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Goodbye, California? Tim Draper Proposes a 6-Way Split
Daniel_Stuckey writes that venture capitalist Tim Draper has mooted a plan "to split California into six separate states, he told Tech Crunch, with Silicon Valley emerging as the richest and most powerful of all. The mockery is already pouring in. Of course a rich tech guru wants Silicon Valley to get its own government, so it can be freed from the dusty laws and regulations of California 1.0. Of course a deep undercurrent of self-aggrandizing narcissism runs through the proposal — only one other state-to-be gets an actual name, (inexplicably, 'Jefferson') and the rest are lazily affixed with topographical descriptors: West, South, Central, and North California...Yes, in shaping his doctrine, Draper has conjured the perfect blend of Seasteading's offshore tech nirvana lawlessness, boilerplate Tea Party antiestablishmentarianism, and good ol' secessionist chutzpah."
Any mention of 'Splitting up California' is just tempting fate at this point..
Of course a rich tech guru wants Silicon Valley to get its own government, so it can be freed from the dusty laws and regulations of
Replace "tech guru" with "cotton plantation owner" and suddenly it all makes sense.
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Because it's a preexisting movement: http://www.jeffersonstate.com/
The only reason it is this big is because it was established at a time when the population was MUCH lower. Were you to do the same thing in the east coast but in reverse, you might get all of new england as ONE state.
Now do you understand? California is much too big.
The government is almost indifferent to voter opinion because they can always play one part of the state off the other part. Which means they never have to do anything anyone wants. They just mommy/daddy the whole thing and then lie when that doesn't work.
Look. It needs to split because its unweldy, inherently corrupt, and incapable of serving the local needs of its residents.
Everything revolves around Sacramento which is the least consequential portion of the state BESIDES for the politics. Its our version of Washington DC. What does DC do? Tell people what to do. Does it produce anything? Nope. Does it create anything? Nope. It just collects the taxes and decides what to do with it all.
Genius ideas like our "bullet" train which as everyone knows is a giant fiasco... which we knew it would be from the start... because a bullet train in California makes about as much sense as a beach resort on the moon.
But it sounds good to the twits in Sacramento so whatever.
Look, you don't like his plan to split the state... Fine. It doesn't really matter what the plan is so long as its reasonable. We just need a more local government in california. A government that actually lives where we live and cares about us because they're ACTUALLY our neighbors. Sacramento doesn't care about San Diego. It doesn't care about the Imperial Valley. It only cares about Los Angeles because that is where most of the votes come from. But it only cares about it in so far as those votes are concerned. Etc.
Too big. Split it. Even in half isn't enough. It needs to be broken into something like three to six pieces.
I've decided to stop wasting my time responding to AC trolls/sockpuppets... so if you want a response from me... login.
There is a really small but similar sentiment in Illinois too. The people who live in rural Illinois feel like the people who live in Chicago and the suburban areas surrounding Chicago disproportionately affect Illinois politics. They feel that the state would be better without Chicago.
I can actually understand that sentiment. But the California equivalent would be Central Valley or far northern secessionists. Silicon Valley can't really make the same kind of argument, because it is already very influential in California politics. Of course, it shares that influence with Los Angeles rather than having it entirely to itself, but the Bay Area is one of the state's main political power bases.
10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10
It really should be pointed out that this guy's idea is in no way new. There has been calls for breaking up California into a number of smaller states for years. Mostly for the reason I put into my previous post. In short: having a very large population being nominally controlled by the whims of LA. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jefferson_(Pacific_state)
A split that puts Marin in a different state from SF doesn't make a lot of sense, considering how much commuting goes across the Golden Gate. The greater SF Bay Area should at least be in the same state.
10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10
number of people that would like to see the South go. They take in more federal dollars than they give while electing Representatives that campaign against receiving those dollars. They're largely the reason the rest of the Country can't have socialized medicine.
Personally I can't see abandoning them, but then again I think the point of civilization isn't to protect property but to improve the lives of everyone. That's a fundamental philosophy that a lot disagree with.
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Government doesn't want that and any forwarding thinking citizen should hate the idea too. There is no way for a single body government to effectively govern a mass of people of such diverse backgrounds and over such a diverse landscape effectively. Unless you have them do much less than they do today and let the people do for themselves again...
I've lived in a number of areas of the country. The common political element that rose above all the rest is the differences between the large cities and the rural areas. So, instead of a split by area, make each large city -- San Francisco/San Jose, Los Angeles/Hollywood -- its own state. (What to do about Sacremento? Is it a city or a condition as the State capitol?) Then City interests could be served by the City States, and the rest of the state with its agriculture base would be able to set policies and law for their own.
Other states/areas could be split the same way: Massachusetts, Illinois, Washington DC area, Michigin (peal Detroit from the rest of the State), New York/New Jersey/Connecticut...and the list goes on. We could combine small states into large states -- think Providence Rhode Island versus the rest of the State.
I'm not sure the Democrats would go for this.
It's a good idea, because California, all by itself, has the 8th largest economy in the whole world. It doesn't need the rest of America.
Maybe Oregon and Washington would like to join it, plus some of the other western states like Nevada. All together, they'd easily be the most economically powerful country on Earth, home of all the major tech industries, and free from the idiocy in Washington (DC; the state should rename itself to eliminate this association) and the east coast states, especially the South.
By George, I think you've hit on exactly the right solution! Merge all states, so that they are a single entity. That's brilliant!
Now, what could we call this entity? The Grouped Together Localities? The Aggregated Places Between Mexico and Canada? The Strongly Connected States of America?
Well, I'm sure we'll come up with something.
No comment on whether or not the state of Jefferson would ever be able to support itself without the rest of California, but Tim Draper didn't pull that particular state out of the ether. I have some parents that used to live up in North State, and the hill folk there love the idea of Jefferson.
They even have a website: http://www.jeffersonstate.com/
---- I'll take you in a Hunt deathmatch any day.
Nah California can go fuck itself. You're liberals aren't realistic and you have way too many conservatives.
Signed, Cascadia
I've often said that when times get tough, you find out what people are really like; when times are good and everyone has plenty, then it's easy to be nice, and courteous, and generous, but when times get tough, you find out who's really like that, and who's just been putting on a false face. In this case what we discover from tough times is who's actually smart, and who's actually dumb as a box of rocks. Splitting up California would wreck havoc with everyone in the former State, and would likely throw the entire U.S. into chaos, and all for the greed and lust for power of (excuse my using an over-used metaphor) the 1%. What they'd actually be doing is very transparent: Leave behind the poorer parts of the former California, so the rich don't have to be "burdened" by them anymore. For the northernmost parts of the State, you may as well just merge it with Oregon in that case, so you can have one larger state full of poor people living in relatively rural areas, all without anywhere near enough jobs to keep them all housed, clothed, and fed. Give the central valley a new spanish name, so the people who live and work there, working the fields, will feel more at home. I don't think I need to go on, you all get the picture, probably without my help in the first place. Of course like all rich despots this wouldn't go like they planned, the northern State could cut off all the water they've been sending to the south and hold it for ransom, jacking the price way up, and the central state could make the food they're growing so expensive that even the richest would be shocked at their grocery bill.
This guy needs to be slapped.
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That seems highly unlikely, if you actually look at the map. California's entire coastline, except for the San Diego area, skews heavily blue (and even San Diego is lightly blue), so the opposite would probably be true - only California 4 (on his map) would likely elect Republican senators. Keep in mind the coasts are also far more heavily populated. So it'd probably be 8-2 the other way.
http://www.csc.ncsu.edu/faculty/healey/US_election/figs/CA.png
I've learned that they're worthless, so I don't read AC comments anymore.
It's sad that an artifact of the nation's early history results in a Senate where a few square post-independence states with tiny populations are effectively able to veto ideas supported by very large majorities of Americans. Splitting states to provide relatively equal populations per Senate district would go a long way towards eliminating the existing gridlock in American politics.
There is simply no reason beyond historical accident why the 40 million people of California have two senators, while the combined 3 million people of the Dakotas, Wyoming and Montana have eight senators.
It's sad that an artifact of the nation's early history results in a Senate where a few square post-independence states with tiny populations are effectively able to veto ideas supported by very large majorities of Americans.
It's a political check on the urban areas.
The entire point of the senate is to provide an equal voice to all members of the federation....besides....the most undemocratic behavior is gerrimandering and that is a behavior seen in the house.
Congressional districts should be required to be closed and compact boarders that meet the population requirements for a district to exist. These things should be drawn by a computer using standard topological analysis, not a committee created by what ever party happens to be in control of the state at the time.
I think the flaw in your logic is the belief that democracy is an ideal that ought to be strived for. Also, I question your assertion that the Senate wasn't intended as a check on urban areas. It gave the rural southern states representation they wouldn't have had if population was the only metric, especially considering that blacks only counted as 3/5th of a person. Without the senate the south would have been similar to the thirteen colonies compared to England (which, as the urban centers in the north grew exponentially, eventually happened and caused a civil war).
Personally, I don't think it's right for people in cities a thousand+ miles away from my rural home to dictate the laws around here because there's more of them. Democracy only works on a very small scale. When it's expanded from sea to shining sea it becomes a tyranny throughout most the land, whether it's a tyranny for of most the people or not.
"From the depths of my skeptical and rationalist soul, I ask the Lord to protect me from California touchie-feeliedom."
Last year, California sent $292.6 billion in federal taxes to the US government. California received $258.9 billion in federal spending. In other words, the federal government received nearly $34 billion dollars more from the state of California than was spent in the state.
Let's see how it works out indeed.
California has a huge agriculture industry, you idiot.
Democracy only works on a very small scale. When it's expanded from sea to shining sea it becomes a tyranny throughout most the land, whether it's a tyranny for of most the people or not.
Exactly, which is why the country needs to be broken up into smaller, more homogeneous units. Those European countries with the highest standards of living in the world, and the least amounts of corruption, are all small and relatively homogeneous culturally. They don't constantly argue internally over issues like abortion, or the role of government, or socialized healthcare. Democracy is a good thing, compared to the alternatives, but as you say, it just doesn't work on a large scale. The only rational solution is to reduce the scale, by breaking apart the country.
Ah, the blissful European countries with cultural homogeneity. Perhaps they don't argue internally, I can't say I pay that much attention. I do recall hearing once or twice of the occasional war between one or two of them, and I note that they've attempted to form overarching economic and political structures in hopes of making such wars less common in the future than they've been in the past.
No doubt the internal arguments in the United States would be fewer if Utah, for example, were its own country. But the thought of a nuclear armed Utah doesn't strike me as an improved geopolitical situation.
CA is broke.
California has a $2.4 billion surplus, about same as Texas.
You don't even need to go as far as you did. First they have to get by Article IV Section 3 of the US Constitution:
This is a sig. This is only a sig. Had this been an actual sig you would have been informed where to tune for more sigs.
If you want to fix that problem the answer you want is proportional representation. You'll pretty much kiss any idea of true local representation goodbye. Gerrymandering up a bunch of low population red states is just more corruption of the system.
I think it was fairly obvious from the GP's complaint about the representative make-up that he was already aware of this. What he was asking was why.
Your "+4 Informative" comment is essentially not merely repeating the basis of the questioner's question back to him, but then complaining he doesn't know why he's asking the question in the first place. It's spectacularly unhelpful.
FWIW, the reason you should have given is that the original purpose of providing states with equal numbers of representatives in one house of Representatives was reflective of the USA's status as a Union of States, and that its purpose is historical. Like all historical conventions, it certainly should be reviewed from time to time. Proponents would suggest that by giving weight to arbitrarily drawn bordered land instead of people, the Senate more likely to come to agreements based upon reason rather than public opinion; however others would argue that there's no sign it does do that, and that the make-up simply provides disproportionate weight to political viewpoints that reflect a small ideologically far-right minority, rather than supportive of the country as a whole.
In other words, the GP has a right to be concerned, as the reasons for the equal votes per state rule do not appear to be relevant today, in theory or in practice.
You are not alone. This is not normal. None of this is normal.
We were talking about "culturally homogenous" European countries, not linguistically. Languages are one indicator of cultural identity, but not the only one. The situation in France is actually particularly acrimonious, even more so than in Spain, and the French regions do not have any of the protections they have in Spain. Spain seems more troublesome than France precisely because the problem is officially recognised. In France, there is a flat-out denial of regional identities, with administrative boundaries redrawn contrary to local will (the city of Nantes, the capital of old Brittany, is no longer part of Brittany, and this is frequently protested about) and the French government refusing to ratify the European Charter of Minority Languages because "French is the language of the republic". Breton activists regularly protest by spraypainting or taking down French roadsigns (and I believe they've actually succeeded in getting some of their railway stations bilingually signed) and the Corsicans have a long history of shooting holes in the French half of bilingual roadsigns. While I was living in Corsica, the North Corsican assembly was putting through a bill to make Corsican co-official with French in the area, even though technically they had no powers to do so. It was an illegal act as an act of protest to France's treatment of regional languages.
The Saami are not analogous to the Pennsylvania Dutch. They're a minority population-wise, but they have a huge territory which leads to conflicts between the needs of the reindeer herders and the state's desire to open up mineral explorations in the area.
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