From Doug

Folks:

I left a good job in the City! Working for the Man!

I left Northern California 3 weeks ago because I was tired of seeing 50-55% of my income being paid to the state and federal government and my services decreasing. I moved to Oregon, immediately lowering my sales tax, my property tax, and now that I am unemployed I am going to see how life on the government dole is! (kidding). I figure at least I can control my outflow, and because of economics the demographics has far fewer illegal non-American citizens living here. For all you dismissive, pandering, thoughtless "progressives" stop already with the racism or the xenophobic thoughts. I love immigrants that come to the country and add value. LOVE. Indians with engineering degrees, Iranians with MDs, Chinese with PhD's - please come! Marry my daughters! Unskilled labor with huge families? No thanks.

I wrote my local government in Los Altos/Mountain View about spending dollars for the "day workers". I was adamantly opposed to it and no one would listen. I refuse to hire non-Americans (come on, they are not illegal immigrants, they are squatters who have illegally occupied positions that would outrage any Union shop. The quasi socialist state that we have become will not tolerate this underground system. We need to employ American citizens. Jobs that Americans won't do? I will stick my head in a pail of poo for the right price!) Hence, lets call them what they are - non-Americans.

I am writing you, because you asked me to yesterday during your show. In California, our dropout rate in our high schools is 25%. It is almost all due to fantastic Latino occupancy of our schools and their ridiculous dropout rate. I can only hope that Oregonians will "go to school" on my experience and the Californian experience. Stop with the dismissive name calling - racist! Xenophobe! and put pencil to paper. The folks that think we should encourage the mass migration of unskilled labor and all of their children to the United States are deluded. I am not casting an insult, the data bears out the delusion. America will not become stronger by encouraging mass migration of unskilled labor and their families. My experience, not my hyperbole-soaked theory, witnessed the following:

My taxes became oppressive, while my schools and emergency rooms became intolerable. The insult to this injury is that in order to avoid the tragedy of the public school, you had to go private. Where we lived the going rate was $22,000 to $30,000 a year and rising at high single digits. I figured in 6 years my three kids would be each $50,000 a year. My property taxes were $25,000 a year for my very average home. That means, in 6 years, I would have to make $330,000 gross income just so my kids could go to junior high (the government gets paid first, folks). This is nucking futz! Last year, my two year old was being a monkey on the bed and bumped her head. It was a huge knot so we took her to ER at 9 pm to get her melon checked out. We waded through a sea of folks, none with any apparent breaks or bleeding, most with dark skin, black hair and construction boots and congestion. Now, I went to ER once for help with bronchitis because I could hardly swallow at 3 am and I got some anti-biotics that set me back $640 after insurance! These folks not only get the medical treatment for free (it will cost ER $50,000 penalty if they refuse treatment) but they also block health care for legitimate emergencies. If they want to pay the crazy price of ER, let it rip, but not for free!
Our schools in upper middle class Los Altos became over-ran with sudden ELL (English Language Learners) and the school district did everything in their power to obfuscate the truth and told the tax payers that we they were going to have to move their kids to different schools to re balance these ELL's (hmmmm, maybe ELL stands for Educating Lotsa Latinos!) Can you imagine? You pay more than TWO THOUSAND a month in property tax, of which 56% goes directly to the school, and the government tells you, "Thanks, but you can't go to the school next to the home you just bought. You need to drive your kid 4 miles to this other school." Oh, and by the way, we want you to donate more after tax dollars to the public schools.

And California is increasing both its sales and income tax 10%. Fewer services, more taxes.

Seriously folks, it is not worth getting your food served, your lawn cut, or your nails hammered for a 20 or even 50% reduction in wages. This is not sustainable. Do the net present value of my above scenario and it is non-trivial. $250,000 a year for 6 years is a net present value of a couple million dollars! For your grass or your food!! This is insane. This is the road to Hell. I was just driving on it and I can assure you that you do not want to get on it.

I am pleading with the Oregon authorities. You have knowledge of the California experience. With that knowledge comes responsibility. If you witness California and know why they are failing and you choose to follow the same path, the citizens should impeach you on grounds of gross incompetent recklessness. We have been forewarned. Dig in your heels folks.

By the way, I am not a Californian. I am an Oregonian, born in Oregon, educated by both Oregon secondary schools and Universities. Oregon needs to try very hard to not become California. I have been to the front, and as a scout, I am pleading to the citizens of Oregon to demand more from their leaders.