California is now a valuable touchstone to the country, a warning of what not to do. Rarely has a single generation inherited so much natural wealth and bounty from the investment and hard work of those more noble now resting in our cemeteries-and squandered that gift within a generation.

Almost every key indicator of the current economy - unemployment, deficits, housing, energy - argues that Obama's reactionary all-powerful statist approach has only made things far worse.

The fact is, beneath the hype, Iraqis will soon appreciate American help and idealism far more than French perfidy. It is never wrong to be on the side of freedom - never.

States are like people. They do not question the awful status quo until some dramatic event overturns the conventional and lax way of thinking.

So why, after prior successes, did Obama's race/class/gender attack finally sputter out like the French at Waterloo?

If I talk to black students on campus, they're not sympathetic to the people who are not sympathetic with [Black Lives Matter movement]. The fact that you want to argue rather than find some common ground, I think, has gotten a lot worse in the last years.

If I talk to rural people where I live - mostly Hispanic but also poor white - they're not sympathetic to the Black Lives Matter movement.