Now for good or ill, California is the place where trends tend to be set in Western civilization - if civilization indeed it is. California, for several generations now, has been the newest, biggest, most experimental place in the newest, biggest, most experimental part of liberal Western capitalism - which is itself a new experiment for mankind.
P. J. O'RourkePopular culture has become engorged, broadening and thickening until it's the only culture anyone notices.
P. J. O'RourkeHow did an allegedly free people spawn a vast, rampant cuttlefish of dominion with its tentacles in every orifice of the body politic?
P. J. O'RourkeIt is important to remember when reading Adam Smith or even when just thinking about Smith that the era that he lived in, we're not talking about poverty in a day when it meant not enough bedrooms for the kids, an old car, a black and white television. We're talking about a whole world where poverty meant not enough to eat.
P. J. O'Rourke