Xanadu

The architect Mies van der Rohe famously said "Less is more", but 20th century America clearly wasn't listening.   On the contrary, "More is more" was the order of the day, and it still is.  2,000 sq. ft. used to be the size of a modest house.  Now it's the size of a master bedroom suite.  A large burger used to be 1/2 lb.  Now it's more like 1lb.   It is true that cars have gotten smaller,  leaving aside that automotive abomination, the SUV.   But somewhat paradoxically, their occupants have gotten larger.  It's a mystery to me why the comparatively svelte Americans of the 50's and 60's needed gigantic cars while their obese 21st century counterparts squeeze themselves into Priuses and mini-coopers.  Maybe it's because the price of gas has gone from $.29/gal. to $4.50/gal?

In any case, standing proudly at mid-century we find that supreme monument to excess known as the Hearst Castle.  We left Atwater Village and drove up 101, or as Angelinos would say, "the" 101, to San Simeon, stopping for pie and coffee at another monument to excess, the Madonna Inn.   This establishment is fabled, not for its food which is somewhat mediocre, but for its kitsch which is world-class.  Be sure to check out the men's room if you visit.

I have a theory about well, almost everything, but in particular how "the" got attached to the number of every freeway in Southern California.  Originally, the LA freeways had names like "The Pasadena Freeway", "The Harbor Freeway", "The Santa Monica Freeway",  "The San Diego Freeway", "The Hollywood Freeway", and so on. But as the freeways proliferated, they ran out of reasonable names, and just reverted to the numbers assigned by CalTrans.  But then, to be consistent, they started using the numbers on the already named freeways as well.  So "The Pasadena Freeway" became "The 110 Freeway", "The San Diego Freeway" became "The 405 Freeway" and so on, and finally they dropped the redundant "Freeway".   Probably BS, but it sounds good.

Bidding a fond farewell to the Madonna Inn, we eventually found our campsite at San Simeon State Park, and prepared for the next day's tour.  We had already taken the main tour on a previous visit, so we signed up for the upper floors tour instead.  This featured the private suites of Hearst and his mistress ("companion" was the way our guide delicately put it)  Marion Davies, as well as a few of the many guest bedrooms.  The castle is an incredible mish-mash:  lots of ceilings, wall panels, and floors lifted intact from many different European castles, palaces, and manor houses along with paintings, statues, and other art objects. It's really impossible to describe in words -- you really have to see it.  But we can say a few words about Citizen Hearst.

William Randolph Hearst was the Rupert Murdoch of his day.  In place of Fox News, or should I say Faux News, he owned the San Francisco Examiner, the New York Journal-American, the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, and a slew of other newspapers around the country, not to mention various national magazines and other media outlets of the period.  "The Chief", as he was affectionately called by his employees, was best known for virtually single-handedly starting the Spanish American War.  This was accomplished through the invention of "Yellow Journalism", a technique that had nothing to do with journalism and everything to do with selling newspapers.   Hearst discovered that sensational stories are the key to increased circulation.  It really doesn't matter if the story is true, although having some "truthiness", as Colbert would say, probably doesn't hurt.  But the main point is the subject matter.  My news anchor friend John once told me, "Focus on nuts, guts, and sluts, and you can't go wrong. "

Of course, Hearst also put a heavy political slant on his news stories, just like Fox does today.  They've basically become little more than a propaganda outlet for the Republican party.  But they have lots of viewers, who apparently lap up all the rubbish they dish out.  Not only that, those viewers and millions of other 99%ers then march off to the polls and vote for candidates who want to give even more money to the 1% in the form of additional juicy tax cuts, and who want to pay for it by cutting or eliminating the government services and programs that benefit those very same voters.  If nothing else, this is a complete indictment of the U.S. educational system.  But it's much more than that.   Let's face it, the far right in America has executed an amazing political tour-de-force over the last half-century.  In 1964, the GOP ran Barry Goldwater, a  far-right extremist candidate, for president.  He was defeated by the biggest landslide in over a century,  losing the popular vote by a margin of more than 3 to 2.  Today he would be considered a moderate.