With two football teams moving to Los Angeles, a host of towers rising in a resurgent downtown and an upcoming IPO for L.A.’s signature start-up, Snapchat parent Snap Inc., one can make a credible case that the city that defined growth for a half century is back. According to Mayor Eric Garcetti, the Rams, Chargers and the new mega-stadium that will house them in neighboring Inglewood, show that “that this is a town that nobody can afford to pass up.” Read more
The cracks in the 50-year-old Oroville Dam, and the massive spillage and massive evacuations that followed, shed light on the true legacy of Jerry Brown. The governor, most recently in Newsweek, has cast himself as both the Subcomandante Zero of the anti-Trump resistance and savior of the planet. But when Brown finally departs Sacramento next year, he will be leaving behind a state that is in danger of falling apart both physically and socially. Read more
https://joelkotkin.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/gov-jerry-brown-speaking.jpg6751600Joel Kotkin/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/jkotkin_logo.pngJoel Kotkin2017-02-28 16:30:422017-03-15 13:19:50The True Legacy of Gov. Jerry Brown
In one of the great scenes from the movie “Dr. Zhivago,” based on the novel by Soviet author Boris Pasternak, a young Bolshevik commander explains to the idealistic physician that “the private life is done in Russia. History has killed it.”
In America today, it also seems increasingly impossible to separate personal life from the political. In awards shows, sports broadcasts and fashion runways — which once provided escapes from politics — we find endless passionate anti-Trump protests and denunciations. Even corporations, like Under Armour, have faced opprobrium — and even boycotts — for daring to support Trump. Nordstrom faced a possible boycott for carrying a now-canceled fashion line of his daughter, Ivanka. Read more
https://joelkotkin.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/protest_at_Trump_Tower.jpg11881800Joel Kotkin/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/jkotkin_logo.pngJoel Kotkin2017-02-22 11:44:532017-03-15 16:15:54Neo-Stalinists Versus the Sons of Anarchy
America is increasingly a nation haunted by fears of looming dictatorship. Whether under President Barack Obama’s “pen and phone” rule by decree, or its counterpoint, the madcap Twitter rule of our current chief executive, one part of the country, and society, always feels mortally threatened by whoever occupies the Oval Office.
Given this worsening divide, perhaps the only reasonable solution is to move away from elected kings and toward early concepts of the republic, granting far more leeway to states, local areas and families to rule themselves. Read more
https://joelkotkin.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/Capitol-Dome-at-dusk.jpg9031800Joel Kotkin/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/jkotkin_logo.pngJoel Kotkin2017-02-14 12:11:292017-03-15 13:20:50Decentralize Government to Resolve Country’s Divisions
In often needlessly harsh ways, President Donald Trump is forcing Americans to face issues that have been festering for decades, but effectively swept under the rug by the ruling party duopoly. Nowhere is this more evident than with immigration, an issue that helped to spark Trump’s quixotic, but ultimately successful, campaign.
Many Americans are clearly upset about an estimated 11 million undocumented immigrants, and many also fear the arrival of more refugees from Islamic countries. Perhaps no issue identified by Trump has been more divisive.
Not surprisingly, Trump’s rhetoric has stirred bitter anger among the country’s polite establishment, right and left, as well as the progressive grievance industry. His call for a massive border wall has not only offended our neighbor, Mexico, but also created legitimate concern in Latino communities of massive raids. According to a 2012 study for the National Institutes for Health, the undocumented account for roughly one in five Mexicans and up to half of those from Central American countries. Read more
Perhaps nothing has made modern progressivism look sillier than the often hysterical reaction to the election of Donald Trump. This has spanned everything from street protests, claims of Russian electoral manipulation and even reports of sudden weight gain and loss of sexual interest. Rather than become more introspective in the face of defeat, the bulk of left-leaning media and their intellectual allies have embraced the notion — even before the new president proposes anything — of following what UC Berkeley public policy professor and former U.S. labor secretary Robert Reich calls “the resistance agenda.” Read more
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Perhaps no president in recent history has more pressure on him to perform economic miracles than Donald Trump. As someone who ran on the promise that he could fix the economy — and largely won because of it — Trump faces two severe challenges, one that is largely perceptual and another more critical one that is very real.
To start, Trump must cope with the widespread idea, accepted by much of the media, that we are experiencing something of an “Obama boom.” Read more
https://joelkotkin.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/d_trump.jpg10661599Joel Kotkin/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/jkotkin_logo.pngJoel Kotkin2017-01-16 00:52:182017-02-06 09:51:37The Irony That Could Trip Up Trump’s Quest To Make The U.S. Economy ‘Great Again’
Across the country, white voters placed Donald Trump in office by a margin of 21 points over Clinton. Their backing helped the GOP gain control of a vast swath of local offices nationwide. But in California, racial politics are pushing our general politics the other direction, way to the left. Read more
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Like a child star who reached his peak at age 15, Barack Obama could never fulfill the inflated expectations that accompanied his election. After all not only was he heralded as the “smartest” president in history within months of assuming the White House, but he also secured the Nobel Peace Prize during his first year in office. Usually, it takes actually settling a conflict or two — like Richard Nixon or Jimmy Carter — to win such plaudits. Read more
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It certainly seems as if boomers are in charge in America now, with Donald Trump about to move into the White House and members of the generation in the majority in Congress. Meanwhile, huge attention has been paid over the past few years to the emergence of the boomers’ children, the millennials, on the national scene. Read more
https://joelkotkin.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/12/Speaker_Ryan_with_Trump_and_Pence.jpg7321024Joel Kotkin and Wendell Cox/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/jkotkin_logo.pngJoel Kotkin and Wendell Cox2016-12-30 22:51:402017-01-31 11:12:23Generation X’s Moment Of Power Is Almost Here
