California still, for whatever reason, controls pop culture in the United States, and thus has a profound influence on the rest of the world. When many foreigners think of the United States, they think about what they see on TV — some of the world’s most prolific production companies are based in California.
But this illusion of wealth is very misleading. In addition to virtually every Hollywood star you can think of, California is also home to America’s largest homeless population. It’s no accident that one of the more famous hair metal bands of the 1980s actually called themselves “Skid Row” after the infamous slum strip near Los Angeles.
Things have gotten so bad in the state that the CDC has reported the return of diseases not seen since the medieval ages. That’s right: there are people alive in 2019 in California contracting the same diseases that serfs did in the dark ages. If that doesn’t scream “progress,” we don’t know what does.
Ronald Reagan once said that America was like a lab of democracy, because it gives every person living here the ability to vote with their feet. Different states have different styles of governing, and California serves a great purpose for this: it shows everyone else exactly what not to do.
