California Dreaming
My apologies to the Mamas and the Papas for using their song title for my column title.
Most Arkansas folks have an opinion about California, and whether it’s good or bad, it probably has to do with either Disneyland or politics. I would guess more folks recognize Nancy Pelosi’s name than they do old, uh, what’s his name, our old senior senator? But we would be doing California a disservice if we based our opinion on one political figure or a theme park.
I have visited California numerous times. Played tennis matches at the John Wayne Tennis Center in San Bernardino, where you must wear all whites, which brings back an interesting tennis story. The match was set up by the Center, and when I met my opponent, who was a good 20 years younger, and told him I was from Arkansas, he reacted as if Arkansas didn’t have tennis courts, and he casually said, “I’m ranked in California.” It was a “tennis snob” attitude I would call “looking down his nose” at just playing me. I nodded. I could tell he thought he was doing me a favor by playing a backwoods novice player. We started warming up, and I sized him up as a good player but not great. His backhand was suspect. Of course, I hit everything to his backhand, and I won the match in straight sets. We walked over to rest, and Mr. I’m Ranked in California commented, “I can’t believe you just kept getting everything back. You know I’m a ranked player in California!”
“Well, I’m also ranked… in Arkansas… and you need to work on your backhand,” I said as I put my racket in its case and walked off. Yeah, that was tacky, but he deserved it.
Yes, I’ve visited Disneyland, spent a vacation at La Costa Spa, listened to the Kingston Trio play in a San Francisco park, took a balloon ride over the vineyards in the Napa Valley, so I do have a feeling about the state, and let me describe it this way.
Several years back we took a family vacation to New York City and our son Ashley had to go from a Scout float trip on the Buffalo National River directly to New York City. Later that day, as Ashley and I were standing on 5th Avenue looking down at a street milling with cars and shoulder to shoulder people, while fire sirens blared, he shook his head and said, “Dad, I think New York is a visiting place not a living place.” Wisdom from an observant 14 year old, and it fits my opinion of California to a T. Of course, I do miss a few amenities by living in El Dorado, but I’ll take the 5 minutes from everywhere in town, the fishing or hunting in 10 minutes from my house, and I’ll give up dining 3 star restaurants, attending pro ball games, big shopping malls and having to commute two or more hours.
But let’s look a little deeper into what is certainly a complex state with an unbelievably diverse landscape, people, and businesses. The state gave Hillary an overwhelming several million vote majority, and even some old Republican strongholds such as Orange County went Democratic in the mid-term elections. Governor Brown, before he left office, signed into law the first law in the Nation which would ban gender discrimination on corporate boards. Corporate boards in California are now required to place women on their boards. That’s not just throwing a bone to the ladies. Numerous studies have shown a board with women on it is more productive than a male only board. California usually leads the Nation, and just as cell phones swept the country, we will follow suit, and in a decade or two the thousands of all male boards and commissions in our state and the country will have not just a woman on them, but an equal number of women.
Not everything starts in California, but the state dominates the issuance of patents, and if you want to see the latest innovations, go to California. Of course, you would figure, with Democrats running the state, the average citizen’s health coverage would be top notch. But hey, that’s just California, and you might think the state is about to turn into a socialist commune, and have a huge over budget debt… but you’d be wrong. The state actually had a $21 billion budget surplus before the pandemic.
The Silicon Valley companies have produced so many of our lifestyle items that I couldn’t possible list them all. Let’s face it folks, we’re actually jealous of California’s success and high standard of living. Their average medium wage is $77,252, and their longevity is 80.9 years. Arkansas average is $45,726 and our longevity is 74.5 years. That might have something to do with the number of people smoking. In California its 10.5% and in Arkansas it’s 22%. Maybe we could learn a few things from California.
It’s easy to understand why California is such a dominate state. If California were an independent country its annual gross national product would
place it number 5 in the world. The state is a hotbed for entrepreneurs with success stories that have influenced consumer habits around the world. Of course I’m writing about companies such as Apple, Intel, Microsoft, and multiple others. It seem the creative atmosphere in the state combined with a huge amount of startup money from venture capitalists equals the best place in the world to start a new company.
Yes, California is the home of Nancy Pelosi, known in some circles as the wicked witch of the west. Of course, she is definitely against the border wall, but she is for mandatory health coverage for preexisting conditions, is in favor of increasing the minimum wage, has worked to keep veteran’s benefits from being reduced, is a strong promoter of increasing teachers’ salaries and for providing all graduating high school two years of free tuition. That is just a sample of the foxy, 76 year old devout Catholic lady who looks 55, who has 6 kids and a bunch of grandkids.Well, maybe she has had a little touch up. Of course, if you’re in the market for a little perk to a sagging face, you might book a flight to L. A. — and that ain’t Lower Arkansas.
As much as we hate to admit it, we spend a huge amount of time and money trying to emulate California. After all, if you look at modern technology, and you don’t want to live in the 50s, you want what California has had for several years. But don’t get me wrong. I’m not even thinking about moving, because we can have it both ways… if we will just pull our heads out of the sand, and instead of trying to lure in another polluting plant or low rent business or hog farmer spray with Dicamba, we will take the best of California and add it to the Natural State, where not only will we have our natural wonders, but we will actually have a state where the 21st century is not something we only see on movie screens.
Richard Mason is a registered professional geologist, downtown developer, former chairman of the Department of Environmental Quality Board of Commissioners, past president of the Arkansas Wildlife Federation, and syndicated columnist. Email richard@gibraltarenergy.com.