The culture, the quality of life, pristine environment, and enviable public school systems are rapidly being segregated into ever-shrinking areas of affluence.
Anyone who has read this blog knows that the focus here is on illegal immigration. Is the presence of people who are unlawfully in the country the only thing that has led to the Golden State's desperate financial and demographic situation, however? Clearly, no. There's been plenty of irresponsible spending by California politicians that is, at most, only marginally related to the millions of the undocumented who have set up house here.
Still, you can't escape the facts; facts that are so plain and obvious that one doesn't need to hold an MBA degree to see that much of California's economic ruin has resulted from nearly unfettered unlawful immigration from Latin America. We're rapidly absorbing the poorest and least educated that countries in that area of the world gladly send north, and the bills for having done this are coming due. California's illegal alien and anchor baby population is well over twice the size of any other state's, and not surprisingly, our state's budget deficit is also over twice the size of any other state's.
When you lack money, you borrow. California certainly has, out the yin yang. In fact, California is so far in debt that its credit rating is the lowest of all 50 states. And when you can't borrow anymore, you do without. California is ...
Because we have been so busy building public schools (among other things) to keep up with an exploding Hispanic population, and repeatedly raising public school teachers' compensation to convince educators to work in dreary academic conditions surrounded by limited-English learners and street criminals, we essentially stopped constructing prisons. Well the illegal alien children, and the offspring of current and former illegal aliens, who now make up the bulk of public school students here, have been graduating at rates below 50%.
OK, so just build more prisons, right? Sure ... with what money? We already spent it on teachers, free public school breakfasts and lunches, new grade school campuses, discounted college tuition for illegal aliens, and prison guards who watch over our growing population of people who didn't seem to benefit from the money we've been laying out to educate/babysit them.
The bottom line: California will be releasing tens of thousands of convicts because government officials don't have any other choice.
Therefore, when we say the Golden State "won't be much like anything that people who have lived here for awhile have known," that isn't hyperbole or agenda motivated exaggeration. It's simply reality. The most basic function of government is to protect people and property. California's government increasingly can't because the money is all gone, and so are many of the citizen taxpayers who never wanted any part of this grand liberal immigration experiment and politically correct nonsense, to begin with.
A video concerning the exodus of middle class taxpayers from California: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZC3q8P6TB54
After 35 years in the city of Los Angeles, I am now part of the exodus. You need not feel shame or a sense of defeat if join me. Yes, we voted in the idiots that allowed, even caused this to happen. But, that does not mean we need to sit on the deck of the Titanic as it goes under in its final death plunge. Also, if you have a spouse and children, subjecting them to further compromise when you could help them have something better might just be a duty rather than an option at this point.
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