THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 21, 2023
California then: Jerry Brown has certainly had a long, unusual career. That said, is he a good fit for this particular PBS franchise?
He seems like a slightly odd choice for the long running "American Masters" series, but a full-length profile appeared this week, thumbnailed in the manner shown:
Jerry Brown: The Disrupter
Experience the political and personal journey of Jerry Brown, the longest serving governor in California history. First elected at 36 years old and again at 72, explore Brown’s 50-year career tackling climate change and inequality.
You can watch the program here. It takes us back to the early days, when the Browns, pere et fils, governed the Golden State.
Jerry Brown was elected governor in 1974, then again in 1978. He followed the two terms of Governor Ronald Reagan—and who had Reagan defeated in 1966?
That's right! Reagan defeated Governor Pat Brown, Jerry Brown's father. He was serving the first of his two terms as governor when our family arrived in California in the summer of 1960.
As it turns out, California was a different place in July 1960. It didn't seem that way at the time, but there were very few people around.
Pat Brown was famously building freeways and schools, but who was he building those freeways for? Compared to modern-day California, the place was practically empty:
Population of California
1960: 15,717,204
2020: 39,538,223
Wow! It didn't seem that way at the time. But like the pioneers of yore, we'd moved to an empty land.
We were headed into Grade 8 at Borel Junior High. John F. Kennedy was running for president. That said, the whole darn country was much smaller then. It was hard to round up any voters:
1960: 179,323,175
2020: 331,449,281
"How did it ever get this far?" as Don Corleone once said.
If history teaches us anything, it possibly teaches us this. It's hard to maintain a giant, sprawling continental nation which contains so many souls.
Increased demographic diversity may make the task even harder. More on that to follow. For today, we'll leave you with this:
When we arrived in California, Governor Brown—Jerry Brown's dad—was building acres of freeways.
The freeways spread in all directions. If you build them, Californians will come!
Biden’s first presidential campaign ended in 1987 due to a scandal involving plagiarism of speeches and a law school paper and exaggerations about his academic achievements.
ReplyDeleteThat's true. Unemployment is down.
DeleteAlso this stuff:
Deletehttps://www.whitehouse.gov/therecord/
How's poverty going?
DeleteThe good news is the national debt is down. This allows us to keep sending Ukraine 200 million dollars a day and to continue to not give a fuck about black children in poverty.
DeleteThe good news is that no one really cares about the debt.
DeleteOr all black children in poverty.
Delete9:49,
DeleteI took Bob's advice and listened to "the Others". The Others say Democrats care about black children more than white people.
You probably didn't realize it because of the tribal silo you live in.
I listened to your mother but she didn't say anything because your cock was in your mouth. When are you going to take it out, yo?
DeleteCorrection: your cock was in your mother's mouth. I guess she'll put her cock in your mouth later.
DeleteMy Mother putting my cock in her mouth, is easily the smartest, most well-thought-out economic idea the Right has ever had.
DeleteSick burn! You're so clever.
DeleteIt's funny, because its true.
DeletePerhaps Jerry Brown's worst sin as Governor was to allow public employees to unionize. The cost of present workers' salaries plus the cost of benefits to retired workers will over time destroy the state's solvency.
ReplyDeleteThe things the government is responsible, such as schools and highways, are already mediocre, despite perhaps the highest taxes of any state. Things will go downhill from here.
I hear it's gotten so bad in California, 3 bedroom, 2 bath houses are going for less than $50K.
Delete#supplyanddemandisaliberalconspiracy
Limiting the liabilities of corporations is the worst thing the government ever did.
DeleteJust don't ask a free-market Libertarian to agree.
CA schools are mediocre? Half of the top 12 public universities in the nation are in CA. UC Berkeley and UCLA are 1 & 2, UCI is 5th, with UC Santa Barbara, UC Davis and UC San Diego in the top 12.
DeleteThe K-12 rankings are affected by the large numbers of immigrant students CA teaches each year. That doesn't mean the schools are "mediocre" but that the schools have an extra challenge that other states do not have to address. That has been true since the 1960s.
"California has 658 colleges in the state. There are more than 2.5 million students enrolled in higher education in the state of California. That is more than the combined student population of the bottom 23 states. It is also more than the total population of 16 individual states."
Compared to all universities, public and private, UC Berkeley is 8th and the private college Cal Tech is 7th. That is not "mediocre" as David suggests. 37% of high school seniors enroll in a 2-year community college, which is an essential part of the California education system.
"The freeways spread in all directions. If you build them, Californians will come!"
ReplyDeleteThis is an odd statement to be emphasizing when California lost population in the last year.
"In 2022, the state's population dropped by roughly 138,400 people, to 38.94 million. It was big news a few years ago when, for the first time in more than a century, California's population shrank."
Why are people leaving? I left CA in 2021 to be with family after the covid lockdown. Others have done the same thing, with family being the #1 reason to move. Other analyses suggest that the high cost of living may be driving people to other states. In an aging population, states with low personal income tax and low costs of living are favored by retirees. But some people are leaving because of the political climate, going to TX for example. They were unhappy with the recent energy mismanagement problems there, where some people suffered for weeks without heat or electricity (during summer heat). Interestingly, TX is becoming a swing state with a possibility of voting blue, even if its governor engages in typical conservative antics involving mistreatment of immigrants. The failures at Uvalde have caused some Texans to rethink their position on gun control. So this idea that people are fleeing wokeness in CA is ridiculous and more complex than Republicans are willing to admit.
If you read Somerby with any seriousness, it sounds like he is saying that our country has (1) too many people, (2) too much diversity, (3) is becoming ungovernable due to 1 & 2, and (4) is Gov Brown's fault for building roads (I assume that extends to Eisenhower too).
ReplyDeleteThis is this silliest analysis I've seen anyone make, except perhaps among white supremacists, who blame everything on the mud people. What does Somerby propose to do with all those extra people everywhere?
When you drive cross country, you are struck by how much wide open space is part of our country. You also see a lot of small towns in every state. And you see miles and miles of rural agriculture (which supports our populaton and provides exports to the rest of the world) and a lot of beautiful national parks. You don't get the impression that we are overcrowded at all.
Given today's preamble, I almost suspect Somerby of suggesting that the diverse people be relocated to somewhere else, maybe Liberia? But Somerby only hints. He doesn't come right out and say anything concrete. So we should just blame Pat Brown for his roads, because anything happening in CA is obviously the fault of the Democrats (despite George Murphy, Ronald Reagan, Arnold Schwartzenegger, George Deukmejian, Pete Wilson, not to mention Goodwin Knight and Earl Warren).
The stereotypes about CA are worse than the stereotypes about Democrats. Somerby doesn't get a bye because he attended school in Palo Alto in the early 60s. If anything, he should know better than to come out with today's crap.
Well said. One of the ways we might make the hard task of running a large, sprawling country effectively is to elimate obviously poisonous, ridiculous elements with definitive action, words and deeds. Bob has no interest in separating the flawed but virtuous from the demented, cruel, and venal. He is only interested in settling scores. The more his perceived enemies turn out to be correct, the more it excites his hatred.
DeleteIt's bizarre how often Somerby gets criticized for what he "seems" to say, or what he "suggests," or what "it sounds like he is saying."
DeleteThat’s because he doesn’t say things directly.
DeleteSomerby is just bugged because PBS did a nice show about Jerry Brown (who was socially liberal but fiscally conservative, concerned about the environment, and an idiosyncratic politician with broad support from both parties).
ReplyDeleteDavid Skurnick is a retired actuary.
ReplyDeleteDavid in Cal is a sock puppet of impCaesarAug.
Sometimes I agree with David in Cal, sometimes I disagree. I have no sock puppets.
DeleteYou poor naif. You’re either fer ‘em or agin ‘em. Ain’t no grey.
DeleteIt’s the anonymouse way.
6:06,
DeleteWhat do you agree with David about?
A stooped clock is correct twice a day, even if its a racist bigot.
DeleteTyler Austin Harper and Glenn Loury discuss affirmative action:
ReplyDeletehttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fVz3ueCP-JA
You mean the one that "betrays the poor?"
ReplyDeleteRubbish.