But ours was intended to be a citizen government. It is what of by and for the people means. And when our most important issue in California is the creation of jobs I think it's quite helpful to have someone in the U.S. Senate or in the governor's seat who actually knows where jobs come from.

When future archaeologists dig up the remains of California they're going to find all of those gyms their scary-looking gym equipment and they're going to assume that we were a culture obsessed with torture.

It's funny but when I arrived in California to start college I was much more interested in becoming a surfer and cruise along in life from one beach to the next. I didn't plan out any huge career for myself.

For some reason and I don't know why but I don't think that I'm funny in California. So I always want to do my movies east somewhere.

California is a fine place to live - if you happen to be an orange.

Everything is just better in California - the wine the food fruits and vegetables the comforts of living. Even the instrumentalists are generous and curious. Everything is wonderful.

And I want to be able to - you know make Republicans and Democrats famous for keeping jobs in California.

The records of adopted children are sealed in California. That seal is considered inviolable... The judge ruled that because I was famous he didn't have the same rights as other kids.

Los Angeles was an impression of failure of disappointment of despair and of oddly makeshift lives. This is California? I thought.

There is science logic reason there is thought verified by experience. And then there is California.

For 25 years it has been my privilege to represent the city of San Francisco and the great state of California to work to strengthen our vibrant middle class to secure opportunity and equality.

The value of an arts education is widely accepted especially in California.

With my ministry of light part of what I do is work on the California Alliance For Arts Education.

I'm on Governor Gray Davis' California Alliance Towards Education to bring the arts back to high schools.

Because if you don't have a great workforce a great higher education system you're not going to have the next eBay the next AmGen the next you know Miasole and not only California but America is going to fall behind a whole new competitive context which is obviously China India and other countries.

It's not like I had big dreams to go to California and become an actor. I loved doing my shows at school and community theater and I probably would have settled in New York because it was closer. I was going to go to NYU.

Well my thoughts about California are kind of mythological. To me as well as being a real place it's a place where people go to find something - to find happiness or to realize their dreams. So it has that kind of quality of heroism and heartache and Australia has that as well.

I always wanted to be a Californian. In my wildest dreams I always liked California - it's the place where oranges grows on trees! Fruit just falls off the trees.

I came at age in the '60s and initially my hopes and dreams were invested in politics and the movements of the time - the anti-war movement the civil rights movement. I worked on Bobby Kennedy's campaign for president as a teenager in California and the night he was killed.

If you're the type of person who has to fulfill your dreams you've gotta be resourceful to make sure you can do it. I came out to California when I was 21 thinking my New York credentials would take me all the way. I came back home a year later all dejected and a failure.

No wonder the film industry started in the desert in California where like all desert dwellers they dream their buildings rather than design them.

Death Valley is really wide-open - it's bigger than Rhode Island - and it's less a part of California than an ungoverned territory so there's lots of weird cops-and-robbers stuff going on.

Crucial to understanding federalism in modern day America is the concept of mobility or 'the ability to vote with your feet.' If you don't support the death penalty and citizens packing a pistol - don't come to Texas. If you don't like medicinal marijuana and gay marriage don't move to California.

My family belongs to a tennis club in Valencia California so I always go there. I play a lot of tennis with my dad and swim. And I like to go to the gym there.

Well it's a little harder in New York. It's not as forgiving to a film crew. You hold up a bunch of New Yorkers who can't cross the street they're not going to take it well. Southern California? They'll wait. It's cool man. In New York they're like 'Are you kidding me? I gotta get to work.'

I've been in California for about 15 years now. You're always in your car and insulated. I miss New York so much.

I arrived in California with no job no car and no money but like millions of other girls a dream.

I was an economics major in college and every summer after school I would drive my car from California from Claremont men's college at the time to New York. And I worked on Wall Street.

You know every family and every business in California knows what it means to go through tough times.

Sometimes I think I might not have written 'The Age of Miracles' if I hadn't grown up in California if I hadn't been exposed to its very particular blend of beauty and disaster of danger and denial.