By the Los Angeles Times‘ count, there have been more than 220 attempts to divide California, and all have failed. A new proposal by a Temecula politician would split off the conservative counties south and east of Los Angeles to form a Republican-dominated South California that would be home to 13 million people (minus those who flee after secession).

A spokesman for Gov. Jerry Brown had this retort to the proposal: “If you want to live in a Republican state with very conservative right-wing laws, then there’s a place called Arizona.”

Unlike previous schemes that would divide San Francisco and Los Angeles from each other, the Democratic strongholds would remain in the same state. This would come as a relief to many of us in Los Angeles, although our northerly cousins find us annoying for our lack of knowledge about chard. — PZS