Thread: The Once 'Golden State' Is Badly Tarnished "Golden State" could become a failed state

The Once 'Golden State' Is Badly Tarnished

Given the current business environment and policies on crime, homelessness, and illegal entry that are likely to continue, the once "Golden State" could become a failed state in short order if left unchecked.

By Janet Levy

With crime soaring, rampant homelessness, sanctuary state status attracting the highest illegal immigrant population in the country and its “worst state in the U.S. to do business” ranking for more than a decade, California and its expansive, debt-ridden, progressive government is devolving into a third-world country. In cities such as San Francisco, public defecation is legal, drug use is flagrant, and tent cities are designated biohazards. In once pristine San Diego, contractors have been spraying down homeless encampments with household bleach to stave off a hepatitis A epidemic. The so-called “Golden State,” which now has the highest poverty rate in the nation, is tarnished beyond recognition with such serious problems that the sublime climate and striking coastline may no longer be enough to sustain its reputation and cachet. With laws that benefit criminals and illegals, big government that endeavors to control every aspect of residents’ lives from plastic bags to straws; sanctioned street, tent, and vehicle dwelling; and an unaffordable overhyped bullet train boondoggle that will cost taxpayers almost $100 billion, California is headed for economic disaster.
Rising Crime
In the past few years, California has instituted criminal justice reform legislation and initiatives, ostensibly to reduce budget expenditures and prison overcrowding, which has led invariably to the release of more criminals into the state’s population.

• Proposition 47, a referendum passed in 2014, reclassified certain drug possession felonies to misdemeanors and required misdemeanor sentencing for theft when the amount involved is $950 or less. Drug possession for personal use is now considered a misdemeanor.
• Proposition 57, a statewide ballot proposition passed in 2016, changed parole policies for those convicted of nonviolent felonies. But the proposition failed to define “nonviolent crimes”. The result was that those committing “nonviolent” crimes such as rape of an unconscious or intoxicated person, assault of a police office, domestic violence, hostage taking, drive-by shootings, and human trafficking of a child became eligible for early parole based on a paper review in lieu of a parole hearing.
• Assembly Bill 1448 and Assembly Bill 1308 allow for the early release of prisoners who are 60 years or older who have served at least 25 years of their sentence and prisoners who committed crimes at least 25 years or younger who have served at least 15 years, respectively. Both were signed into law by Governor Jerry Brown in 2017.
• In June this year, Gov. Brown signed into law AB 1810, that gives defendants a chance to have their charges dismissed and evidence of their arrest erased from the record if they can convince a judge that they suffer from a treatable mental disorder. Such defendants could be offered a pretrial diversion of two years to undergo mental health treatment.

As may have been expected with lenient policies, violent crime and property crime rates in the state increased and will mostly likely soar in the aftermath of some of the newly implemented measures. An FBI study of crime rates from 2014 to 2015 found that 48 California cities saw overall increases with 24 experiencing increases in the double digits for property crime, an increase directly attributable to Prop. 47, according to Marc Debbaudt, past president of the Association of Los Angeles Deputy District Attorneys.
Homelessness
As of 2017, California had a homeless population of over 134,000, or one quarter of the nation’s homeless. UCLA researcher William Yu noted that 26% of California’s homeless are severely mentally ill, 18% are chronic drug abusers, 9% are veterans and 24% are victims of domestic abuse. Orange County Supervisor, Tod Spitzer attributes much of the problem to legislation signed by Governor Jerry Brown over the past few years that markedly decreased the penalties for drug use, possession, and petty crimes, thereby reducing arrests and eliminating mandatory treatment for drug abuse and mental health treatment.
Where other states have successfully instituted welfare-to-work programs, California’s liberal government has resisted pro-work reforms and retained a system of cash disbursements with no strings attached. This has led to a state bureaucracy that continues to grow and expand its budget, staffing, and client base. Inordinately high housing prices, somewhat driven by restrictive land use and environmental regulations, have exacerbated the problem.
Civil rights organizations such as the ACLU have made the homelessness issue a difficult one to tackle. In 2003, the ACLU filed a lawsuit, Jones v. City of Los Angeles, on behalf of homeless people who were ticketed and arrested for sleeping on public sidewalks at night. In 2006, the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled on the lawsuit by striking down the Los Angeles ordinance that made it a crime for homeless people to sleep on the streets when no shelter is available. Not only is it permissible to pitch a tent in many areas in the state but also vehicle dwelling is allowed in Los Angeles residential areas from 6:00 a.m. to 9 p.m. and in business and industrial areas from 9:00 p.m. to 6:00 a.m.
Illegal Immigration
California, a sanctuary state, is home to at least 4 million illegal immigrants and their children. National Economics Editorial, a website that covers economic issues, has estimated that those in the state illegally contribute $3.5 billion in taxes while costing California approximately $30.3 billion annually, or 17.7% of the state budget. According to the Migration Policy Institute (MPI), more than half are unskilled, uneducated, and lack English proficiency.
Services to illegals include welfare, food stamps, meal programs, free immunizations, low-cost housing and in-state tuition rates. In addition, children of illegals make up 18% of the public-school population, straining the already burdened school system by increasing student-to-teacher ratios and by impeding the learning process with supplemental, English-language instruction.
Unchecked illegal immigration comes with a marked increase in crime rates. Those who have broken the law to come to the United States are overrepresented in murder charges, drug trafficking, and gang violence. Increased policing, court, and incarceration costs put additional strain on the justice syste. In 2014, the U.S. Department of Justice and U.S. Sentencing Commission reported that illegal immigrants committed over 13% of all U.S. crime, and a particularly high level of violent and drug-related crimes, according to criminologist and law enforcement expert Ron Martinelli. A substantial illegal immigrant population coupled with a policy signed by Governor Jerry Brown in 2014 that protects criminal illegal immigrants by reducing their sentences to fall below federal standards for deportation further aggravates the problem. This, at a time when 59% of Californians want to increase deportations of illegals.
In a measure that would add to costs and incentivize illegal entry, California gubernatorial candidate, Gavin Newsom, plans to issue an Executive Order to grant universal healthcare, if elected. Former governor Pete Wilson warns that a system that removes all market-based competition could produce annual budget shortfalls of $40 billion, add six million illegals to the healthcare rolls, encourage medical tourism, and restrict the range of care and increase waiting times for California citizens. The resulting elimination of competitive private sector health care options would mean that more businesses and sources of tax revenue will leave the state.
Poor Business Climate
In 2014, Chief Executive magazine quoted CEO comments like “California goes out of its way to be anti-business,” “California continues to lead in disincentives for growth businesses to stay,” and “The regulatory, tax and political environment are crushing.” California’s reputation as the worst state to do business has a lot to do with its high tax rates. In addition to having the highest state income tax in the nation, it has the highest sales tax rate, the 9^th highest corporate income tax rate, one of the highest property tax rates and the highest gasoline tax rate. Yet, with a shortfall of $612 billion when future pensions, bond repayments and other debts are added to the budget shortfall, the state is drowning in debt, more than twice as much debt as any other state. In addition, the cost of living is 36% higher than the national rate, and, at 23.4%, California has the highest poverty rate in the nation, according to former California Assemblyman Steve Baldwin.
California, a world leader in technology, entertainment, agriculture, and a past global trendsetter in culture and innovation, has been dominated for decades by a government made up of far-left ideologues. These so-called "progressives" have supported an ever-growing and onerous regulatory climate that effectively redistributes wealth by adding to an already burdensome rate of taxation and expanding entitlement programs. Given the current business environment and policies on crime, homelessness, and illegal entry that are likely to continue, the once “Golden State” could become a failed state in short order if left unchecked. In the words of Steve Baldwin, “A state cannot chase away the producers and attract the takers year after year without economic consequences.”

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The Once 'Golden State' Is Badly Tarnished

California, this is so hard to say, it really is, but someone needs to say it. You already are a failed state. You are a state that brags about growing more food that any other state in the country yet you can't feed your own citizens and residents or even produce all that food without breaking US immigration law. You don't have enough water for the size of your population, you have to import it from other states. You also brag about being the 5th or 6th largest economy in the world, yet you're the largest user of federal welfare and poverty programs in the country and your seaports are controlled by the Communist Chinese. You boast of all those high-tech industries and brain tanks, yet you can't figure out how to build homes that won't slide into the sea when it rains or how to protect your beautiful forests from wildfires that need federal assistance to put out. And on top of all that, some of you want to "secede" from the nation you couldn't survive one day without.

I love California and I love Californians. I think about your ancestors, the Pioneers of All Pioneers, who pushed West until there was no land left to push across. The Americans who settled California were the toughest, the smartest and the luckiest Americans. Thousands didn't make it and died along the way. But for those who made it, what a beautiful reward they found and deserved. My ancestors stopped in the Midwest. But yours, they pushed on, risked everything and endured so much hardship getting there.

It's time to fix your state, don't you think? Time to remedy these strange ironies I discuss above? Time to get straight and solve these inequities? I think so. You can do it, you all can do anything you set your minds to. It's in your blood, it's in your genes, you can fix this.

FIX YOUR STATE! VOTE REPUBLICAN IN 2018!!!!

California’s poverty rate is still the highest in the nation, despite state efforts

By Michael Finch
mfinch@sacbee.com
September 12, 2018 11:41 AM

Newly released federal estimates show California’s poverty rate remained the highest in the nation, despite a modest fall, and the state’s falling uninsured rate slowed for the first time since before Medicaid expansion.
According to the Census Bureau, the share of Californians in poverty fell to 19 percent — a 1.4 percent decrease from last year. However, policy experts warned that in spite of the good news more than 7 million people still struggle to get by in the state.
The poverty figures released Wednesday are said to paint the best picture of life for California’s working poor since it encompasses income from government programs and factors in the high cost of living in some corners of the state.
Although California has a vigorous economy and a number of safety net programs to aid needy residents, it’s often not enough to forestall economic hardship for one out of every five residents, the data show.

The high cost of living, primarily in housing, is a strong counterweight to many of the state’s efforts, said Caroline Danielson, policy director at the Public Policy Institute of California.
“We do have a housing crisis in many parts of the state and our poverty rate is highest in Los Angeles County,” she said, adding that cost of living and poverty is often highest in the state’s coastal counties. “When you factor that in we struggle.”
The portion of uninsured residents dropped from 7.3 percent to 7.2 percent. The one-tenth of a point decrease was a significantly smaller decline than the last four years.
California, like many states, expanded Medicaid after the passage of the Affordable Care Act. The law has come under attack by the Trump Administration in the last year — a fact some blame for the state’s slowed progress.
Scott Graves, director of research with the California Policy and Budget Center, said the tumult over the health law and multiple attempts to repeal it carry most of the blame for the state’s slowing improvement.
“We saw this huge cloud of uncertainty descend over the Affordable Care Act and Medicaid last year,” Graves said, adding that the multiple attempts to undermine the law likely discouraged people from signing up.
“We’re definitely seeing some of those federal headwinds showing up in the data here in California to the extent that our uninsured rate, which has come down several years in a row — in 2017 it sort of stalled out.”
Since 2013, the share of Californians who are uninsured fell by 10 percentage points. The only other state to see remotely similar growth was New Mexico, according to a Census report.

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“From our standpoint this represents a historic low. It’s only a small kick down from where we were a year ago but it does represent a new historic low in California,” said James Scullary, a spokesperson for Covered California. “California has experienced the largest decrease in uninsured than any state in the nation.”

https://www.sacbee.com/news/local/he...218270905.html

The federal poverty rate is 12.7%

At 19%, the state of California's poverty rate is almost 50% higher than the national rate.

How is that possible? How is it possible that a state with all the blessings, resources and talent of California have almost 1/5 of its population living below the poverty line? That's 1 out of every 5 people in your state. How is that possible?

It's time to fix your state. Seriously. Federal taxpayers can't afford to underwrite this, and furthermore, we don't want to underwrite this. The federal poverty rate is too high as it is, it should be much much lower and with enough years of Trump, we will see those numbers go down due to the many things he's doing to fix our economy. Not everything he has done has had time to create all the jobs and raise wages because that takes quite a lead time, but it's begun. So California needs to grab the brass ring this offers you, run with it and make the most of it. All states need to do this and do it quickly. Time is of the essence.