Californians must overcome their ‘colonial mentality’ and assert their dominant national role.

I’ve come to realize a few things about California. One of them is its inability to exert as much influence in the whole country as you would expect for the most populous state that generates the most income. There’s a flip side to that.

Californians don’t believe they’re in the biggest, badest, heavy-duty state that can demand things from others. Instead they think they’re just important enough to be left alone.

I believe that geographic distance, the lack of news media, and Mediterranean climate have given Californians a colonial mentality.

People in European colonies sometimes benefited from helping colonizers, even if that hurt their own country’s interests. They may have empathized with or at least understood the colonizer’s perspective. They may have believed their own culture was inferior.

The Russians, the Spanish, and the Americans all colonized California. But they went native, to some extent. California turned out to be easier that many other places. Californians developed their own culture.

Geographic distance helps. Californians see Washington DC and Wall St as a world apart. We don’t rebel against this; it’s part of our heritage. It’s also a mirror image of the way people in those power centers view California. In NY people think of Californians as hippies, surfer dudes. Californians sort of accept this.

Californians doubt their national relevance. California has benefited from being so far away. Silicon Valley investors do not follow Wall St. bankers rigid rules. In a nutshell, that’s why you can’t reproduce Silicon Valley in the east. Wealthy people here developed their own culture.

Hollywood is where it is because it’s the farthest place in America from New Jersey. Thomas Edison locked down patents on movie making equipment, circa 1905. He wanted to start the industry in NJ. Filmmakers got a hold of the equipment and went as far away as they could. Edison would send attorneys out, and filmmakers hopped across to Mexico.

But like a lot of places that grow using an advantage, once they mature that can hold them back. California grew strong behaving like a little brother. Now it has to take its place as America’s big brother.

Californians don’t have a newspaper of record. Major broadcasters are centered on the east coast. Political and investigative reporting doesn’t focus on California. Not as much as it merits. Energy decays exponentially over distance, and so does information. If PG&E had blacked out the east coast, journalists would have swarmed over it, camped out on executive lawns, dug into arcane documents. But the NY Times isn’t going to send that many people out here. There’s no Californian counterpart.

Californians believe they aren’t as important as they really are. They accept the distorted view of Californians of others, perhaps even follow it. That’s a kind of colonial mentality.

Over two million Californians lost power for several days recently. It caused immense economic damage, and some people died. It was the second or third article on the front page of the NYT. It was the second story on the broadcast news.

I’ve experienced blackouts on the east coast, and in the big one the entire front page of the newspaper was devoted to it. I called a friend in NY during the recent blackout, and he agreed. He wasn’t surprised that California’s blackout wasn’t such a big deal. It’s California, after all.

But the business of America is California. California black-outs cause more damage to the entire country than blackouts anywhere else.

Colonial mentalities keep people from standing up and demanding the power they deserve. If the blackout was in the east, every governor in an effected state, every Senator and congressperson, would demand federal assistance. Not here.

Californians are debating whether PGE rate payers, or California tax payers, should cover the huge cost of hardening the electric grid. If this was Georgia, Maryland, New Jersey or Massachusetts the national government would be expected to take the lead.

It’s time to recognize who we are. The entire country needs a more robust electric grid. Californians should insist it starts here, and demand the entire country help pay for it.

It’s time for Californians to shed their colonial mentality.