1) Illegal Immigration – When one looks to identity the presupposed cause and effect of the many volatile issues affecting the Golden State one needs look no further than illegal immigration. From escalating income and sales taxes ranking the highest in the nation in order to subsidize overcrowded yet under performing education and healthcare systems, to increasing crime and homeless rates that are rapidly placing it on par with violent crime-ridden urban cities like Chicago and Detroit, illegal immigration virtually feeds every detrimental issue facing Californians today in one way or another.
Governor Jerry Brown designating California as a “Sanctuary State” in spite of all the evidence “Sanctuary Cities” like San Francisco contribute disproportionately to all the issues mentioned above clearly indicts those elected to public office who have purposely chosen to disregard their oaths to “defend and protect the Constitution” and the rule of law.
California currently has between 2.3 – 2.6 million undocumented illegals. Over 1 million of them have obtained driver licenses. This has fueled not only higher insurance rates due to accidents involving uninsured drivers but other important issues like voter fraud created with driver license applicants being offered to register to vote, an issue politician’s deny but have been documented in districts throughout California that show over 100% of its residents registered to vote.
Gerrymandering has resulted in a progressive super-majority that panders to the illegal population rather than those who elected them, creating a special interest lobby second in influence only to unions. Combined with voter fraud, an unconstitutional voting block has propelled a few of these politicians into seats in the U.S. House of Representatives and the U.S. Senate. Senator Kamala Harris who has directly benefited from being an open advocate of illegal immigration during her stint as California’s Attorney General is currently being considered to run for President.
The solution to this problem is not at all complicated. We need elected representatives that place those who reside legally within their respective constituencies at the top of their priority list rather than those in both major parties who profit through the constant influx of illegals, whether it is for influence that affects voting demographics for collective social engineering legislation or cheap labor that hiring someone who will work for virtually nothing affords. These officials simply need to honor their oath to “…protect and defend the Constitution of the United States” as well as those laws already on the books to prevent illegal entrance into our Republic.
This can only happen through a valid, honest, hardworking third party like the Conservative Party USA. To quote Gavin Newsom, one of California’s most recognized progressive darlings: “As California goes so goes the nation.” By correcting the ill-fated course California is currently traversing by restoring the principles and values of those like Ronald Reagan we can once again become, “The Golden State” and lead the way to restoring our Republic as “One Nation Under God.”
2) Economy – California currently boasts at being the world’s fifth largest economy just ahead of the United Kingdom. The sheer size of California’s population (40 million to date) lends somewhat to this statistic but a closer look at the numbers reveals some very troubling trends that left unattended will bring an eventual implosion of the economy, first here then the nation and world.
Once known as an agricultural oasis, taxes and regulations that place politically expedient environmental causes over food production as well as ever increasing high costs for water (farming uses 41% of all California’s water reserves) have reduced farming to such a degree it is the only economic sector that has not gained in contributing to the state’s GDP. In fact it has shrunk. To counter the excessive cost of water, many cities and districts now bill residents living outside the farming community with multi-tiered fees that penalize homeowners for using water above government allowed levels.
Financial services and real estate are the main contributors to economic growth with manufacturing taking up the rear of California’s GDP profile. Financial services deal primarily with loans and real estate, the reason for the loans. The sub-prime lending scandal that brought about the recession of 2008 and ushered Obama into the White House when his opponent, John McCain refused to recognize the problem, hit California harder than any other state. Housing appraisals ballooned out of control and when it burst large swaths of homes in neighborhoods became ghost towns when people could not pay the inflated interest rates attached to the many refinancing schemes that drove the scandal. At present the same pattern that happened in 2008 is trending in the same direction threatening to result eventually into another housing meltdown.
Taxes are draining the pocketbooks of Californians those living here legally, all but negating the level of prosperity politicians in this state like to brag about. The sales tax in California is the highest in the nation, averaging between 8.75 – 9%. State income tax is a whopping 13.3%. In 2017 it was determined Californians were paying just under 59% in combined sales, state excise and federal taxes for every dollar spent at the gas pump. The recent 20 cent gas tax (called a “carbon tax”) implemented by Governor Jerry Brown in 2018 has inflated the tax on gasoline in California to just under 79% on every dollar, placing California as the #1 cash cow for Federal and state tax revenue.
Regulations are also depleting the bottom line of business and citizens. The “environmental handprints” of climate change lobbyists that control the campaign chests of legislators in a progressive super-majority are everywhere as well as social justice activists that have discovered there is much money to be made in the “equality” business. For instance, employers in California are now prohibited from asking about an applicant’s past salary history or questions regarding any criminal past for any position not covered by rules for State, Federal or local Law. Add to that the movement to require a $15 dollar minimum wage and it is easy to see that the cost of living in California negates the benefits of a robust economy.
The solution to these issues is again, quiet simple but not easy. There needs to be balanced budget amendments that are enforced once they have served the political expediency of passing them. Democrat State Controller John Chiang tried to withhold legislator’s pay under the State Constitution in 2011 when he determined the budget submitted by State legislators was not legal under the State Constitution or justifiable. Legislators countered his actions by passing laws that prevented him from operating under Constitutional mandates while protecting their pay checks.
There needs to be a more transparent accounting of funds. Bond measures are used to hypothetically balance books or to give the appearance of a revenue surplus when in fact these bonds are future projections and often end up legislatively being used where they were not originally intended, usually around election time when incumbents like to brag about the condition of the state’s books.
Taxes need to be reduced where excessive and eliminated where they are not contributing directly to infrastructure. And regulations need to be more concerned with the bottom line of businesses rather than protecting a field mouse in a Sacramento desert.
The only realistic solution is to return to conservative values and tenets that mandate prudence, integrity and transparency as the way to once again make California the “Golden State”. Such reforms could not only move California to the top of the world economy rather than 5th place but significantly put more of what Californians earn in their bank accounts, rather than the pockets of those elected to serve them.
3) Education – President Ronald Reagan is credited with saying, “Freedom is a fragile thing and is never more than one generation away from extinction. It is not ours by inheritance; it must be fought for and defended constantly by each generation, for it comes only once to a people. Those who have known freedom and then lost it have never known it again.” President Abraham Lincoln stated it much simpler, “The philosophy of the school room in one generation will be the philosophy of government in the next.” Vladimir Lenin acknowledged his own deviant purpose for the value of education when he stated, “Give me just one generation of youth, and I’ll transform the whole world.”
Progressive messiah Barack Hussein Obama, a self-avowed Marxist before masking himself as a pragmatic centralist when he decided to run for our Republic’s highest elected office fully embraced Lenin’s proclamation as a cornerstone of his desire to “…fundamentally transform the United States of America.” Obama went to great lengths to persuade younger voters to vote for him through social media platforms like Facebook, cable outlets like “The Daily Show” and the late night talk show circuit after the departure of hosts like Jay Leno and David Letterman who kept political discourse pretty much within the confines of light, airy monologues.
Obama’s campaign and subsequent actions took advantage of a previously largely ignored demographic virtually transforming the college crowd into its own influential special interest group. Obama often echoed Lenin’s desire to influence youth by saying such things as, “We are the ones we’ve been waiting for.”
The youth of today have bought the lie and are following the Pied Piper to the brink of disaster in larger numbers than perhaps ever before. The issues that lure them to the polls are indicative of an education system that has for too long chummed the adolescent population like shark infested waters by the likes of Barack Obama through the use of federal tax dollars that advance social engineering platforms and subsequent legislation that follows the money at state levels.
Offering such promises as future loan free education or erasing student debt in exchange for serving the state after graduation, leftist globalists that occupy government seats have methodically implemented Lenin’s paradigm, having gone from educating to indoctrinating. By introducing social justice issues as curriculum electives rather than educational elements that advance a student’s ability to think and reason in a real world environment the purpose and value of education has all but been destroyed, reduced to creating political pawns for collective entities. Obama was more than instrumental in creating voices of dissent that can be manipulated at will in support of any and all collective paradigms and narratives progressive activists seek to advance.
The list of specific issues regarding public education in California is as long as it is deep in deception as to its intent and purpose. But there are specific issues more dangerous then others, not only to California in particular but our Republic as a whole. Among them:
Common Core is a deceptively marketed political strategy to remove individual critical thinking and replace it with collective conformity. Standardized curriculums to date have not been published but rather “objectives” have been mandated by Federal bureaucrats. Subjects are designed to “dumb down” a student’s test score (think studying to the test rather than studying to retain subject material). This produces a false “graduation rate” since eventually everyone passes the test because the test keeps being administered until the student passes with each test relatively easier than the one before it. The central idea is to pander to the student’s self-esteem rather than challenge the student to improve their retention, the goal being to make them feel “accepted” rather than self-sufficient. Advocates of Common Core believe these standards should be mandated and implemented at global levels in their delusional quest for Utopia.
Teacher Unions have become nothing more than conduits that allow politicians to keep their campaign war chests full. Unions help promote the leftist agenda and in turn leftist government officials feed subsidies into the unions through contracts and legislation that hinder and/or penalize non-union businesses who leftists consider greedy capitalists. In return unions contribute member dues into their favorite politician’s war chest and the cycle starts all over again.
We see this in particular in California with the leftists seeking public office in alliance with teacher unions that want to see Proposition 13 overturned forcing corporate entities to pay more taxes under the guise of subsidizing the ever increasing cost of schools in the state. Such revenue projections are not being ascribed to their proper ledger column. They say it is “for the kids” but it’s actually to shore up union pension accounts overburdened by tenured teachers who can retire after only ten years of employment.
The solution to public education is to get government out of the classroom altogether and back into the local communities schools are supposed to serve. At the Federal level the Department of Education needs to be abolished. At the state level parents need to become more involved in the curriculum itself to ensure the subjects being taught create productive adults capable of contributing to the economy in such manner as to allow them to really achieve the American dream of financial independence and esteem that goes with it.
Only the election conservative candidates will accomplish this because only conservatives truly understand the proper place of government as ascribed in our Constitution and the necessity of maintaining its principles and intent that contribute and protect civil society from the tyrannical forces that would create subjects rather than citizens.
4) Environment – If anything depicts the end game of the progressive collective narrative Utopia can be achieved through tax dollars and regulation it is the issue of the environment. California is an environmental paradise with its mountains, lakes, deserts and ocean. Where else can you snow ski and waterski virtually the same day while enjoying colorful western sunrise over the desert and ocean view sunsets on your transit to both? Resources like agriculture, oil and natural gas powers this economic behemoth in the same way tourism qualifies the Golden State as a recreational mecca.
Environmental activists who have discovered there is mega dollars to be made by controlling every aspect of a Californian’s life, while politicians seek the sheer power attained through legislation that supports such efforts, transforming California into a collective political think tank and cash cow. Recent laws like the ban of plastic bags in retail centers, to the amount of water and electricity homes can use without being penalized through multi-tiered billing systems, to the excessive gouging of gas taxes and even talk to ban gas powered vehicles altogether under the guise of keeping the air we breathe free from carbon footprints are just a few of the latest schemes in a long list of efforts by special interest lobbyists and power hungry progressives hell bent into using California as a prototype for globalist planning.
The big word employed in this scheme to tax and regulate the lives of Californians into submission is currently known as “climate change” replacing its previous labels “pollution” and “global warming” after those terms did not adequately advance the collective agenda fast enough or did not produce profit within the projections of those who employ creative destruction as a business. Pollution was too vague in its reach limited in its perception corporations were the guilty parties and global warming proved to be a false alarm when its models were found to be in error along with record cold spells across the globe. All were fabricated under the guise of “…preservation of habitat and critical ecosystems” which makes for a nice little marketing blurb that sounds so well intended yet hides the real purpose of its agenda…control. The environment is a key element of the left’s desire to subject citizens to such plans as “Agenda 21” a globalist attempt at equalizing everyone by controlling the environment everyone lives in. Success of such an undertaking will virtually place everyone in the same socio-economic categories and subject to the State in every aspect of their lives. California, with its rich environment and large populous makes the perfect model for its eventual implementation on a global scale.
The environment certainly needs to be cared for. Pollution that destroys our beaches, water reserves and air quality can be monitored and controlled within reason without exerting undue government overreach. Legitimate research that exposes those who place profit over the health of its residents and our state can play out in the free market, driving offenders to either clean up, close down or move out of the state.
Only an intelligent and practical entourage of conservatives seated in positions of public trust can accomplish this. Only conservatives have the objective perspective necessary to reverse the damage being done to California’s citizens that reside along its coastlines, in its hills and mountains and across its valleys, plains and deserts. If anything needs to be “banned” it is those in positions of trust who in reality have only their own interest of heart, not those whom they are elected to represent.
5) Energy – In tandem with environmental concerns in California is energy. This is a two-fold issue because there are progressive entities with separate agendas for wanting to control those utilities necessary for the comfortable lifestyle those who reside in our state enjoy.
Progressive environmental activists have allied their cause with those seeking to topple the energy production/distribution conglomerates through the implementation of “creative destruction” the process of industrial mutation that incessantly revolutionizes the economic structure from within, incessantly destroying the old one, incessantly creating a new one.
Those who practice creative destruction do so not for the protection of the environment but for profit. You can recognize players in this facet of operation by such topics as “carbon footprints” along with campaigns to stop oil drilling, fracking, the use of coal or nuclear energy. A few names that are very involved with this capitalist venture are former Governors Gray Davis (recalled over market manipulation practices on electricity) and Arnold Schwarzenegger (biggest advocate and abuser of carbon footprints) and former Vice President Al Gore who has made billions of dollars advocating “green energy” while burning enough fossil fuel you would think he is a rock start on a world tour. California, with its vast energy resources are seen as competitors and have become a primary target of capitalists disguised as environmental advocates.
Then there are the hardcore environmental activists. They employ the concept of “energy conservation” as their means to an end in their continuous assault on private sector at the expense of private citizens. But as we pointed out in our section on environmentalism their objective is much more sinister. Their objective is control. The narrative put forth by “conservationists” is Americans consume too much energy and that is resulting in the acceleration of the deterioration of the earth’s O-zone layer, rising sea levels and melting icebergs. Citizens as well as industry need to be taxed and regulated into submission and even eradication if possible.
California has dealt with (and in some instances) is still dealing with manipulative narratives and legislation regarding electricity and water consumption. This has resulted in multi-tier billings for basic utilities that penalize citizens that use more resources then their neighbors. Fines for washing a driveway, watering within 48 hours after it rains, leaving a porch light on, even receiving notices the state may step in and replace home fixtures at the homeowner’s expense if use is not curtailed are now common practices in the state.
Budget proposals and bond measures are constantly being floated to voters to build water storage plants (during droughts), subsidizing solar panels, reducing the number of gas pumps while increasing the number of charging units for electric cars and of course closing down nuclear facilities.
Solutions are rather simple but would eradicate the leftist agenda of control. California possesses one of the largest coastlines in the world. Recycling plants can produce water for farm irrigation (80% of California’s water goes to farming). This same ocean water can be used to generate electricity reducing the need to build massive dams and facilities inland.
Rather than mandate solar panels in homes why not produce solar panel energy producing facilities? These can be made to look more environmentally friendly than thousands of wind mills that tower hundreds of feet into the air and have destroyed much desert skyline. Finally, rather than close nuclear plants, expand on them. They run on seawater also.
Until Californians realize they have been duped by false prophets of climate doom for power and profit California the siege being orchestrated by leftist elements will continue to transform the Golden State into a rust belt. And even then we will be forced to listen to the effects of rust in our water and in our air.
6) Corruption – When one thinks of political corruption it is not difficult to conjure up images of criminal syndicates greasing the palms of elected officials who desire power and wealth over civic duty and personal integrity. There have probably been made as many movies depicting the buying of favors, perverting our justice system through campaign contributions, outright bribery or blackmail as there have been love stories.
Based on the number of convictions resulting from federal charges of corruption, Five Thirty Eight (a website that publishes statistics and analysis on various facets of politics and industry) rates California as the second most criminally corrupt state in the Union, second only to New York and just ahead of Illinois.
Though it can be said corruption is the largest issue facing our entire Republic it is worth noting corruption in California politics is tantamount to all other issues facing our state because from corruption all the other pertinent issues flow.
Special interests not only roam the halls of the State Assembly and Senate but have a place at the table of Governor, Lt. Governor, not to mention the sitting Attorney General who has become the PC Police of the state. It is not uncommon to find business owner sitting as City Councilors who feed contracts to their personal businesses in exchange for campaign funds funneled back to officials.
California state lawmakers are the highest paid in the nation with the exception of Pennsylvania.
On the other hand there are many politicians who practice their own level of corruption absent major criminal elements in their quest to obtain wealth and power at the expense of those who have entrusted them with the safe guarding of our institutions, businesses and prosperity.
Ideology rather than public service is the driving force behind this particularly corrupt faction. Californians know all too well many of those who serve in our state’s capitol simply have used their positions to climb the ladder to Congress and even the Presidency, motivated by their delusional dream of Utopia with them at the head.
Gerrymandering has all but solidified a progressive super-majority intent on mandating everything from the amount of water we can use to the type of light bulb that illuminates our homes – not to mention sexual orientation in our schools that advocates perverse lifestyles in defiance of God and a “sanctuary state” that defy laws necessary to maintain a civil society.
But the corruption we see in local, state and national politics are only symptoms of a disease that has been much more corrupting than voter fraud and empty campaign promises by the power hungry.
The corruption that needs to be addressed is that of morality – morality defined by standards of righteous virtue premised in acknowledgement of natural law established by a Creator Who not only endowed us with unalienable rights but promises to hold us accountable for them.
The tenants of humanism have always been the rationale used to justify the means to an end. This makes it more than predictable that through politics unethical, illicit and illegal means are employed against an otherwise law-abiding society. What is politics if not the gauge of the moral fiber of a nation or people?
The whole concept of collectivism is to make everyone think, feel and believe the same in order to mandate the perimeters in which emotion, logic and reason are controlled to manipulative end. And since the morality of our Republic is declining rapidly under this onslaught of humanism it is imperative our course be reversed through the selection of God-fearing, integral citizens who understand that a nation united for the wrong cause will fall. History proves this beyond any doubt. We can no longer blame politicians for the moral dilemma facing our state and Republic. After all, we are the ones electing them.