Forbe’s Magazine recently published their list of the Top 20 Most Miserable Cities in America.
Out of sense of morbid curiosity, I paged through their presentation, and when I came to the end, the first thing that popped into my mind was: “Yet one more reason for my shadow to never, ever darken the borders of California.”
Of the twenty cities listed, eight of them are in California.
Folks, if eight of your cities are among the “Most Miserable” places to live in the United States, that there is what we finely-trained law-enforcement types call “A Clue”.
By way of comparison, I give you the Great State of Texas. Not a one of our cities lands on the Top 20 list — and that’s saying something considering there’re parts of Houston, Dallas, San Antonio and El Paso that I wouldn’t venture into without heavy fire-power and a full platoon of Marines for back-up.
California has eight out of the twenty, yet California is still held to be the ideal in certain social and political sectors.
“You should be more like California,” they say, “California is enlightened!” “If it’s good enough for California to do, it must be mandatory for you!”
Huh. I hadn’t ever considered that “Misery” might equal “Enlightenment” but that thought process might explain a great deal.
California is the reason that every bit of fishing tackle I buy has an idiot label on it that says: “This product contains chemicals known to the State of California to cause cancer and/or birth defects or other reproductive harm” — even the brass-and-tungsten “no-tox” weights.
If it isn’t bad enough that media and social pundits keep extolling the virtues of California, people fleeing California to my Fair State keep trying to make Texas into a carbon-copy of the misery they just left.
Why? Texas: None of the Top 20 Most Miserable Cities. California: majority shareholder in the Top 20 Most Miserable Cities. SO WHY THE HELL DO YOU WANT TO CHANGE TEXAS?!
Now I realize that California liberals fleeing their State couldn’t get a clue if they smeared themselves with clue musk and did the clue mating dance in a field full of receptive clues at the height of the clue mating season, but here’s to tilting at windmills:
California is doing something wrong. Texas is doing something right. Quit trying to turn Texas into a carbon-copy of California. Leave us the hell alone.
Grr.
LawDog
The cancer has about killed off California so now it has to spread to other states or die.
From your lips to Odin's ears.
Dog, my apologies for the people fleeing my state and trying to infest yours. I will admit, though, I'm hoping they all go away and the sane folks who remain can reclaim the Golden State for what it used to be.
Honestly, I love it here (I'm a CA native), with the exception of the politics, which are awful and mostly run by the fiscally incompetent people in the LA and SF areas. /:
The rest of the state is much more sane, but unfortunately, how we elect our state senators is messed up. We essentially have two "house of representative" branches instead of a house and a senate. The more-suburban and rural parts of the state don't get a voice in how things are run at all. ):
Yep, they've already screwed up Washington, Oregon, and the Denver Metroplex… I'd just say shoot em at the border if they're in a Uhaul… 🙂
The problem with that Old NFO, is that U-haul trucks and trailers have plates from all over, rarely from the state the occupants are actually from.
Hence, if drivers of California U-hauls get shot, they're most probably NOT from California.
And, yes Dog, they do try to change everywhere they go to the crap that they left. It is not logical, but it is the reality.
Well if the license plates don't give them away, you have two options: Stop them and find out, or turn them all away and let God sort them out….whatever is cheaper.
Having lived in both Washington and Colorado, I find the first California character trait to be a lack of humility followed by an air of superiority.
Have family up on CO with the same gripe: clowns who move there from CA or OR, then try to change laws to make it more like where they ran from.
They're considering "So go the hell back" signs to stick in yards.
We get droves of them coming here to Utah, also. They've been trying to Caliform the state for forty years now, but we have managed to hold our ground fairly well.
Don't apologize, Leanne, they don't rate one. We had the freaks and weirdos of fifty states moving here for half a century and more, while our beloved Golden State generously acted as the kidney of the nation, doing the filtering. I didn't hear many apologies while people moved here from all over, messing the place up.
Mike James
Or, as I learned very quickly when I arrived in Houston some thirty years ago:
"We don't give a damn how you did it up North."
Hey Mr. Dog, I'm in Austin and we're getting a bunch of Kalipornians moving into here. People are building $500K+ spec homes again and they are getting sold before the slab is poured. Austin is a lost cause for now. Good economy and the leftists luv the town. But hopefully Williamson County and the surronding area will remain conservative. Where are you? If you are within 100 miles of Austin and plan on doing some shooting, I'd love to tag along. I need to sight in my FN/FAL and a couple of the AR's. Thanks.
LawDog, at the top of New England we feel the same way as NY, MA and other city folk come and then promptly try to turn our state into a copy of that which they fled. Well said, sir, well said.
Damsel
They are TRYING to change the small town in CO I live in. Normally I wouldn't care but I like it how it used to be. I have stopped them temporarily but when I go back to TX, I hope someone takes up the fight.
North Georgia… Up here in the mountains… We have the same problem with Florida people and Yankees… moving in here trying to turn it into Florida. The money helps the local economy, but the attitudes don't help the legal, political, and social situations.
Notice that every single one of the named cities is a DNC stronghold?
6 of the 8 California cities are Central Valley agriculture-dependent economies, as is Salinas.
That part of California is not 'Democratic strongholds' – see the election map re 2004 Presidential Election at http://www.mapsofworld.com/usa/presidential-election/results/california-2004-2008.html
If you haven't yet done so, those interested in California should read Victor Davis Hanson at PJMedia and National Review Online.
Besides that, sorry our exports can't figure out that they left here for a reason.
Sorry about that–we Arizonans have been making a valiant effort to hold the line, but some of those Kalifornians have managed to slip through. You see, it's because they start talking and the stupidity that pours from their mouths simply stuns us into inaction.
We just need bigger rifles and earplugs.
Dear Law Dog,
I heartily commend your efforts to preserve Texas for what it is, without letting the liberal knuckleheads ruin yet another fine state.
However, kindly check the pedigrees on the so-called "Californians" so many other states whine about, and you'll find in most cases that the Golden State was merely their LATEST residence, and not the one they were born and raised in.
With no disrespect intended to Texas or anywhere else, if the other 49 states would merely reclaim their toothless banjo-playing kinfolk who moved here and helped besoil this former paradise, we wouldn't be on any worst cities lists, let alone 8 of them.
Best Regards,
Aesop
As a native Oregonian (there are still a few of us around) I agree, in part, with the comments about "Pedigrees". Oregon wasn't totally hosed until the mid 1970's when the Californians started moving north. Our Governor at the time, Tom McCall, had signs at the border saying "Welcome to Oregon, we're glad you're here for a visit, now go home." When he left office in 1975, the signs came down.
Since then, every liberal, bleeding-heart, yahoo who wants to save the trees and liberate the animals (Spotted Owl, anyone?) has come here and turned Oregon into a melting pot of loonies. They've driven the housing prices through the roof and made it almost impossible for the average family to buy a decent house, instituted new taxes to pay for the new benefits that the public employees unions have demanded, and completely screwed up the educational system. I keep hoping and waiting for them to find other places to infest so I can have my state back…
"6 of the 8 California cities are Central Valley agriculture-dependent economies, as is Salinas."
Yes. The Central Valley is being destroyed by the folks who got the bright idea that we needed to save the Delta Smelt from extinction*. So instead of coming up with any better ideas, they turned off the water coming into the Central Valley.
They've been in a man-made drought for years. Kinda hard to farm when you can't get water — the rest of the country can tell you that right now. They have my sympathy. ):
*It's not that I don't appreciate trying to save endangered species, but humans are part of the ecology too. There has to be a better solution.
Lawdog- can you run for Governor?
Awesome diatribe. I have to link it.
As a resident of (rural, red-county country) Oregon I heartily agree. If it could ever get past the courts I would seriously advocate a long-term residency requirement before enjoying the franchise when you move in. I figure 10 years would be a decent, even modest requirement.
Well said, my friend! I'm fully in favor of placing a huge sign at the border on the ONE road leading into the Last Frontier reading "Welcome to Alaska, NOW GO HOME!" Just can't seem to get it past the whole "tourism-is-money" crowd. A far too large number of those tourists are staying here….
Can TEXAS invade California & clean out our infestation? Try as we might, we haven't been able to do it!
Ulises from CA
Dog, I live in #5, Sacramento, and it's a nice place to live if you have a job or two. I don't, and I'll have to move, soon, probably up to ND for one of those oil jobs.
Sadly, the primary employer here is the State of California, which doesn't seem to understand it has no money.
Leanne said:
es. The Central Valley is being destroyed by the folks who got the bright idea that we needed to save the Delta Smelt from extinction*. So instead of coming up with any better ideas, they turned off the water coming into the Central Valley.
They've been in a man-made drought for years. Kinda hard to farm when you can't get water — the rest of the country can tell you that right now. They have my sympathy. ):
*It's not that I don't appreciate trying to save endangered species, but humans are part of the ecology too. There has to be a better solution.
The smelt are a marker species_if they die out it's an indication that others will follow. That drought has hit Northern California, too, and the water is low here too.
Antibubba
Hey, they're coming to Idaho too. At least you have more space in Texas.
I can't believe Gary, Indiana didn't make the list.
It earns a spot on every other misery list I can think of…
all The Best,
Frank W. James
We escaped to the free state of Nevada 23 years ago. We have watched Reno become Kalifornicated but fortunately we are still able to defend ourselves when people get to stupid. Las Vegas is just called East L.A. and you have to get permission to have your gun there.
A Different LeAnne
…sorry, that should be too stupid…really, I didn't mean to sound like I had a California education!!
A Different LeAnne
11 1/2 years ago I escaped from the dark and fascist Peoples Republik of Neu Jersey – a former near paradise that was ruined by New Yawkers who were fleeing the destruction that they had wreaked upon that once fine city and state (and, of course, they have never been able to connect the dots between the stupid liberals that they have always voted for and the aforementioned destruction, so they repeated it in NJ). I happily came to Texas**…only to find Austin. This more recent influx of mutant alien Kalifornicators has begun to have a damaging impact upon our fair state, much to my horror and disgust. Many of them seem, as LD pointed out, to want to change things to be like their former homeland. My advice to them is: if you like Kali so bloody much, either don't leave in the first place, or turn around and go back – but either way, leave us alone!
**When SWMBO and I were moving from the PRNJ to Texas, I interrupted her in mid-sentence when we passed the sign on the bridge that said, "Welcome to Delaware" to solemnly inform her that, "Well, now you won't ever have to bail me out of jail." I figured that it was a great teachable moment, and was rewarded with her nearly breaking her lower jaw on the floorboard, followed immediately by, "Wh, wha, WHAT!! are you talking about?!" I explained the PRNJ's insane law against magazines considered by the local hoplophobes to be "too big" (i.e. capable of holding over 15 rounds). She asked how many I had, and I told her, "18 inches behind my posterior sits about 200 years in Rahway State Prison." Another near-miss for a broken jaw, a minute of silence, followed by, "They don't have laws like that in Texas, do they?" I said, "No, honey, Texas is in America."
Thus ended the lesson. I LOVE Texas, let's keep it the way it is (with possibly a 10-mile diameter crater where Austin is currently located).
While we're talking craters, I have a little list . . .
Starting with the DPRoS!*
–WebFoot Logger
*Democratic People's Republic of Seattle.
aprapo of nothing in particular, I don't avocate killing all the stupid people, just remove all the california inspired warning lables and let mother nature chlorinate the gene pool!