When Compassion Replaces Competence

It felt good to be a Democrat in California.

California Democrats illustrate the problem with national Democrats

Well, it used to, and the State of the Union address by President Trump illuminated exactly why I left the party.

In Silicon Valley, it often feels like the default setting.

In many professional circles, especially in technology and venture communities, political alignment is assumed. Fundraisers double as social gatherings. Giving is expected. Belonging has signals.

It feels compassionate. Enlightened. On the right side of history. 

But that night, the president challenged any member of Congress to stand who believes that the first duty of the American government is to protect American citizens, not illegal aliens. Shockingly, democrats remained seated, providing a stunning visual of the current values of the Democratic Party. 

What changed my mind was not rhetoric. It was outcomes. And California is the glaring example of the failure of liberal policies.

Three areas illustrate the pattern.

Elections: Confidence Is a Safeguard

California does not require photo identification to vote in person. A voter provides a name and address and signs the roster. More than 30 states require some form of voter ID, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. Countries such as Canada, France, and Germany require identification to vote. A 2023 Gallup poll found roughly three-quarters of Americans support requiring photo identification at the polls, including majorities across party lines.

Even if large-scale fraud is difficult to quantify, administrative failures and inconsistent verification practices fuel public doubt. The point of visible safeguards is not only to deter misconduct, but to preserve confidence before suspicion metastasizes.

When California Democrats treat voter ID as ideological heresy rather than institutional hygiene, they weaken the very legitimacy they claim to defend.

Family: When the State Becomes the Decision Maker

Under California law, minors aged 12 and older may consent to certain mental health services without parental notification if deemed mature enough by a provider. State law also allows minors to access reproductive health services confidentially. Recent legislation has expanded confidentiality protections in sensitive areas.

The justification is protection.

The effect is the normalization of state supremacy in decisions that belong to parents.

The Supreme Court has long recognized parental rights as fundamental. Family authority is not a bureaucratic detail. It is the first layer of civil society.

When the state positions itself as the confidential decision maker in significant medical and psychological matters involving minors, it shifts sovereignty from the family to the state.

That is not compassion. It is the steady expansion of state authority at the expense of parental sovereignty. It is government overreach into the most intimate sphere of civil society. As the co-founders of Moms for Liberty have put it, “we do not co-parent with the government.”

Compassion cannot justify dissolving the family as the primary unit of accountability.

Fiscal Reality: Arithmetic Still Applies

California’s budget rests on a narrow and volatile base. The Legislative Analyst’s Office has documented that the top 1% of earners account for close to half of the state’s personal income tax revenue in many years. That revenue is heavily tied to capital gains and is therefore inherently unstable.

Instead of broadening and stabilizing that base, state leadership has repeatedly targeted it. Wealth-based tax proposals focus on the very taxpayers who fund a disproportionate share of state commitments. Capital is mobile. IRS data shows sustained net out-migration of high-income households from California to states such as Texas and Florida over the past decade.

You cannot finance permanent spending commitments with cyclical and mobile revenue. That is not compassion. It is structural risk.

Then comes execution.

California’s high-speed rail project, approved in 2008 at an estimated $33 billion, is now projected to exceed $100 billion and remains incomplete. Florida, by contrast, expanded Brightline passenger rail through a public-private partnership model that attracted private capital and delivered major segments on time. The contrast is managerial.

Between 2019 and 2023, California spent roughly $24 billion on homelessness programs. During that same period, homelessness rose statewide. In 2024, the California State Auditor found the state failed to consistently track whether billions in spending produced measurable results.

The pattern is simple.

Spend expansively. Measure loosely. Promise morally. Deliver inconsistently.

The issue is not the stated goals. The issue is the absence of discipline.

California as a model of Democrat dysfunction

In each case, the rhetoric was noble. The result was dysfunction.

This is the governing model Kamala Harris rose within, and Gavin Newsom refined over time. Not because they lack intelligence, but because the system they represent rewards virtue signaling over measurable performance. It resists basic electoral safeguards despite broad public support. It expands state authority into the family. It builds budgets on volatile revenue while accelerating out-migration. It spends billions without demanding outcome verification.

If that framework scales nationally, the consequences will not be symbolic. They will be structural.

I did not leave the Democratic Party because I stopped caring about vulnerable people. I left because I care about institutional durability. Compassion matters. But governing requires discipline. Incentives aligned with outcomes. Visible safeguards that preserve trust. California is not failing because it cares too much. It is failing because it confuses caring with governing. Compassion without competence becomes institutional rot.

If you are a Democrat in California who feels uneasy but cannot quite articulate why, I understand. I defended the language long after I stopped believing in the results. At some point, loyalty to outcomes must matter more than loyalty to a label. It did for me.

This article was originally published by RealClearPolitics and made available via RealClearWire.