Activism Change

Leftist California comments (was Election postponement)

Question:

<snip  El Camino Real, and More: I always thought that were the nations south of the border in better condition, we should not only augment the Pan-American highway by making it a US-style freeway all the way, but also a possibly better thing to do would be to build a fully-double-tracked (expanded where applicable) Pan-American Railroad.  (Going up to Alaska would be good, too.  Imagine the tourist RVs put atop special RV-service-equipped flat cars to go to Alaska and back.  To Panama or beyond in winter, too!)

Some of this has been done, of course, but not so much north to south as east to west. There’s a very impressive rail line across Mexico, whose principal function is to provide the Mexican portion of a line connecting New York city with it’s nearest Pacific Coast port — Mazatlan. Mostly built under the impetus of WWII, and improved since.  Note that any Pan-American route (super El Camino legacy) runs into the Darien Gap, and besides environmentalists and the whole assortment of anti-progress lefties, many governments are against breaching the gap to enable easy transit between North and South America because of diseases in one continent that easily can "imported" into the other.

I don’t know how useful such a route would be, though. Cargo moves more readily by sea, and there are not particular obstacles to sea travel between south and North. Al Moore

Response:

 Note that the remoteness of this place to Mexico ("a very long way from home") made control of it difficult. That and the lack of a maritime tradition. Imperial Spain monopolized shipping to the best of their ability, largely in order to maintain control. California was so far from their major interests that the people who settled there came to depend on the Yankee and other whalers that called on the coast for news and communications. Spain had prohibited such trade, but that was only effective in Monterey and San Diego, where they had officials and garrisons, and not very effective even there. Anywhere else, anyone at all was welcome, which is one reason why so many non Spanish speakers settled here.

  Yes, I’m aware of this.  (Note: I grew up in Calfornia; I have lived all over the USA outside California since then, although I revisit California from time to time.) California was remote even from Mexico. Independance in 1823, and the conversion from Republic to Empire a year or so later both came as surprise news in California. The lack of any Mexican seaborne trade or a navy made California almost as remote from the rest of Mexico as it had been from Spain. You can get an idea of what communications were like by visiting southern portions of El Camino Real, where it crosses the Baja peninsula. Much of it remains impassable to wheeled vehicles to this day.

  What’s also of note is not only California, but the Pacific Northwest (which actually includes northwesternmost California by strict standards), and onward into Alaska — that part of the world had been considered remote to Europeans and even to Americans for ages.   * * *   El Camino Real, and More: I always thought that were the nations south of the border in better condition, we should not only augment the Pan-American highway by making it a US-style freeway all the way, but also a possibly better thing to do would be to build a fully-double-tracked (expanded where applicable) Pan-American Railroad.  (Going up to Alaska would be good, too.  Imagine the tourist RVs put atop special RV-service-equipped flat cars to go to Alaska and back.  To Panama or beyond in winter, too!)   Note that any Pan-American route (super El Camino legacy) runs into the Darien Gap, and besides environmentalists and the whole assortment of anti-progress lefties, many governments are against breaching the gap to enable easy transit between North and South America because of diseases in one continent that easily can "imported" into the other.   Dave Simpson

Response:

– Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – <snip Contributing further to topic drift, My recollection is that the Russians were looking for a place they could engage in agricultural production in support of their Alaskan interests. As they continued to look southward, the Spanish, concerned at possible encroachment, accelerated their settlement and development northwards. This was the attitude of the imperial governments, but the colonies were, in both cases, a very long way from home, and when the empires met, just north of San Francisco, quite friendly relationships were established between the local administrations, who had, after all, the same problems in the same place. The importance of the sea for communications and transportation dictated that neither empire looked very hard very far inland. Had the Russians got an earlier start, or the Spanish a later one, The Russians might have found what they needed, either around the San Francisco Bay or in the Salinas valley. As it was, their California settlement didn’t provide what they were looking for, and they sold it as soon as a suitable buyer appeared.  Note that the remoteness of this place to Mexico ("a very long way from home") made control of it difficult.

That and the lack of a maritime tradition. Imperial Spain monopolized shipping to the best of their ability, largely in order to maintain control. California was so far from their major interests that the people who settled there came to depend on the Yankee and other whalers that called on the coast for news and communications. Spain had prohibited such trade, but that was only effective in Monterey and San Diego, where they had officials and garrisons, and not very effective even there. Anywhere else, anyone at all was welcome, which is one reason why so many non Spanish speakers settled here. California was remote even from Mexico. Independance in 1823, and the conversion from Republic to Empire a year or so later both came as surprise news in California. The lack of any Mexican seaborne trade or a navy made California almost as remote from the rest of Mexico as it had been from Spain. You can get an idea of what communications were like by visiting southern portions of El Camino Real, where it crosses the Baja peninsula. Much of it remains impassable to wheeled vehicles to this day. Al Moore

Response:

 (Note I don’t dispute your comments about Mexico and Peru, which add believeability to what you have stated.) I got it from a course in California history. I should do some research and find some citeable source, because I know this is _not_ common knowledge.

  The common knowledge is about Sutter and the Forty-Niners (including those who went around the Horn and across Panama to get to California). – Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – Contributing further to topic drift, My recollection is that the Russians were looking for a place they could engage in agricultural production in support of their Alaskan interests. As they continued to look southward, the Spanish, concerned at possible encroachment, accelerated their settlement and development northwards. This was the attitude of the imperial governments, but the colonies were, in both cases, a very long way from home, and when the empires met, just north of San Francisco, quite friendly relationships were established between the local administrations, who had, after all, the same problems in the same place. The importance of the sea for communications and transportation dictated that neither empire looked very hard very far inland. Had the Russians got an earlier start, or the Spanish a later one, The Russians might have found what they needed, either around the San Francisco Bay or in the Salinas valley. As it was, their California settlement didn’t provide what they were looking for, and they sold it as soon as a suitable buyer appeared.

  Note that the remoteness of this place to Mexico ("a very long way from home") made control of it difficult.   Dave Simpson

Response:

Actually, the Spanish knew of the "mother lode" — they named it, long before 1846. It was, however, too distant to be interesting to exploit, given the much more accessable silver deposits of Mexico and Peru.  That’s news to the rest of us.  It wasn’t common knowledge to Americans at the time, either, and hasn’t been part of US history, even from leftist revisionists.  (Note I don’t dispute your comments about Mexico and Peru, which add believeability to what you have stated.)

I got it from a course in California history. I should do some research and find some citeable source, because I know this is _not_ common knowledge. <snip – Hide quoted text — Show quoted text –  [Russians] They sold their California holdings to Johann Sutter, shortly before the Mexican war, and have never advanced a claim since taking the money and running.  What’s of most interest to me — and I’ll preface this by noting aloud it is not an attempt to divert attention from what you are saying; I am not disputing your statements — is that elements of the Pacific Northwest in a much weaker sense extend along the coastline south of (beyond) Cape Mendocino, and it is San Francisco Bay that forms a great natural boundary dividing Northwest and Southwest. (Redwoods are found as far south as St. Lucia on the coast, though.) It is as if the Russians continued to follow the Douglas firs, then the redwoods, south, as long as they encountered non-xerophytic coastal vegetation.  (They may have been following sea lions, too.)

Contributing further to topic drift, My recollection is that the Russians were looking for a place they could engage in agricultural production in support of their Alaskan interests. As they continued to look southward, the Spanish, concerned at possible encroachment, accelerated their settlement and development northwards. This was the attitude of the imperial governments, but the colonies were, in both cases, a very long way from home, and when the empires met, just north of San Francisco, quite friendly relationships were established between the local administrations, who had, after all, the same problems in the same place. The importance of the sea for communications and transportation dictated that neither empire looked very hard very far inland. Had the Russians got an earlier start, or the Spanish a later one, The Russians might have found what they needed, either around the San Francisco Bay or in the Salinas valley. As it was, their California settlement didn’t provide what they were looking for, and they sold it as soon as a suitable buyer appeared. Al Moore

Response:

Actually, the Spanish knew of the "mother lode" — they named it, long before 1846. It was, however, too distant to be interesting to exploit, given the much more accessable silver deposits of Mexico and Peru.

  That’s news to the rest of us.  It wasn’t common knowledge to Americans at the time, either, and hasn’t been part of US history, even from leftist revisionists.   (Note I don’t dispute your comments about Mexico and Peru, which add believeability to what you have stated.) US aspirations to take over Spanish, subsequently Mexican, territory go a lot further back than that. See, for exmple: http://historicaltextarchive.com/sections.php?op=viewarticle&artid=165 President Polk, in launching the war with Mexico, fully intended to take, in addition to what was eventually annexed, Baja California, Chihuahua and some or all of Sonora.

  No surprise there.  Nor was "from the Ithmus [Panama] to the Pole!" Actually, it was the gold rush that "put San Francisco on the map."

  San Francisco was used as a harbor, which was its long-desired purpose. The place had no particular importance until the hinterland of the Central and Santa Clara Valleys were developed. The Spanish had held it only to deny its use to a potential hostile power.

  It certainly wasn’t developed to any great extent, though it wasn’t exactly an uninhabited wasteland, either.  (Consider what already was extant around the time of our American Revolution.) Yes, and Americanos del Norte actually served both with the California Separatist movement and with the Mexican loyalists when the revolt came to actual fighting, about 300 on each side. Mexico had no chance whatever to stand up to the United States, however. Recall that Mexico had been independant for less than 25 years, that the Mexican government changed several times during course of the war, and that Mexico’s economy was completely dominated by foreign interests.

  There were other inherent problems that no doubt are related to the problems of Latin America today.   [Russians] They sold their California holdings to Johann Sutter, shortly before the Mexican war, and have never advanced a claim since taking the money and running.

  What’s of most interest to me — and I’ll preface this by noting aloud it is not an attempt to divert attention from what you are saying; I am not disputing your statements — is that elements of the Pacific Northwest in a much weaker sense extend along the coastline south of (beyond) Cape Mendocino, and it is San Francisco Bay that forms a great natural boundary dividing Northwest and Southwest. (Redwoods are found as far south as St. Lucia on the coast, though.) It is as if the Russians continued to follow the Douglas firs, then the redwoods, south, as long as they encountered non-xerophytic coastal vegetation.  (They may have been following sea lions, too.) And I’ve argued many times in alt.mexico and soc.culture.mexican that California and the Southwest would be uninhabited desert today if they had remained part of Mexico.

  Note that I did not say this, but I have stated that these places would be much less developed and advanced than they are as part of the USA. Probably not. The Santa Clara and Salinas Valleys were already known to be highly fertile. The Mercury mine at New Almaden were developed during the Mexican period – this was the single highest value mine in all of California, according to a report of the State Division of Mines and Geology.  There was a rapidly expanding community in the Santa Clara Valley, and expanding trade from Mexico’s Pacific Coast ports. Increasing demand for beef, and improved rail access were also driving increased settlement of Arizona, New Mexico, Sonora, Chihuahua and other relatively sparsely populated areas.

  It was better-watered than the dusty South.  The Santa Clara Valley remained a sea of orchard blossoms into the 1960s, and the Salinas Valley still is very agricultural.  (A trip along US 101 shows this.)  What is sane and relevent is that it would be much more primitive, less advanced.  It would not be a left-wing, environmentalist’s paradise.  (Many trees would be cut for firewood, and if anything, more native wildlife slaughtered for food and for sport.)   It appears that you are unfamiliar with conditions in California, either now or in that period.

  I am not unfamiliar at all.  Not only do I know what California is like, but I also know what Mexico is like — I have seen it for myself. Redwood doesn’t burn worth a damn, for example,

  It is used instead for structures. and the climate of the most densly populated portions of the state is warm enough to make cooking out of doors attractive, most of the year. Even into the 1920s, most domestic water heating in California was solar. It might be worth pointing out that most of California’s money is derived from industries established during the Spanish and Mexican periods: Mining and Agriculture. The latter still appears to depend heavily on imported Mexican labor.

  Agriculture still does, yes.   Major industry did not arise from the earlier period. It would be like you can see for yourself by going into Mexico now.  Away from the borders it might be less crowded (but still primitive); at the (alternative) US border it would be as Tijuana or Ciudad Juarez are now.   Not necessarily. Remember by what fraction Mexico was reduced by the war, and what natural resources were lost. When, in 1912 we discovered that we had accidently left them some copper in the 1848 treaty, we hastily cobbled together the Gadsden purchase to be sure to grab that.

  South of the Gila… In th 1970s, more was discovered, south of the new border, and old-timers in Arizona wondered whether we’d seek a further adjustment to the border. By then, however, it was more profitable for American firms to mine copper in Mexico than in the US, all else being equal.

  By the 1970s it was too, too late!  I have encountered something interesting, though, later: During the Mexican financial crisis and subsequent bailout, one writer I read stated we should bail out Mexico — in exchange for its northern tier. (That would include the prospect of liquefied natural gas terminals in California ports to serve the enviromentalist-NIMBYs north of that alternative border who needed the natural gas for cleaner-burning energy, just as is the real case with Mexico and California now.)

  No comment or attempted rebuttal here — it’s true; Mexican LNG plants are being set to meet California’s needs (augmenting and even substituting for what California should be building). http://www.energy.ca.gov/lng/projects.html Yes. The benign climate and relaxed attitudes of the natives make California a popular destination for migrants of all kinds. This, too, has been true since the Spanish period, or even before, however.

  That’s not the issue.  The issue is that such an environment exists now and that this is (as you admit) an explanation for why there are so many poor and homeless as well as people of all other kinds.  California is a giant state with a giant economy, fully capable of acting as an independent nation.  You are foolish to believe it would be fully developed and a paradise if it remained a part of Mexico, and also foolish to believe that any Mexico successful at retaining it would permit California to become another Texas.  No, gringo; you cannot come to settle and develop California. It’s perhaps worth pointing out at this point that the California separatist movement of the Mexican period was mostly a movement of Spanish speakers. The Norteamericanos had quite mixed feelings on the subject, for various reasons. For example, some of them wanted the region to be annexed by the US. US aspirations to the area were known to all and sundry from at least 1836, when the US navy actually compelled the surrender of the capital of California (owing to the commodore not having read his orders carefully enough).

  Every once in a while there is sentiment in California about secession (more than any mention of expulsion of Calfornia by the rest of the nation).  Almost all of the sentiment and activism related to this concerns partition of the state as well as other north-south related concepts that aren’t restricted only to California.  The most noteworthy idea is the "Cascadia" concept. A separate and independant California might not have been included in the United States following the inevitable war with Mexico.

  Agreed completely.  By "not another Texas" as I’ve written before, specifically I mean that Mexico would not permit without a fight a repetition of large-scale Anglo migration into Mexican California, followed by a desire for secession and obvious interest in joining the USA. Well, it would be like what Mexico would be like today if they had been able to retain any important regions of arable land and useful resources. The history of both nations would be so completely different as to make speculation useless.

  Not useless at all.  We’ve seen elsewhere in Latin America the phenomenon of Beggars on Golden Stools.  And yes, Mexico (which has oil and gas wealth galore, don’t forget, in modern times) has demonstrated what California would very much be like.  (I didn’t have to mention the Mexican Hispanic parts of LA and other metro areas, too, which is obvious.  If there were enough money, the streets would be paved rather than unpaved as is true in much of Juarez, though in a Mexican California one cannot assume the same things as you see now there.) – Hide quoted text — Show quoted text –  Regrettably, you miss the real issue.  If you were still a part of Mexico, you, gringo, would likely not be there, and the place would not be a

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Response:

"Ayyyy!! they stole our territory, and especially the part with all the highways..carajo!!

Response:

"Ayyyy!! they stole our territory, and especially the part with all the highways..carajo!!

  Even the extremists themselves have their own fringe views: http://www.unm.edu/~ecdn/map2080ad.htm   Dave Simpson

Response:

– Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – [Distribution corrected] This was too attractive not to neglect. I like the idea of getting California and New York– specifically the Los Angeles and New York City parts– to secede from the Union. Maybe we can cede LA to Mexico, since it is full of Mexican citizens anyway. Would be fine by me if California succeeded from the union.  It was stolen from Mexico and through US greed of always going after cheep labor it is nearly a Mexican state now.  Whether California were to revert to Mexico or go independent, it would certainly be better off not being a part of the USA.  The USA is simply to rogue like these days, starting wars all over the place, no respect for basic human rights, etc… Civilized states should reconsider if they want to be part of the union IMHO. California was not "stolen" from Mexico, that is a lie repeated over and over by radical Mexican nationals and U.S. chicano activists.  I seem to recall that Generalissimo Santa Anna SIGNED a treaty ceding California and the other territory that comprises the U.S. Southwest.  Yes, we did hold a gun to his head, but he still chose to be cowardly and sign away half his country’s territory to save his life rather than being a man and dying before signing something like that. Like I said, stolen. The US interest in California was its gold, sort of like the US interest in Iraq these days over its oil. Most Iraqis like most Californians will not benefit from US "interests".  This is too typical a leftist statement — the truth is missing from the argument.  When was the war with Mexico?  (1846-48.)  When was the big gold discovery?  (Early 1848.)  When was the Gold Rush? (1849 onward.)

Actually, the Spanish knew of the "mother lode" — they named it, long before 1846. It was, however, too distant to be interesting to exploit, given the much more accessable silver deposits of Mexico and Peru.  Our American Southwest was wanted, at the same time the Northwest also was wanted, because of a desire for land and expansion to the Pacific.  We chose to settle for what we negotiated for with both Mexico and Great Britain, even as many wanted us to take more land.

US aspirations to take over Spanish, subsequently Mexican, territory go a lot further back than that. See, for exmple: http://historicaltextarchive.com/sections.php?op=viewarticle&artid=165 President Polk, in launching the war with Mexico, fully intended to take, in addition to what was eventually annexed, Baja California, Chihuahua and some or all of Sonora.  Specifically, what was most prized in California was San Francisco Bay and its harbor.  And that was before, repeat before, any big gold discovery.

Actually, it was the gold rush that "put San Francisco on the map." The place had no particular importance until the hinterland of the Central and Santa Clara Valleys were developed. The Spanish had held it only to deny its use to a potential hostile power.  Mexico never had a strong claim to, or control of, the lands in dispute.  In fact, there was revolutionary activity in California in addition to the US war with Mexico (which, as no doubt you and other fact-challenged lefties fail also to know, the USA wasn’t guaranteed easily to win, or win at all.)  

Yes, and Americanos del Norte actually served both with the California Separatist movement and with the Mexican loyalists when the revolt came to actual fighting, about 300 on each side. Mexico had no chance whatever to stand up to the United States, however. Recall that Mexico had been independant for less than 25 years, that the Mexican government changed several times during course of the war, and that Mexico’s economy was completely dominated by foreign interests. There is no reason to attach any silly leftist emotional support to the claims of Mexico any more than to Russia in California.  (Yes, the Russians advanced beyond Alaska to the Pacific Northwest proper, and even to California.)

They sold their California holdings to Johann Sutter, shortly before the Mexican war, and have never advanced a claim since taking the money and running. http://www.parks.sonoma.net/rosshist.html  Our discovery of gold in California afterward (repeat, afterward) only added insult to injury to the losing side in the Mexican War. And I’ve argued many times in alt.mexico and soc.culture.mexican that California and the Southwest would be uninhabited desert today if they had remained part of Mexico.

Probably not. The Santa Clara and Salinas Valleys were already known to be highly fertile. The Mercury mine at New Almaden were developed during the Mexican period – this was the single highest value mine in all of California, according to a report of the State Division of Mines and Geology.  There was a rapidly expanding community in the Santa Clara Valley, and expanding trade from Mexico’s Pacific Coast ports. Increasing demand for beef, and improved rail access were also driving increased settlement of Arizona, New Mexico, Sonora, Chihuahua and other relatively sparsely populated areas. That would be terrific, too many people here now.  Your reply is silly and irrelevent.  What is sane and relevent is that it would be much more primitive, less advanced.  It would not be a left-wing, environmentalist’s paradise.  (Many trees would be cut for firewood, and if anything, more native wildlife slaughtered for food and for sport.)  

It appears that you are unfamiliar with conditions in California, either now or in that period. Redwood doesn’t burn worth a damn, for example, and the climate of the most densly populated portions of the state is warm enough to make cooking out of doors attractive, most of the year. Even into the 1920s, most domestic water heating in California was solar. It might be worth pointing out that most of California’s money is derived from industries established during the Spanish and Mexican periods: Mining and Agriculture. The latter still appears to depend heavily on imported Mexican labor. It would be like you can see for yourself by going into Mexico now.  Away from the borders it might be less crowded (but still primitive); at the (alternative) US border it would be as Tijuana or Ciudad Juarez are now.  

Not necessarily. Remember by what fraction Mexico was reduced by the war, and what natural resources were lost. When, in 1912 we discovered that we had accidently left them some copper in the 1848 treaty, we hastily cobbled together the Gadsden purchase to be sure to grab that. In th 1970s, more was discovered, south of the new border, and old-timers in Arizona wondered whether we’d seek a further adjustment to the border. By then, however, it was more profitable for American firms to mine copper in Mexico than in the US, all else being equal. – Hide quoted text — Show quoted text -(That would include the prospect of liquefied natural gas terminals in California ports to serve the enviromentalist-NIMBYs north of that alternative border who needed the natural gas for cleaner-burning energy, just as is the real case with Mexico and California now.)  The region is prosperous ONLY because it is part of the USA.  California is currently the ***5th*** largest economy on earth. If the California is such a large economy, why are there so many poor and homeless people here?  Being a large economy is not a good thing if all the wealth is concentrated at the top.  All the wealth isn’t concentrated at the top.  The reason California has so many poor and homeless people has to do with absolute and relative terms.  California is a gigantic state population- as well as area-wise, and it is only natural to expect its poor and homeless population would be large.  It also is favored because of its benign climate and the often relatively benign attitude toward the poor and homeless and US-liberal welfare-state politics and policies.

Yes. The benign climate and relaxed attitudes of the natives make California a popular destination for migrants of all kinds. This, too, has been true since the Spanish period, or even before, however.  California is a giant state with a giant economy, fully capable of acting as an independent nation.  You are foolish to believe it would be fully developed and a paradise if it remained a part of Mexico, and also foolish to believe that any Mexico successful at retaining it would permit California to become another Texas.  No, gringo; you cannot come to settle and develop California.

It’s perhaps worth pointing out at this point that the California separatist movement of the Mexican period was mostly a movement of Spanish speakers. The Norteamericanos had quite mixed feelings on the subject, for various reasons. For example, some of them wanted the region to be annexed by the US. US aspirations to the area were known to all and sundry from at least 1836, when the US navy actually compelled the surrender of the capital of California (owing to the commodore not having read his orders carefully enough). A separate and independant California might not have been included in the United States following the inevitable war with Mexico. – Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – Mexico would have driven it into the ground, making  it poorer than Rwanda today. I doubt that, probably California would have been an independent country had it not been for the gold.  Not at all.  Manifest Destiny in fact was limited in what was sought and taken by and into the USA, as opposed to what some wanted (such as all of North America, all the way to Panama at the most extreme, as well as the less extreme demands for Baja California and all of what now is northern Mexico, if not all of Mexico — there also were moves toward the

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Response:

[Distribution corrected] This was too attractive not to neglect. – Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – I like the idea of getting California and New York– specifically the Los Angeles and New York City parts– to secede from the Union. Maybe we can cede LA to Mexico, since it is full of Mexican citizens anyway. Would be fine by me if California succeeded from the union.  It was stolen from Mexico and through US greed of always going after cheep labor it is nearly a Mexican state now.  Whether California were to revert to Mexico or go independent, it would certainly be better off not being a part of the USA.  The USA is simply to rogue like these days, starting wars all over the place, no respect for basic human rights, etc… Civilized states should reconsider if they want to be part of the union IMHO. California was not "stolen" from Mexico, that is a lie repeated over and over by radical Mexican nationals and U.S. chicano activists.  I seem to recall that Generalissimo Santa Anna SIGNED a treaty ceding California and the other territory that comprises the U.S. Southwest.  Yes, we did hold a gun to his head, but he still chose to be cowardly and sign away half his country’s territory to save his life rather than being a man and dying before signing something like that. Like I said, stolen. The US interest in California was its gold, sort of like the US interest in Iraq these days over its oil. Most Iraqis like most Californians will not benefit from US "interests".

  This is too typical a leftist statement — the truth is missing from the argument.  When was the war with Mexico?  (1846-48.)  When was the big gold discovery?  (Early 1848.)  When was the Gold Rush? (1849 onward.)   Our American Southwest was wanted, at the same time the Northwest also was wanted, because of a desire for land and expansion to the Pacific.  We chose to settle for what we negotiated for with both Mexico and Great Britain, even as many wanted us to take more land.   Specifically, what was most prized in California was San Francisco Bay and its harbor.  And that was before, repeat before, any big gold discovery.   Mexico never had a strong claim to, or control of, the lands in dispute.  In fact, there was revolutionary activity in California in addition to the US war with Mexico (which, as no doubt you and other fact-challenged lefties fail also to know, the USA wasn’t guaranteed easily to win, or win at all.)  There is no reason to attach any silly leftist emotional support to the claims of Mexico any more than to Russia in California.  (Yes, the Russians advanced beyond Alaska to the Pacific Northwest proper, and even to California.) http://www.parks.sonoma.net/rosshist.html   Our discovery of gold in California afterward (repeat, afterward) only added insult to injury to the losing side in the Mexican War. And I’ve argued many times in alt.mexico and soc.culture.mexican that California and the Southwest would be uninhabited desert today if they had remained part of Mexico. That would be terrific, too many people here now.

  Your reply is silly and irrelevent.  What is sane and relevent is that it would be much more primitive, less advanced.  It would not be a left-wing, environmentalist’s paradise.  (Many trees would be cut for firewood, and if anything, more native wildlife slaughtered for food and for sport.)  It would be like you can see for yourself by going into Mexico now.  Away from the borders it might be less crowded (but still primitive); at the (alternative) US border it would be as Tijuana or Ciudad Juarez are now.  (That would include the prospect of liquefied natural gas terminals in California ports to serve the enviromentalist-NIMBYs north of that alternative border who needed the natural gas for cleaner-burning energy, just as is the real case with Mexico and California now.)  The region is prosperous ONLY because it is part of the USA.  California is currently the ***5th*** largest economy on earth. If the California is such a large economy, why are there so many poor and homeless people here?  Being a large economy is not a good thing if all the wealth is concentrated at the top.

  All the wealth isn’t concentrated at the top.  The reason California has so many poor and homeless people has to do with absolute and relative terms.  California is a gigantic state population- as well as area-wise, and it is only natural to expect its poor and homeless population would be large.  It also is favored because of its benign climate and the often relatively benign attitude toward the poor and homeless and US-liberal welfare-state politics and policies.   California is a giant state with a giant economy, fully capable of acting as an independent nation.  You are foolish to believe it would be fully developed and a paradise if it remained a part of Mexico, and also foolish to believe that any Mexico successful at retaining it would permit California to become another Texas.  No, gringo; you cannot come to settle and develop California. Mexico would have driven it into the ground, making  it poorer than Rwanda today. I doubt that, probably California would have been an independent country had it not been for the gold.

  Not at all.  Manifest Destiny in fact was limited in what was sought and taken by and into the USA, as opposed to what some wanted (such as all of North America, all the way to Panama at the most extreme, as well as the less extreme demands for Baja California and all of what now is northern Mexico, if not all of Mexico — there also were moves toward the Caribbean and what commonly is known as Central America). The USA did not take more of Mexico, though it did re-take its Southeast following an attempt at secession.  That high-growth period in US history is very much behind the decision north of us for Confederation. http://collection.nlc-bnc.ca/100/200/301/nlc-bnc/cdn_confederation-ef…   There was no question for the desire of the US for California and its port with Pacific access.  (Southern Calfornia was backward and dusty for ages, even after US acquisition.  The USA wanted San Francisco.)  There was bound to be conflict, especially as Mexico’s claim was weak at the same time the US’s desire was strong.  (The USA aded some insult to injury at Canada, insofar as the United Kingdom and Canadians might be concerned, because where was the Alaska boundary eventually placed?  What latitude?  54-40.)   What may be of interest to you and everyone else regarding What Might Have Been concern the negotiations for establishing the boundary or boundaries with Mexico.  If I recall, we (the USA) initially asked for all Alta and Baja California, while the Mexicans initially asked for everything south of the vicinity of Monterey.  (Envision the border along the southern part of the Santa Cruz Mountains.)  In a later stage Mexico tried to retain all of what most consider to be Southern California (south of the Transverse Ranges).   South of any boundary it would be now what Mexico is like today, including what Mexico is like at Tijuana or Ciudad Juarez where there is much close to the international boundary.  (It includes dirt roads in the streets of Juarez, plainly viewable from I-10 as one approaches El Paso from Las Cruces.)  If California were part of Mexico right now, it would probably have less than a million residents, 950,000 all living on the CA-MX/OR-US border awaiting their chance to escape across that border into the U.S.  L.A., S.F., Sacramento, etc. would all be tiny peasant villages if they existed at all, and there might be a dozen or two fields of beans and goat farms in the entire state. That would be so nice! No pollution, all that wonderful farmland in the central valley to ourselves while the US starved.  Our mountains and forests would still be full of wildlife and would still contain the original old growth trees.  Instead the US has pretty much raped California of its oil, gold, old growth trees, etc. Whats left now is a population who in significant numbers is either imprisoned, homeless, poor, and our natural resources mostly gone.

  Regrettably, you miss the real issue.  If you were still a part of Mexico, you, gringo, would likely not be there, and the place would not be a paradise; nor would you gringos be permitted to turn California into anything resembling what it was in the 1880s to 1960s.  If you were an independent country, enough people in Mexico in favor of "la Reconquista" would love to see it happen; you would need us to defend you (especially if your leftism dominated Californian foreign and military policy).  If you had been still part of Mexico, which is the real alternative to what has happened, you largely would have been devoid of development; you would have been similar to what you see on the other side of the existing international border between the US and Mexico, with you and your kids likely to die of death as infants from diarrhea or in your childhood from a large number of diseases almost unknown or truly unknown in this country.   And you’d be looking largely to go north to find a much better economic life.   Dave Simpson

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