, and just incidentally happen to have a Spanish surname.

db99 said...

Actually,the Economist recently ran a "California vs. Texas" story that DID make that point.

Jun said...

Who Killed California?