If venture capitalist Tim Draper has his way, California will be sliced and diced into geographically uneven six smaller states. The affable, Forbes Magazine cover worthy businessman is not joking or making a political statement. His common sense dictates him that this is the solution to the ills that plague his beloved state. In his own words, this would hold politicians more accountable and to make the state more governable.
The movement is gaining traction largely because there is widespread dissatisfaction on the current administration. But while it makes economic sense, how would it affect the beauty pageant scene in California? If the proposal will be put into ballot this year and will eventually win the referendum, the six states that will come out from original California will be named – Jefferson, North California, West California, Central California, South California, and Silicon Valley. Thus at the Miss USA pageant, there would be 56 contestants instead of the traditional 51.
There are some good news about this. For example, the proposed Jefferson state which will be carved from the sparsely populated northern California would now be represented nationally when it is very much underrepresented at state level. On the bad side, we will soon see a very weak state of Silicon Valley, home of the über-rich, as women in these areas tend to be liberal, career-oriented and very much obsessed with political correctness. Well in fact, if California will be sliced into six, the new state of Silicon Valley will become the richest in the United States in terms of per capita income.
But the critics of the proposal is saying that this is all just a ruse and an attempt of the Silicon Valley techies to formalize their isolation from the realities of the other parts of the state. With the division, Central California would come out as the poorest state in the nation and would fall way below the current last ranked state of Mississippi. This would be the future state where we will soon see large participation in pageants. After all, it is an established fact that when a certain political entity have less economic opportunities, women tend to be interested in joining pageants.
Whether it will be pushed through or not, it seems there are far more negative things that will happen if California will be split into six. Many analyst contend that it does not make any sense whether in economic or political standpoint. Meanwhile, in the pageantry world, California would no longer be a superpower state – a state that boasts six Miss USA winners. The six new states will have to start all over again and their sash weights will be basically zero.
They say you don’t fix things if they are not broken. Well, California is not broken in terms of pageantry but it is a huge mess economically. If the biggest nightmare of Californians will indeed become a reality, a new dark chapter of pageantry in the American western coast is just looming ahead.
