Speaker 1: Well, it just goes from bad to worse for the
Speaker 1: high speed rail project. On Wednesday, they had a budgetary
Speaker 1: hearing about it at the State Assembly. Here's the story
Speaker 1: about it from Ashley Zavala. Ashley Zavalla, by the way,
Speaker 1: who you should all look up on Twitter. Ashley Zavalla.
Speaker 1: She's a reporter for She's just a local news reporter
Speaker 1: in Sacramento, and she's like the only reporter who breaks
Speaker 1: any news about anything happening within state government. It's actually remarkable.
Speaker 1: She's far and away the best person to follow about
Speaker 1: news in Sacramento. And I think she's kind of putting
Speaker 1: every every reporter for every other news outlet that's based
Speaker 1: in California to shame. Anyway, she writes, California's embattled high
Speaker 1: speed rail project will soon need at least seven billion
Speaker 1: dollars in order to move forward. During a budget hearing
Speaker 1: focused on transportation in the State Assembly on Wednesday, Helen
Speaker 1: Kirstein with the California Legislative Analysts Office told lawmakers the
Speaker 1: project faces a seven bohbo bo bo bo bo bo
Speaker 1: bo billion dollar budget gap and the funds need to
Speaker 1: be secured by next June. So June end of fiscal
Speaker 1: year twenty five twenty six. If not, Kirstine said, it
Speaker 1: will create yet another delay for plans to finish the
Speaker 1: project's first segment between Merced and Bakersfield. There is no
Speaker 1: specific plan to meet that roughly seven billion dollar gap.
Speaker 1: We also think there is some risk that gap could grow.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna interpret that as it's AB's a freaking loutly
Speaker 1: going to be more than seven billion dollars. Kirstine said.
Speaker 1: This isn't a way out in the future funding gap.
Speaker 1: This is a pretty immediate This isn't a way out
Speaker 1: in the future funding gap. This is a pretty immediate
Speaker 1: funding gap. Wednesday's hearing on the project was brief. Well,
Speaker 1: you wouldn't want to spend a lot of time on it.
Speaker 1: This is one of the great things about the California legislature.
Speaker 1: Like they introduce a bill in committee, usually one side
Speaker 1: only gets two minutes to discuss it, and the side
Speaker 1: that they want to v for gets as much time
Speaker 1: as they want. Anyway, Wednesday's hearing on the project was brief,
Speaker 1: as the High Speed Rail Authority submitted an incomplete project
Speaker 1: update to lawmakers in time for the hearing. Good the
Speaker 1: High Speed Rail Authority that they can't even get a
Speaker 1: full update in time for hearings. Officials said the update
Speaker 1: would be ready sometime later this summer, which irked lawmakers.
Speaker 1: We have no plan, we have a good likelihood it's
Speaker 1: going to get worse, and we have a short time
Speaker 1: to solve the problem, set Assemblyman Stephen Bennett, a Democrat
Speaker 1: from Ventura. That's not a good place for government to
Speaker 1: put itself into. The project was originally pitched to voters
Speaker 1: in two thousand and eight. Ah, let's let's go back
Speaker 1: to two thousand and eight, the two thousand and eight November.
Speaker 2: Elections in California.
Speaker 1: What a What a wild election that was the same
Speaker 1: election where we overwhelmingly elected Barack Obama, we passed Proposition
Speaker 1: eight to define marriages between one man and one woman,
Speaker 1: and we decided to build the bullet train. What a
Speaker 1: wild election that was anyway. The project was originally pitched
Speaker 1: to voters in two thousand and eight as a forty
Speaker 1: billion dollar bullet train that would take riders from Los
Speaker 1: Angeles to San Francisco. Since then, the price tag for
Speaker 1: the original vision has swelled to at least one hundred billion,
Speaker 1: and most of the money has yet to materialize. While
Speaker 1: the state has spent about fourteen billion on the project
Speaker 1: so far overall, it still needs more than double that
Speaker 1: amount in order to finish the merce said to Bakersfield Line,
Speaker 1: which project leaders hoped to be completed between twenty thirty
Speaker 1: and twenty thirty three, Well, that's an awfully big window.
Speaker 1: Twenty thirty to twenty thirty that's like a four different
Speaker 1: years in which that could be completed. The Trump administration
Speaker 1: earlier this year launched an investigation into the use of
Speaker 1: about four billion dollars in federal funds, which is still underway.
Speaker 1: Lawmakers acknowledged the administration could halt future money or try
Speaker 1: to claw back the dollars. Kirstine told lawmakers the rail
Speaker 1: authorities incomplete update assumes it will still receive and keep
Speaker 1: federal dollars. Okay, so we're we're facing a seven billion
Speaker 1: dollar shortfall.
Speaker 2: And that's assuming that we can keep.
Speaker 1: All the federal money which the Trump administration is actively
Speaker 1: trying to claw back. Mike Tolifson, the chief of staff
Speaker 1: for the High Speed Rail Authority, told lawmakers the project's
Speaker 1: new CEO is working to review the project. Overall, we
Speaker 1: are diligently working to get that information respect to scope
Speaker 1: schedule ridership, Toulson told the panel, You've been working on
Speaker 1: this for forever. How is that not all one hundred
Speaker 1: percent laid out in detail already? Kirstin recommended that lawmakers
Speaker 1: try to figure this out.
Speaker 2: Well, maybe maybe you should figure it out.
Speaker 1: Kirstine recommended that lawmakers try to figure this out as
Speaker 1: they work to determine the state spending plan for the
Speaker 1: next fiscal year, which starts in July. The timing of
Speaker 1: the project review seems totally out of whack with when
Speaker 1: we need to be making decisions, said Assembly Member Kaddy
Speaker 1: Petrick Norris, a Democrat from Irvine.
Speaker 2: That this is this is key.
Speaker 1: The timing of the project review seems totally out of
Speaker 1: whack with when we need to be making decisions. The
Speaker 1: definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and
Speaker 1: over again, ex backing a different outcome. So I think
Speaker 1: the point she's trying to make is, you know, the
Speaker 1: governor starts working on next year's budget in I don't know,
Speaker 1: like December January. We're in March. We're now learning about
Speaker 1: this seven billion dollar shortfall, and if we don't get
Speaker 1: that money by June of next year, the high speed
Speaker 1: rail will be delayed until. I mean now the window
Speaker 1: is twenty thirty to twenty thirty three, what'll it be,
Speaker 1: I don't know what it'll be like, twenty thirty two
Speaker 1: to twenty thirty six, I don't know. Meanwhile, State Senate
Speaker 1: Transportation Committee Chairman David Cortes Cortesi told KCRA three he
Speaker 1: is hoping to schedule a hearing on the high speed
Speaker 1: rail project in May. Wednesday's hearing happened hours after Governor
Speaker 1: gavenue From released the latest episode of his pot cast
Speaker 1: featuring political commentator and author Ezra Kleine, in which the
Speaker 1: governor defended the project. We did the railhead. We're starting
Speaker 1: to lay track. This thing is starting to get very
Speaker 1: very real, the governor said. The episode focused on how
Speaker 1: now that's actually interesting. I maybe I need to go
Speaker 1: listen to Gavin Newsom.
Speaker 2: Gosh, it would really suck. As part of my job.
Speaker 1: I need to actually listen to a Gavin Newsom podcast
Speaker 1: every week. Ezra Kline is a columnist for The New
Speaker 1: York Times, and he's been highly critical of democratic leaders
Speaker 1: basically being unable to accomplish big goals in the high
Speaker 1: speed rail was one of the chief objects of his approbrium,
Speaker 1: So it seems that Newsom is trying to have him
Speaker 1: on to say, oh, no, it's not that bad.
Speaker 2: I think this is.
Speaker 1: Newsom trying to lay the groundwork for his twenty twenty
Speaker 1: eight presidential campaign and so oh no, no, no, high
Speaker 1: speed reel isn't total failure. The episode focused on how
Speaker 1: Democratic leaders have struggled to build and finish major projects
Speaker 1: in recent decades, which has frustrated the party's supporters and
Speaker 1: voters overall. Newsome acknowledged the challenges with the California's high
Speaker 1: speed rail project, but claimed, now the hard work is
Speaker 1: behind us and now we're laying track. Well, clearly the
Speaker 1: hard work is not behind you, because you've got a
Speaker 1: seven billion dollars short fall. When Klein pressed him about
Speaker 1: the money shortfalls to complete the project overall and then
Speaker 1: are said to Bakersfield line, Newsom replied, at the end
Speaker 1: of the day, we've got these constraints that are well
Speaker 1: established in existing constraints. That's not an answer. At the
Speaker 1: end of the day, we've got these constraints. Yeah, the
Speaker 1: constraint that you don't have enough money. There's not a
Speaker 1: high speed rail system that doesn't have some popularity and success.
Speaker 1: Most are wildly popular. It's an experience no one has
Speaker 1: had in the United States of America. At least we're
Speaker 1: out here. We're out there daring, he said. I was
Speaker 1: in middle school when this happens, said Assembly Member Alexandra Mesido,
Speaker 1: a Republican from Tularry who was elected to the state
Speaker 1: Assembly in the last election.
Speaker 2: We don't have the time, we don't have the money.
Speaker 1: We just need to pull the plug on this project,
Speaker 1: she said, as the voters passed it in two thousand
Speaker 1: and eight.
Speaker 2: It's never going to happen. Hard to argue with that.
Speaker 1: I mean, I am really struggling with how Democrats can't
Speaker 1: come to that analysis. The sunk cost fallacy, all right,
Speaker 1: The sunk cost fallacy is basically, I've got a failing project,
Speaker 1: but I've invested so much into it that I can't
Speaker 1: just give up on it. That is feeding into the
Speaker 1: sunk cost fallacy. No, at a certain point, you need
Speaker 1: to just accept the loss, cut your losses and move on.
Speaker 1: Will actually be a better outcome than continuing to stick
Speaker 1: with something that's doomed. And Gavin Newsom is desperate. That's
Speaker 1: the other thing is that we have people with lots.
Speaker 2: Of different motivations. So let's think about this.
Speaker 1: Nobody currently in the state legislature was in the state
Speaker 1: legislature in two thousand and eight. Okay, California has term limits,
Speaker 1: twelve year term limits, So nobody who's currently in the
Speaker 1: state legislature was in the state legislature in two thousand
Speaker 1: and eight when the high speed rail was passed.
Speaker 2: Okay.
Speaker 1: There are very few people left in the state legislature
Speaker 1: who feel some kind of political need to keep defending
Speaker 1: the high speed rail. Now, Newsom was around in two
Speaker 1: thousand and eight. He was supportive of it then and
Speaker 1: critically Newsom made this big decision after he was elected
Speaker 1: governor in twenty nineteen. A lot of people thought that
Speaker 1: Newsom would cut bait on the high.
Speaker 2: Speed rail project.
Speaker 1: There's a lot of reporting that he was less enthused
Speaker 1: about it than Jerry Brown was, and it seems of
Speaker 1: what happened was he got convinced of this idea well,
Speaker 1: merced to Bakersfield, merceaid to Bakersfield, and Newsom's entire governorship,
Speaker 1: all we've heard about is we're cutting our loss, We're
Speaker 1: going to focus on let's just get merced to Bakersfield done,
Speaker 1: and once me said to Bakersfield is done, it will
Speaker 1: demonstrate the viability of the system as a whole, which
Speaker 1: was always an argument that it just didn't make any
Speaker 1: flippant sense. Merceaid to Bakersfield was never going to be.
Speaker 1: That's not representative of the system as a whole. Okay,
Speaker 1: it's building it across the least populous and flattest stretch
Speaker 1: of California, with the least amount of problems with eminent
Speaker 1: domain seizures, the fewest engineering challenges as far as navigating
Speaker 1: the terrain. Okay, you don't have to blast through mountains,
Speaker 1: which apparently we I don't know that we even today,
Speaker 1: I don't know that there's a great strategy for how
Speaker 1: we get this high speed rail across the Grapevine. And
Speaker 1: it's also I also have always thought that there's no
Speaker 1: way this is going to demonstrate the viability of the
Speaker 1: high speed rail just based on ridership, because who in
Speaker 1: the San Joaquin Valley, the San Wauquin Valley, which is
Speaker 1: the most negative region in the in the state with
Speaker 1: regards to its opinions on the high speed rail. Who
Speaker 1: in the San Joachin Valley is gonna ride this thing.
Speaker 1: There's no trip all right. Merced to Bakersfield itself is
Speaker 1: roughly a I don't know, a three hour car drive,
Speaker 1: and there's not a lot of direct mer said to
Speaker 1: Bakersfield traffic.
Speaker 2: I mean, mostly it's okay.
Speaker 1: If you live in Fresno and you want to go
Speaker 1: to Bakersfield, what are you gonna do? Well, you can
Speaker 1: either get to a train station forty minutes early, get
Speaker 1: on the train, take the train to Bakersfield, takes about
Speaker 1: an hour. You get off in Bakersfield, and then what.
Speaker 2: Are you gonna do? You're gonna take an uber or something.
Speaker 1: You haven't really saved any time, so, I mean, and
Speaker 1: then when you're.
Speaker 2: In Bakersfield, you don't have the flexibility of your own car.
Speaker 1: I just don't think anyone is gonna actually ride this
Speaker 1: thing from Merced to Bakersfield. I just don't see how
Speaker 1: this is going to happen unless you have I don't know,
Speaker 1: you work in downtown Fresno and you're going to someplace
Speaker 1: that happens to be right next to the train station
Speaker 1: in Bakersfield or Maderra, Merced or whatever. But to me,
Speaker 1: it just seems like there's no way anybody's going to
Speaker 1: ride this thing or its ridership is going to be
Speaker 1: really small. How is this going to demonstrate the viability
Speaker 1: of anything. Newsom sort of decided in twenty nineteen this
Speaker 1: was what he was going to do, and he needs
Speaker 1: this to work. He can't abandon it like a sunk
Speaker 1: cost because it's about his presidency. When we return, I
Speaker 1: want to talk about how important the high speed rail
Speaker 1: is for his presidential ambitions.
Speaker 2: That's next on the John Growardy Show.
Speaker 1: Gavin Newsom needs the high speed rail project to work
Speaker 1: because he needs to run for president.
Speaker 2: He needs it. It's an essential cog in his desire
Speaker 2: to run for president.
Speaker 1: If at least merced De Bakersfield isn't completed or well
Speaker 1: on the road to completion, this is what the debate
Speaker 1: stage is gonna look like for the presidential election. You
Speaker 1: want to talk about infrastructure, This guy can't even get
Speaker 1: his high speed rail project done. He's been working on
Speaker 1: it in California. He worked on it in California for
Speaker 1: eight years. When he started. There wasn't a single inch
Speaker 1: of operable track. When he left office, there wasn't a
Speaker 1: single inch of operable track. They had to and Newsome
Speaker 1: is so vulnerable about the high speed rail, He's gonna
Speaker 1: get roasted on a debate stage when that subject is
Speaker 1: brought up, whether that's in the primary debates against other
Speaker 1: Democrats or if it's on the main debate stage going
Speaker 1: up against Jade Vance, he's gonna get fried.
Speaker 2: So here's the thing.
Speaker 1: I think most lawmakers, even on the Democrats side, would
Speaker 1: be open to the idea of is this the sunk
Speaker 1: cost fallacy? Should we just cut our losses? Should we
Speaker 1: just say forget it? We need to just abandon this project.
Speaker 1: It's never gonna happen. It's just not viable. Forget it,
Speaker 1: We're done, roll it all up, deconstruct it, get all
Speaker 1: the stuff for salvage or something, and move on.
Speaker 2: I think a lot of Democrats would be open to that.
Speaker 1: I think particularly a lot of Democrats from the Los
Speaker 1: Angeles area. Los Angeles was always less supportive of high
Speaker 1: speed rail than San Francisco was. It was always going
Speaker 1: to be more of a benefit to San Francisco. Why well,
Speaker 1: home prices in San Francisco are too insane. The trend
Speaker 1: has been in the San Francisco in the Bay area
Speaker 1: just to move further and further south away from the
Speaker 1: Bay Area and have longer and longer commutes. Speed rail
Speaker 1: was a very attractive thing if you're a young if
Speaker 1: you're an urban professional, you want to buy a big
Speaker 1: old house in Madera or something and commute twice a
Speaker 1: week to San Francisco, get a high speed rail train
Speaker 1: and by to being by a bang baa boom. That
Speaker 1: made a lot of sense for the Bay Area. It
Speaker 1: doesn't make as much sense for Los Angeles. So, I mean,
Speaker 1: I don't think anyone's going to buy a home in
Speaker 1: Bakersfield to go, you know, commute two hours to go
Speaker 1: into Los Angeles or something. So high speed rail was
Speaker 1: always more popular in the Bay Area. I could see
Speaker 1: a lot of LA Area lawmakers thinking this is dumb,
Speaker 1: Like why are we still This is not really going
Speaker 1: to benefit our region all that much. It's going to
Speaker 1: cost a lot of money, and like, you know, it's
Speaker 1: not very environmentally sensitive to say, but we have a
Speaker 1: high speed system to get from to San Francisco.
Speaker 2: It's called airplanes.
Speaker 1: We got a gazillion planes that shuttle back and forth
Speaker 1: forty minutes flat you go from Los Angeles to San Francisco.
Speaker 1: So I could see lawmakers from Los Angeles saying, you know,
Speaker 1: forget it. I'd never voted for the Look I could
Speaker 1: see a lawmaker from Los Angeles saying, hey, I was
Speaker 1: like sixteen when the state voted for the high speed
Speaker 1: rail in two thousand and eight. Alexandra Mesdo, the assembly
Speaker 1: member from Visalia, is saying that same thing.
Speaker 2: She said, I was in middle school when the state
Speaker 2: voted for this. A lot of these.
Speaker 1: Lawmakers from LA could say, look, I wasn't a prominent
Speaker 1: person pushing for the high speed rail in two thousand
Speaker 1: and eight. I don't have any commitment to this. I'm out.
Speaker 1: I'm not going to keep voting for its funding anymore.
Speaker 1: Democrats could do that, but there's one Democrat who needs
Speaker 1: it to succeed, and it's Gavin Newsom. If Gavin Newsom,
Speaker 1: if his own Democrats rebel and say we're done with
Speaker 1: the high speed rail, we're giving up. If Gavin Newsom,
Speaker 1: seven years into his eight years of governorship, were to
Speaker 1: finally pull the plug on the high speed rail.
Speaker 2: Now.
Speaker 1: There's no way he's running for president. Now it's different.
Speaker 1: If Newsom on day one had said forget it. This
Speaker 1: high speed rail is a it's a train of nowhere.
Speaker 1: It's never gonna happen, and he withdrew support. If he
Speaker 1: withdrew support for it in twenty nineteen when he started
Speaker 1: as governor, he'd be in a much better position right now.
Speaker 1: He wouldn't have this issue hanging over his head.
Speaker 2: But he's in too deep now.
Speaker 1: He has the high speed rail has to work for
Speaker 1: his political ambitions.
Speaker 2: There's no other option for him.
Speaker 1: If if the state legislature pulls all the funding for
Speaker 1: the high speed rail and gives up on.
Speaker 2: It, he's done.
Speaker 1: I think I don't think he's got a prayer in
Speaker 1: a Democrat presidential contest against Jade Vans if they can
Speaker 1: just say, look at this idiot who supported this high
Speaker 1: speed rail project that was such a waste of money,
Speaker 1: such a disaster that his own Democrats couldn't even support
Speaker 1: it anymore. I think he's cooked, and I think he
Speaker 1: knows it. I think he understands that's why he's bringing
Speaker 1: Ezra Clin on to try to onto his podcast to
Speaker 1: try to like talk to him about oh, no, no, no,
Speaker 1: it's not a disaster. And then of course the next
Speaker 1: day here's the budgetary thing where they say, yeah, there's
Speaker 1: actually a seven billion dollars short shortfall that we need
Speaker 1: to get resolved by June of twenty twenty six. He's
Speaker 1: I mean, if he doesn't get the high speed rail
Speaker 1: on track to be completed in twenty thirty twenty thirty three,
Speaker 1: he's cooked. And if the state legislature undoes it there,
Speaker 1: I mean, he's if the state legislature eventually pulls its support,
Speaker 1: if all the Democrat lawmakers from Los Angeles southern California
Speaker 1: join with all the Republicans, it could be doomed for him,
Speaker 1: and I think that's what he's worried about. I wonder
Speaker 1: how much juice he still has. Our lawmakers still afraid
Speaker 1: of him. I think they are, probably because he's got
Speaker 1: such a good connection with the donor class. Probably still
Speaker 1: be a bad idea to make an enemy out of him.
Speaker 1: So I'm I don't know that Newsome. I think a
Speaker 1: lot of lawmakers are willing to accept this is a
Speaker 1: sunk cost. We got to just cut our losses and
Speaker 1: move on. But he can't. He can't if he wants
Speaker 1: to run for president, he can't make that decision. So
Speaker 1: as a result, I think he's gonna have enough sway
Speaker 1: with his fellow Democrats to move them to keep on,
Speaker 1: keep on, keeping on, keep on funding this thing in
Speaker 1: a state where we're running deficit every year, we don't
Speaker 1: have enough money for it. I think he's gonna keep
Speaker 1: pouring money into this. I wish he'd be willing to
Speaker 1: sort of accept reality, but he can't do that and
Speaker 1: then run for president.
Speaker 2: It just it won't work.
Speaker 1: When we return the alternate universes of Gavin Newsom next
Speaker 1: on the John Zarardy Show, it's funny to think how
Speaker 1: it all could have gone so much differently for Gavin Newsom.
Speaker 1: If he had made a couple of different decisions, he
Speaker 1: would be the rock star of the left and probably
Speaker 1: the shoe in for twenty twenty eight.
Speaker 2: The left would look at him the way you know.
Speaker 1: I mean, if if Trump had not come back to
Speaker 1: run in twenty twenty four, Ron DeSantis would have been
Speaker 1: the rock star for the right. And I think DeSantis
Speaker 1: probably would have kicked Biden's but I think DeSantis probably
Speaker 1: would have kicked Kamala Harris's but and would would have
Speaker 1: had this rock star. And DeSantis is a very popular
Speaker 1: Republican governor. I think Newsom is not that to the left.
Speaker 1: I think he's disliked by the hard Bernie left, and
Speaker 1: I think a lot of people look at him skeptically,
Speaker 1: even on the more moderate left, the kind of the
Speaker 1: the John Fetterman types. I don't think he's a beloved figure.
Speaker 1: And it's so interesting to think what kind of a
Speaker 1: governorship he could have had if he had just taken
Speaker 1: a couple of different steps, even on things that don't
Speaker 1: necessarily touch on like core liberal beliefs, or on things
Speaker 1: where he could have been more liberal. So let me
Speaker 1: count the waves. So Gavin Newsom comes in in twenty nineteen.
Speaker 1: He's sworn in January of twenty nineteen. It was right
Speaker 1: then where there was all this talk about is Newsome
Speaker 1: gonna abandon the high speed rail? A lot of people
Speaker 1: thought he was going to abandon in the high speed rail,
Speaker 1: broad understanding that he was less enthused about it than
Speaker 1: Jerry Brown, was less idealistic about it. He was cutting,
Speaker 1: we were going to cut our losses, were done with
Speaker 1: high speed rail. He comes in though, with this half
Speaker 1: measure of like, well, he basically cannot bring himself fully
Speaker 1: to abandoned high speed rail. He gets convinced to well,
Speaker 1: we'll just finish merceaid to Bakersfield without hending seemingly that
Speaker 1: merceaid to Bakersfield is an incredibly tall order still for
Speaker 1: which we still don't have the money, and he basically
Speaker 1: takes the position we will finish merceaid to Bakersfield in
Speaker 1: order to demonstrate the viability of the system as a whole,
Speaker 1: so he doesn't abandon high speed rail when he could have.
Speaker 1: He had an opportunity to credibly do that in twenty nineteen,
Speaker 1: he didn't do it. That's a big sliding doors moment.
Speaker 1: You know, take the red pill or take the blue pill.
Speaker 1: Which way are you going to go? He chose the
Speaker 1: easier way out, easier as far as Democrats were more
Speaker 1: okay with it, and as a result, for his presidential ambitions,
Speaker 1: he eats all the blame for high speed rail because
Speaker 1: he committed himself to it and he's too deep in
Speaker 1: you know, as I talked about in the first two segments,
Speaker 1: just on Way, there was a budgetary hearing in which
Speaker 1: it was revealed that we need seven billion dollars before
Speaker 1: June of twenty twenty six for this upcoming budgetary cycle.
Speaker 1: We need seven billion dollars for the high speed rail.
Speaker 1: If we don't get seven billion dollars. High speed drill
Speaker 1: is going to be delayed further, so Newsome doesn't look good.
Speaker 2: With high speed rail. Here's another sliding door.
Speaker 1: I don't know how many of you remember this, but
Speaker 1: when Newsom was campaigning in twenty eighteen, he was a
Speaker 1: very big proponent of single pair health care. The idea
Speaker 1: with single pair health care is instead of a marketplace
Speaker 1: of insurance companies, there's only one insurance company, the government, Calcare.
Speaker 1: And Newsome advocated for it, and he even very specifically
Speaker 1: used language like I don't like it when these liberal
Speaker 1: politicians they say they're going to push for single payer healthcare,
Speaker 1: and then when they actually get in a position to
Speaker 1: do it, it's, oh, it's not the right time and it's
Speaker 1: too difficult, and oh and they kicked the can down
Speaker 1: the road.
Speaker 2: I don't like that.
Speaker 1: He was so explicit about how these other politicians they
Speaker 1: just say they're going to pursue single payer, and then
Speaker 1: when the rubber meets the road, they don't.
Speaker 2: Actually do it.
Speaker 1: Well, that's precisely what Newsom did. He when the rubber
Speaker 1: met the road, he didn't do it. Insurance companies got
Speaker 1: to him. He realized how much taxes would have to
Speaker 1: be increased, and he just didn't pursue it.
Speaker 2: Again, kind of a sliding doors moment.
Speaker 1: What does his governorship look like if he actually does
Speaker 1: pursue it. It becomes the single issue of his camp,
Speaker 1: the most singular issue of his campaign. Too, was a
Speaker 1: very good year for Democrats.
Speaker 2: I don't know.
Speaker 1: I don't think he would have lost, and he would
Speaker 1: have moved that ratchet one way for Democrats nationwide. I
Speaker 1: think he would have become a hero on the left.
Speaker 1: Now a question is, well, what would that have done
Speaker 1: to California health care? Would that have done to California's
Speaker 1: economy if the tax if taxes had been increased to
Speaker 1: that extent, what would that have done to our revenue base?
Speaker 2: Would everyone who's wealthy have left?
Speaker 1: More people who are wealthy than who left the state
Speaker 1: during COVID? How would that have functioned during COVID? I mean,
Speaker 1: would that have put different kinds of strain on the system.
Speaker 2: I don't know. I don't know if it would have
Speaker 2: made the situation better or worse.
Speaker 1: I mean, the situation with California healthcare right now is
Speaker 1: really this sort of half measure that doesn't work where
Speaker 1: we massively expand medical eligibility so that everyone's covered by
Speaker 1: medical even though we don't have enough money in medical
Speaker 1: to cover everybody. I mean, just just about a month ago,
Speaker 1: they had the story that they need to take out
Speaker 1: a big loan to help pay for medical because, oh geez,
Speaker 1: adding illegal aliens to the medical roles is more expensive
Speaker 1: than we thought. And that's how Newsome kind of got
Speaker 1: around that campaign promise.
Speaker 2: What he said was, well, what I.
Speaker 1: Was trying to do, I wasn't just really what I
Speaker 1: wasn't concerned about was single payer necessarily. I just wanted
Speaker 1: everyone to be covered by health insurance, and I've accomplished that.
Speaker 2: It's like, all right, well that's a very different thing.
Speaker 1: I mean, it's sort of a seems like kind of
Speaker 1: a half measure that you enacted here. And meanwhile, you know,
Speaker 1: here's Madera community hospital going out of business. Why because
Speaker 1: sixty percent of their patients are medical and they lose
Speaker 1: money on their medical patients or they can't make money.
Speaker 2: Too many medical beneficiaries.
Speaker 1: Not enough money going into the state's coffers to pay
Speaker 1: doctors for reimbursements for services to Medicaid patients, to medical patients,
Speaker 1: so that's.
Speaker 2: Another sliding door.
Speaker 1: It's very I don't now, I don't know if he
Speaker 1: would be better off worse off politically. I think he'd
Speaker 1: be a rock star on the left certainly if he
Speaker 1: had gotten single payer healthcare past it's an interesting sliding door.
Speaker 1: What would have happened if Newsom had actually pushed for
Speaker 1: single pair? The other stuff is just kind of stuff
Speaker 1: that isn't necessarily super politically coded. What if Newsom had
Speaker 1: really taken fire prevention in forestry management, really, really seriously,
Speaker 1: if Newsom had been willing to buck the environmentalists, how
Speaker 1: popular would he be? Right, I'm well, let me correct it.
Speaker 1: How many horrible black eyes would Newsom have avoided if
Speaker 1: we had enough water going to the Los Angeles area
Speaker 1: through the California State Water System, if we had appropriate
Speaker 1: forestry management where we were actually allowed to cut down
Speaker 1: some trees to prevent worse burns. If Newsom just decided
Speaker 1: to stop taking calls from the Sierra Club and went
Speaker 1: to his donors directly and said, listen, I understand you
Speaker 1: donate to them. I'm going to stand on my own
Speaker 1: here and I'm not going to.
Speaker 2: Support their policies.
Speaker 1: Where would he be I mean he would have avoid
Speaker 1: I mean, it's sort of hard to know because it's
Speaker 1: disasters that would have just not happened. But I think
Speaker 1: his presidential ambitions in twenty twenty eight are not going
Speaker 1: to be helped by the fires that we experienced last
Speaker 1: year in Los Angeles. I don't think his presidential ambitions
Speaker 1: are going to be helped by the horrible forest fires
Speaker 1: in twenty nineteen and twenty twenty. And lastly, I sort
Speaker 1: of wonder if Newsom had taken a page out of
Speaker 1: the DeSantis Kemp playbook during COVID, what would life what
Speaker 1: would his perception be. Desantasen Kemp became significant figures on
Speaker 1: the national right because of COVID, because of how they
Speaker 1: managed their states during COVID, their willingness to go against
Speaker 1: the grain and to say no, these lockdown measures aren't
Speaker 1: really necessary for public health, and they're destroying businesses and
Speaker 1: we just can't do this. Newsom went whole hog the
Speaker 1: other way. I don't think anyone in California loved it.
Speaker 2: There was a real moment where the.
Speaker 1: Recall effort and sort of the Larry Elder recall effort
Speaker 1: against Newsom, there was a real moment where it looked
Speaker 1: like Newsom could lose, and then what happened, Well, Nwsom
Speaker 1: opened up all the schools, like, you know, two months
Speaker 1: before the recall election, and then he wins sixty three percent.
Speaker 1: But I don't think anyone got out of that feeling like, oh,
Speaker 1: we love.
Speaker 2: Gavin Newsom so much. And that's the thing with COVID.
Speaker 1: It was so bizarre with COVID, how one strategy versus
Speaker 1: another got coded as liberal versus conservative, left wing versus
Speaker 1: right wing. It was all just sort of artificial grouping
Speaker 1: of people together because I think the left perceived that
Speaker 1: Donald Trump it was all like it really it honestly
Speaker 1: felt like so much of it was the left organizing
Speaker 1: itself against what they perceived Donald Trump wanted. I mean,
Speaker 1: all the raging against hydroxychloroquine and ivermectin were purely because
Speaker 1: Trump said something positive about it. Yeah, I feel like
Speaker 1: there was literally no other reason, Like the whole healthcare
Speaker 1: is establishment seemed to organize itself around the principle of
Speaker 1: we don't like Donald Trump, or we don't like Trump
Speaker 1: supporters or something.
Speaker 2: So it it kind of.
Speaker 1: I don't think there was really any like core liberal
Speaker 1: beliefs that Newsom would have actually violated if he would
Speaker 1: have just had to go against the grain of all
Speaker 1: the rest of the Democrats in the country, and possibly
Speaker 1: against the grain of you know, Joe Biden in twenty
Speaker 1: twenty one. But Newsom could have stood on his own
Speaker 1: two feet and said, no, you know, no, we're not
Speaker 1: going whole hog the way all these other liberal states
Speaker 1: are going. We're not going to be like New York.
Speaker 1: We're not going to be like all these other states.
Speaker 1: We're going to be pretty open and we're going to
Speaker 1: let people conduct business. But Newsom didn't do that. If
Speaker 1: if he had governed California the way to Santis governed Florida,
Speaker 1: you probably would have had a a lot fewer people
Speaker 1: leaving the state to go to Texas, to go to Idaho,
Speaker 1: to go here.
Speaker 2: There.
Speaker 1: We lost a lot of people and a lot of
Speaker 1: tax revenue during COVID. Would we be facing the kind
Speaker 1: of budget shortfall we have now if we didn't lose
Speaker 1: all those people to COVID and if we had abandoned
Speaker 1: high speed rail project right away. Honestly, Gavin Newsom, if
Speaker 1: he had done a lot of these things, you know,
Speaker 1: is it better, is it worse?
Speaker 2: I don't know.
Speaker 1: The single payer healthcare, that's a wild card. Maybe that
Speaker 1: would have made him a lot more hated in some ways.
Speaker 2: Maybe that would have driven more business out of the state.
Speaker 1: I don't know, but it's a fascinating thing. How he
Speaker 1: had a couple of really big time moments where he
Speaker 1: had to decide, who am I going to listen to?
Speaker 1: Am I going to do what my backers tell me
Speaker 1: or not? Am I going to stand on my own
Speaker 1: two feet and be my own man? Or am I
Speaker 1: going to do what all the money'd interest want me
Speaker 1: to do?
Speaker 2: It?
Speaker 1: Shut downs A lot of that were prompted by the
Speaker 1: teachers' unions. Teachers unions didn't want to go back to work,
Speaker 1: and he felt he had to listen to them. It's
Speaker 1: really a fascinating sliding doors thought experiment because Newsom will
Speaker 1: I think a couple of changes, and Newsom would be
Speaker 1: standing right now as the rock star likely hero heading
Speaker 1: into the twenty twenty eight election, and heck, maybe he
Speaker 1: throws his hat in more aggressively for twenty twenty four
Speaker 1: when we return the United Kingdom really get into the
Speaker 1: root of their problems with public violence.
Speaker 2: Banning ninja swords.
Speaker 1: Next on the John Girardi Show. Keir Starmer, the Prime
Speaker 1: Minister of Great Britain, just tweeted out his announcement that
Speaker 1: Great Britain would be banning ninja swords.
Speaker 2: Saying, when we make commitment, when we bloody well make commitments,
Speaker 2: we follow through on them. I don't know why assume
Speaker 2: that here Starmer sounds like Winston Churchill. You know, here's
Speaker 2: the funny thing about banning ninja swords. This is the
Speaker 2: problem is that there is likely a clandestine group of
Speaker 2: highly trained, secretive warriors who are one the most likely
Speaker 2: group of people to use ninja swords and because of
Speaker 2: their martial arts, prowess, their ability to operate in the shadows,
Speaker 2: and their deadliness, the most likely to evade your silly
Speaker 2: little ban on ninja swords. Keir Starmer, the.
Speaker 1: Ninja assassins are coming for you and for all Britannia.
Speaker 2: That'll do it, John Girardi Show. See you next time
Speaker 2: on Power Talk.