Us Homo-Sapiens, All So Similar Yet Sharing Differences: Understanding Our DNA

Nadene Goldfoot                                              

This is a double helix.  DNA is in this shape.  The glue that holds
these 2 together are pairs of nucleotides or base pairs.  A, G, C, and T.
G pairs with C.    A pairs with T.

Coming from Adam and Eve, we might be all humans, but oh so different while being the same.
The garden of Eden must have been in Africa back millions of years ago as scientists find that's where we all came from.  " People have been created with 23 matched pairs (46 total) of chromosomes."                                                                        

Homo sapien of Pleistocene to Present era
This is from the Ice Age 2,588,000 to 11,700 years ago
European male
Neanderthal died out 30,000 years ago.

The factory producing us had a pre-homo-sapien model called Neanderthal.  Some of us still bear a few of their genes. We have 23 chromosome pairs where our genes lie.  There are 20,000 to 25,000 genes in human DNA.  These genes are made of chemical  base pairs.  Our human genome is estimated at 30,000.  Almost all (99,9%)  of our nucleotide bases are exactly the same in all people;  and 97% are the same as the chimpanzee's.  I for one carry 2.9% of my genes from Neanderthal forebears.  Some of the genes have been found to have particular functions such as causing diseases and other problems in our body, but as of 2005, the functions are unknown for over 50% of identified genes.

Chromosome #1 has the most known genes of 2,968, and the 23rd chromosome called the X or Y has the fewest of only 231.  It is the sex gene of a child. A female inherits an X-chomosome from each parent which gives her a matching pair.  A male inherits an X from his mother and a Y from his father.  That makes the baby a male.  #23 doesn't get a matched set.  This means that if you have had an autosomal dna test such as familyfinder at Family Tree DNA or 23&Me or ancestry.com and find you are a female who has an X match with some man, it means the common ancestor you both match is a female.  If you don't have an X match, it's with a man.  FTNDA also has a male or female icon now with the matching surname to show the sex of what side of the family is involved, your mother or your father's side.  I match a lady through my father's side of the family and we have an X match.

There are 2 types of DNA; Mitochondrial (mtDNA) and nuclear DNA (Ydna).  One haplogroup or branch  of mtDNA is called W or Wilma.                                                                            

Zlata Jermulowski/ske b: 1870 in Lazdijai, Suwalki, Lithuania.  

 I have a 3rd cousin I have found through DNA testing and our common ancestor would be from  a female, through my grandmother, Zlata Jermulowske side of the family-of the W haplogroup. I know this because we share a segment on the 23rd gene called X.   She was from Lazdijai, Suwalki, Lithuania that had been taken over by Poland.  She stubbornly said she was a "Litvak!" 
 "Haplogroup W is derived from the N superhaplogroup, which dates to approximately 65,000 years ago.  The origin of haplogroup W dates to approximately 25,000 years ago,"  Abraham was born in the 2nd millennium BCE or we can say about 2,000 BCE.  I've picked 1948 BCE as his birthdate.  That is  only 3,965 years ago.  A generation is considered to be 25 years.  If we go back 10 generations , we have accumulated 1,024 ancestral grandparents; 512 females and 512 males.  That would take us to the year 1766.  We've already been exposed to a lot of our ancestor's genes.  It's amazing that  genes are handed down to us in chunks that have stuck together quite well, losing a few here and there as passed down or not losing a thing.  The length of the chunk is measured in cMs.  This is an example of my match with a 3rd cousin.  Notice that we share 2 segments on chromosome #2 and #7, some pretty nice chunks.  Wish I knew just what 2 and 7 do for us.  

Chr	Start Location	End Location	Centimorgans (cM)	SNPs
2	138,135,345	162,323,361	18.9	4,745
2	216,028,295	233,912,366	29.7	4,338
7	140,018	7,007,025	11.0	1,535
7	114,657,702	142,114,524	29.0	5,468
10	92,870,563	102,328,599	9.6	2,593
12	125,009,705	127,532,282	9.6	952
13	90,765,165	97,231,917	8.9	2,014

Largest segment = 29.7 cM
Total of segments > 7 cM = 116.7 cM
7 matching segments
Estimated number of generations to MRCA = 3.5 : meaning between 75 to 100 years to our common ancestor, and I have found that person on my tree along with some factual information.  

 Paternal aunt, Aunt Elsie carrying W haplogroup.
If her son tests, he will carry it but not pass it onto his daughters. They will
get their mtDNA from their mother.  

Wilma and Fred Flintstone

      W was discovered later.  Haplogroup W is believed to have originated around 23,900 years ago in Western Asia. It is descended from the haplogroup N2. That's why it wasn't discovered with the other 7.  It was a branch, and was named "Wilma".  These 7 women found by Sykes lived in Europe within the last 50,000 years.  They were called the CLAN mothers of us women.  They descended from a common ancestor, Eve, who  lived in Africa about 100,000 to 200,000 years ago.  

    Mitochondrial DNA are cells also found in animals, plants and fungi.  The mother passes her mt onto her children and just females can pass it to the next generation.  It is the branch on the tree of life that tells where each female has started out from; where her factory was located.  A cell in our body has hundreds to thousands of mitochondria and each one carries between 5 and 10 copies of its own DNA.   Mitochondrial DNA is passed from mother to child virtually unchanged .  My tag the scientists have created for my mtDNA branch is H2a1.  My mother's mother was born in Sweden to Swedish parents.  This tag of H is carried by almost half of Europeans.  My paternal grandmother came from Lithuania and was Jewish.  Her mtDNA is W.

The mtDNA is found outside the cell nucleus in small organelles called mitochondria.  You don't inherit it from your father; only your mother.

It is believed that 500 to 700 million years ago, mitochondria were just independent bacteria that colonized the precursors of the complex cells found in today's animals and plants, forming the symbiotic relationship we see today.  A mitochondrion acts as the power plant of a cell, taking nutrients from the cell for the production of ATP (adenosine triphosphate) energy.  

                                                                   

My Swedish Aunt Dorothy Olson who carried H2a1,
died of an appendicitis attack at age 5 in Iowa. She would have been
my mother's half sister by Grandma's 1st husband.  

Brian Sykes came up with the fact that there were only 7 different branches of mtDNA in humans, and then about 3 more have been found since his book was published in 2001.  H was named "Helena" and her origins happened 20,000 years ago during the worst of the last ice age.Scandinavia was covered by glaciers and permanent ice fields as far south as Berlin and Warsaw then.  In those days, Britain was still joined to continental Europe.                                                                    
 About 40% of Ashkenazi Jewish people of today are said to come from 4 different mothers.
"Those women apparently lived somewhere in Europe within the last 2,000 years, but not necessarily in the same place or even the same century, said lead author Dr. Doron Behar of the Rambam Medical Center in Haifa, Israel.  It's figured that there are about 8 million Ashkenazi Jews today.  They can be "traced back to Jews who migrated from Israel to Italy in the first and second centuries."   Our ancestors lived  in "Eastern Europe in the 12th and 13th centuries and expanded greatly, reaching about 10 million just before World War II, he said."
Through autosomal DNA testing in such tests as familyfinder from FTDNA, we can find DNA matches of 2nd cousins to 5th cousins and more distant.  We just need to make a great family tree for ourselves and with luck, might find a few common ancestors.  Research for everyone can be done on such companies as ancestry.com.  For Jewish genealogy, try http://jewishgen.org.                                                                            
 W (Wilma) is a small group that appears in the western Ural Mountains, the natural border between Europe and Asia and the eastern Baltic area, and is also found in India. 

Nathan Abraham Goldfoot (fus) b: August 5, 1871 Telsiai, Lithuania
carrying and passing on his Q1b1a or QBZ67  Y haplogroup-a male-only line. 

                                                                                     

Here is great grandfather Abiathar Smith Robinson b: 1829 with grandfather Frank Hugh Robinson b: June 21, 1870.  They both carry R1b1a2a1a1b4/now shortened to R-L21.
They're finding out that their origins were Irish, not English or Welsh as thought. 
This Robinson line is not Jewish, though there are Robinsons that are.  

Nuclear DNA  (yDNA) is found in the cell nucleus.  This is used by genealogists for surname studies  mtDNA is found outside the cell nucleus.  Both are necessary for long term population studies and to tell if one has Native American or African ancestry.  There are about 20 different branches of yDNA compared to about 10 of mtDNA.  
                                                                                
Certain ones are found in Jews as they are found consistently in Jewish men. J is called the Cohen gene, coming from Aaron, brother of Moses who inherited the position of priest for the Israelites.   It is also found in many Arab men as well, with a few differences to show each branch.  A large group-J1c3d is now called J-L147, a new form of shorthand.  E haplogroup is the next most widely found in Jewish men.  

                                                                                

There are 3 billion base pairs of DNA in the nucleus of human cells grouped in 23 chromosome pairs; one from your father and one from your mother.  About 97% of nuclear DNA was called "Junk DNA in 2001."  Today some of it has been found to have a purpose.  "For example, it has been discovered that some of the formally "useless" DNA actually controls embryos."  

75% of Jews are lactose intolerant.  That's a new fact to me.  

Resource: DNA & Genealogy; Colleen Fitzpatrick & Andrew Yeiser
The Seven Daughters of Eve, by Bryan Sykes
What Haplogroup We Be? Nadene Goldfoot, Jewish haplotypes
http://jewishfactsfromportland.blogspot.com/2010/01/what-haplogroup-we-be.html
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_Y-chromosome_DNA_haplogroup
FTDNA
http://www.icr.org/article/3396/ Revealing purpose in Junk DNA
http://www.nbcnews.com/id/10827385/ns/technology_and_science-science/t/millions-jews-traced-four-women/
http://www.eupedia.com/forum/threads/29172-New-map-of-mtDNA-haplogroup-W
http://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/science/.premium-1.664967

Oregon, Most Liberal of the USA States, Once Was Republican: What Happened and Why?

Nadene Goldfoot
                                                Oregon has had 38 governors.
                                              Three were Jewish.  One was a Syrian-American Christian
                                               17 were Democrats including the last 6 governors
                                                 1 was Independent.
                                                 2 were females.
                                               20 were Republicans.


 Farmers settled  Oregon.  Here is a Hillsboro, Oregon's farm with a Pumpkin Patch

Another view of Roloff Farm in Hillsboro, Oregon

                                                                             

Eastern Oregon onion farm in Snake River Valley 
I saw a lot of this while teaching in Ontario, Oregon.

     In my college Oregon History class, I learned that Oregonians were the ancestors of farmers and Californians and Washingtonians were ancestors of gold miners.  The Californians were a daring bunch, willing to gamble for their wealth, while Oregonians were a cautious lot, not taking chances anymore than they had to, such as depending on the weather.  I still see the differences.  It shows up in politics.    Oregon had been mostly Republican.  It was Republican when I was growing up here.  Now it houses a weird Portland and has gone Democrat, all except Eastern Oregon, that is.    What has caused this to happen?                                                        

Julius Meier-Jewish Governor in Oregon from 1931 to 1935 as Independent.  He
was my first governor as I was born in Portland in 1934.
 
"The son of the Meier & Frank department store founder, he would become a lawyer before entering the family business in Portland. Politically an independent, Meier served a single term as the 20th Governor of Oregon from 1931–1935".Meier was born in Portland to German immigrants of Jewish ancestry.   "While he had been reticent due to his wealth and religion, Meier agreed to enter the race as an independent candidate. 

. In spite of opposition to his candidacy by The Oregonian (the state's largest newspaper), he won 54.5 percent of the total vote, outdistancing his nearest competitor, Democratic candidate Edward F. Bailey, 135,608 votes to 62,434.  Meier's overwhelming victory was viewed as a reflection of strong public support for public hydropower development."  

"He was active in Jewish affairs.  "Mr. Meier is very active in Jewish communal life, among his philanthropies being the establishment of a B’nai B’rith center and summer camp for boys and girls. He is a trustee of Temple Beth Israel, president of the Portland Jewish Shelter Home and prominent in B’nai B’rith work."

My maternal grandfather, Frank Hugh Robinson, son of farmers from Illinois and Vermont,  voted Republican. His Swedish immigrant wife may have, also.  His daughter, Mildred Elizabeth Robinson, married a Jewish Democratic voter so she voted for what she thought was the best person, either Democrat or Republican.    I switched from being a Democrat to vote Republican in 2008. My paternal grandparents would have voted Democrat if they could have. My grandfather died in 1910 and Bubba didn't read or write, so I doubt if she voted.  Actually I don't think they were citizens.  
                                                                           
Oregon had been a Republican state after Independent Julius Meier was governor from 1931 to 1935. Before Julius, Oregon had been Republican too, with 11 Republicans and 8 Democrats.  
                                                                               

The first to be a governor was neither.  It was George Abernethy, and the grade school I had attended in Portland was named for him.  He can be said to have been a Loyalist versus people who were for British rule in the Oregon Country.  On June 3, 1845, Abernethy was elected to serve as Provisional Governor of the Oregon Country, defeating Osborne Russell, a member of the outgoing Executive Committee. Abernethy and his supporters were American loyalists who believed that the Provisional Government was strictly interim until the question of U.S. and British claims on the Oregon Country were finalized. Russell, however, headed up the "Independents" faction which wished to create a Republic of the Pacific.  At this time, James Knox Polk was a Democrat president.  

John Whiteaker 1859-1862 was the first real Oregon governor and was a Democrat. At the time, James Buchanan was the Democrat president-our 15th president.   Abraham Lincoln, Republican was elected president in 1861.  From this time to 1931, there were :
8 Democrats and 
11 Republicans elected.

Julius Meier was the first and only Independent governor as well as the first Jewish governor and served from 1931 to 1935.  This was when Herbert Hoover and Franklin Delano Roosevelt were presidents.  It was during the eve of WWII when Jews were being suppressed and harmed in Germany.  After Governor Meier, Oregon had
 3 Democrat governors up to 1987.  However, they had
 9 Republican governors.
Jews throughout the USA were voting Democratic as they felt that Roosevelt had saved them from the Nazi regime in Germany  that had taken over Europe.  The war was over in 1945. " An important accomplishment was Meier's  leading the Columbia River Highway Association, the citizen committee creating political support for building the Columbia River Highway, first west from Portland to Astoria (1912–1915) and later east from Portland to The Dalles (1913–1922). His daughter, Jean, would later recall that he walked or crawled every inch of the highway's projected roadway."
                                                                              

Victor Atiyeh, Oregon's 32nd governor from 79 to 87 ;  attending  Holladay Grade School and Washington High School
which was also my high school. He's also the last Republican governor for Oregon.   Atiyeh was born in Portland to Syrian immigrant parents, George and Linda Atiyeh. He attended Portland public schools and the University of Oregon for three years, where he played guard for the Ducks football team. He dropped out of college to tend to the family carpet business, Atiyeh Brothers, at the age of 21 after his father passed away. A golfer and gun collector, he was involved with the Boy Scouts of America and the Episcopal church. My parents bought their oriental rugs from the Atiyeh Brothers.  

Victor Atiyeh, Last Republican governor, was in office for 2 terms from 1979 to 1987.  From then on, Oregon has had only Democrat governors.  Jimmy Carter, Democrat and Ronald Reagan, Republican were Presidents then.  "As governor, Atiyeh established new public safety programs for Oregon's traditional fishing and lumber trades.^] He provided incentives to bring new industries to the state to diversify the economy, including the opening of a trade office in Tokyo, Japan, Oregon's first overseas trade office. He launched a worldwide tourism initiative and worked towards the designation of the Columbia River Gorge as a national scenic preservation area.

Atiyeh helped to establish a statewide food bank, which was the nation's first.  He also worked to raise awareness of the dangers of drunk driving and signed new laws against the practice.  He chaired the Republican Governors Association and was the Republican National Convention's floor leader for President Ronald Reagan in 1984."

   Since 1987, Oregon has had 6 Democrat governors as follows:  
                                                                           

Neil Goldschmidt- Jewish Democrat Governor from 1987 to 1991,
a businessman and politician who was first Portland's mayor in 1972.  Like Clinton,who came along later in 1990,
he got into trouble over a sexual sin of being involved with an underaged female, ruining his reputation.  Goldschmidt became the sixth U.S. Secretary of Transportation in 1979. His recess appointment by President Jimmy Carter came on July 27 of that year. 

1. Neil Goldschmidt 1987 to 1991:  Ronald Reagan and George HW Bush were Republican presidents.  
                                                                 

        2. Barbara Roberts 1991 to 1995:  George Bush and Bill Clinton were  Republican and Democrat presidents. Roberts was born Barbara Kay Hughey on December 21, 1936, in Corvallis, Oregon, to Bob and Carmen Murray Hughey. Her father, a millworker, was a descendant of Oregon Trail pioneers.  During her term as governor, Roberts worked with the Clinton administration to secure federal waivers and funding for the Oregon Health Plan. She also helped to increase the number of children in the Head Start Program, secured financing for additional units of affordable housing, and developed programs to help move Oregonians from welfare to the workplace. The Roberts administration was known for its strong support of gay rights and appointed women to positions in state government.
                                                                       

3. John Kitzhaber, MD  1995 to 2003: Bill Clinton and George W. Bush were Democrat and Republican presidents. John Albert Kitzhaber is an American politician and physician. He is the longest-serving governor in Oregon's history, as well as the only Oregon governor to resign (Feb. 2015) because of a scandal.  He was in his 4th term at this time.  He resigned not because he was guilty of anything but because of " the media frenzy around these questions kept me from being the effective leader I wanted and needed to be," Kitzhaber said in a statement.  While Kitzhaber claims he was a victim of "fake news," there was nothing fake about the more than $200,000 Hayes collected from work she did for private nonprofits while first lady. 
                                                                      

4. Ted Kulangoski 2003 to 2011: Barack Obama  was president.  Under Obama, the Democratic Party took out Israel from their list of important issues to support. "Theodore Ralph "Ted" Kulongoski is a Jewish-American politician who served as the 36th Governor of Oregon from 2003 to 2011. A Democrat, he served in both houses of the Oregon Legislative Assembly and also served as the state Insurance Commissioner."  Kulongoski was born in St. Louis, Missouri in 1940. He was 4 years old when his father died, and spent the rest of his childhood in a Catholic boys' home. After High school, Kulongoski served in the Marines. With the help of the G.I. Bill, he obtained an undergraduate and law degree from the University of Missouri in 1970. Kulongoski then moved to Eugene, Oregon and became a labor lawyer.
                                                                   

John with Cylvia Hayes who was the reason of his governing problems.
He became a target of federal investigation.  A Portland lawyer commented, ""Whatever you think about the personal choices he's made, the guy has a hell of a lot of expertise."

5. John Kitzhaber again  2011 to 2015:  Barack Obama was president .On February 13, 2015, facing a criminal investigation, Kitzhaber announced his intention to resign as governor effective February 18.  Secretary of State Kate Brown succeeded him.
                                                                         

Kate Brown, born in Spain as father was in US Air force.  She was a graduate of Lewis & Clark Law School.  "She earned a Bachelor of Arts in Environmental Conservation with a certificate in Women's Studies from the University of Colorado at Boulder in 1981 and a J.D. degree and certificate in Environmental Law from the Northwestern School of Law at Lewis and Clark College in 1985
Oregon's 2nd female governor and first openly bisexual governor in US history.
"Brown lives in Portland, Oregon, with her husband,  Dan Little."

6. Kate Brown since 2015 stepped in upon Kitzhaber's resignation.   Barack Obama and Donald Trump have been president-Democrat and Republican. " Brown has been criticized for her willingness to undermine her colleagues. She was integral in rounding up votes to pass a bill reforming Oregon's Public Employee Retirement System and then voted against the reform bill in order to preserve her own ties to organized labor. Many of her colleagues would go on to lose their seats due to backlash from labor unions."
                                                                             

Dad, a Democrat voter and Mom-for the best man

My personal opinion is that Democrats and Republican parties have traded places.  My father used to say that the Democrats are the ones for the small businessman.  That's changed.  So are Republicans.  They're for any type of business to remain in the USA.  Dad was a small businessman as a wholesale meat dealer.  He started his business career as a kosher butcher.  
                                                                         

Democrats are being led by self denial Nancy  Pelosi, minority leader of the US House of Representatives, representing California's 12th District (mainly San Francisco,  who sees Republicans as the enemy.  Pelosi was the former Speaker of the House.  She and her homies are faultless and permissive with Gifford holding up a bloody head of our Republican President Trump who won the election over their darling Hillary who they thought had it in the bag.  Or as for  the Shakespearean play in the NY City park of the death of Caesar played by Trump  she sees nothing wrong with him being hacked to death in the heart.  It's theater.  It's art.    Pelosi refuses to see the connection between all these acts going on which Republicans see as the the desire to impeach Trump.  Pat Buchanan, Republican, feels we're on the  verge of a Civil War.  We know there are a lot of easily led and impressive voters out in the hinterland, and one worked up Democrat has gone so far as to make a list of key Republicans he was going to take out and almost got away with at the Congressional practice baseball game the night before the big one.  The shooter was a nasty dude, on the verge as we see in hindsight.  He took his wife by complete surprise, she said.  The police shot and killed him after he shot a senator in the hip.  Near death at the hospital, the Republican whip is pulling through.  Others were shot as well.  Pelosi sees no wrong in the actions of these Democrats.  She was one who approved of Obama Care.  "Pelosi has been credited for spearheading President Obama's health care law when it seemed that it would go down in defeat. Now it has died. She is quoted to have said,
"Think of an economy where people could be an artist or a photographer or a writer without worrying about keeping their day job in order to have health insurance."  Well, the average man couldn't as it became too expensive.  She's still in denial about it.  

How has Portland, Oregon's largest city,  become weird and very much to the left? One example:   "Our mayor of Portland, Ted Wheeler (D), attempted to cancel a rally in defense of “free speech” in order to preserve free speech.  Portland " is one of the most liberal cities in America. Portland (Multnomah County) has about 515,000 registered voters – nearly 54% are Democrats and less than 13% are Republicans. Many of the remaining 33% simply don’t think the Democrat Party is liberal enough and so they register as Independents, Progressives, Pacific Greens, Working Families or non-affiliated. (In the 2016 election Portland voted overwhelmingly for Sen. Bernie Sanders (Socialist-VT)."I'm one of the rarest-a Jewish Republican.  

                                                                      

I've seen the weird TV program about Grimm dealing with all these
fairy-tale type ogres running around Portland and I loved it!
A fairy tale for adults is weird!

Oregon is being invaded by Californians. "Reasons local residents are moving out of California include the cost of housing, congestion, high taxes and gun laws. Jennifer Leach and her family are selling their Ladera Ranch home and moving to Denver because of a new school vaccination law.(Photo by Cindy Yamanaka, Orange County Register/SCNG) .

Why to Oregon?  It's a neighbor state.  "If it's cheaper, they will come. That thinking has been behind a major real estate boom in Oregon, as workers flee California, where housing is among the priciest in the nation.

" They are coming up from that southern state with lots of money as the cost of living must be higher there to have the privilege of living under the sun and surf, and they have cash in their pockets and are buying homes above the asking price with it.  "Oregon was the most popular state to move to last year, according to moving company United Van Lines. And a quarter of those people came from The Golden State." (California).  Portland home prices jumped 11.1% between November 2014 and 2015 -- the biggest increase in the country. 
                                                           

Portland, city of bridges over the Willamette River
SW Portland houses the downtown area

"Of all the transplants that moved to Oregon in 2014, the U.S. Census Bureau found, 30,500 came from California - far more than the 18,500 who came from Washington, the second-largest group. Meanwhile, home values and rents in Oregon have sharply increased, and the inventory of available homes for sale and rent has been historically low -- a fact many locals have blamed on the transplants."

"For people in Portland, it feels like the city is getting away from them," said Nick Krautter, a real estate agent from Keller Williams Portland. "For two school teachers making $70,000 a year, it's tough for them to buy anything for over $300,000. But for people coming here with millions, it's a bargain."

Rent prices also went up 13.7%, according to Zillow.

The median home price in Portland is now $345,500. In San Francisco, it's $1.12 million."Many new residents have high-paying jobs that let them work remotely.  "They maintain the salaries from where they use to live ... and those salaries -- especially those having to do with software, engineering and development -- happen to be higher than what most companies pay in Portland," 

"It's becoming a city that is not recognizable for folks who have lived here for more than a year," said Isenstein Krueger. She said a new tall building has earned the nickname "sore thumb" among some residents.  "People are terrified that we are going to turn into San Francisco."  "The clear message is that those promoting violence – particularly when the violence is directed against policies, with which the Portland City Commission disagrees – are, welcome and tolerated in Portland."  An example is that "Portland Police have  been instructed to "go easy” on these leftist demonstrators that it is now standard operating procedure. The treatment is so biased in favor of the leftists that in one instance the police arrested and charged an individual who drew a gun in an effort to protect himself from a mob purporting to represent Black Lives Matter."

Californians are moving to many Western states; not just Oregon:  A futuristic power spoken about is  the Leftist nation of Pacifica.

One Leftist is trying to get California to cede from our union and trying to talk others into joining them.  "For confirmation, take stock of our present 2016 election season in all its novel madness: All we can agree to is our shared addiction to fast food and NFL football and that we are likely to disagree disagreeably on every thing of pith and moment for the foreseeable future.

What else can you do when the center cannot hold?  When things fall apart? Disunite.  Break up along existing cultural fault lines into smaller, more homogenous and manageable nations.  Breaking up is not that hard to do...sometimes it’s the only thing to do.  Ask those nearly half of Americans with a first divorce behind them.  And so I call upon my fellow citizens of the enlightened Pacific Slope to go west with me and seek our separate destiny on our own tectonic plate, the Pacific, which shall be the root of our name: Pacifica.

-- A Left Coast Manifesto:  Why the Pacific States Should Secede and Form Their Own More Perfect Union  by Larry L. Meyer  (Meyer is professor emeritus in journalism from California State University Long Beach, where he headed its Magazine Journalism Option for 15 years and was a three-time winner of the Meritorious Performance Award.  Prior to that, he taught writing and editing at UCLA and CSUN part time.)

    I hope this terrible idea dies.  America is great because we have been a strong union, unbreakable since the end of the Civil War in 1865.  

Where Californians Roam     

The Californians as depicted on Saturday Night Live

These states have seen the biggest influx of people born in California (counting adults 21 and older).  What may be ironic is the fact that most of the people leaving California are relatively conservative — by California standards, but numbers show that Democrats prevail.   in 2017 of this year, Oregon has 3,831,074 people.  California now has 39,849,872 people.  

State	Share of total population
Nevada	18.4%
Oregon	15.6%
Idaho	13.4%
Arizona	10%
Alaska	9.7%
Washington	9.3%
Utah	8.7%
Hawaii	7.1%
Colorado	6.9%
Montana	6.8%

Oregon became a state on February 14, 1859 and Portland's City Hall dates back to 1895 when it was finished.
President Trump might be interested in this: "The city hired Henry J. Hefty to design the building; his design was "a huge ostentatious structure that appeared to be modeled on the Kremlin." The city purchased the block in 1890 for $100,000, and construction began in 1892, but was halted due to dissatisfaction with the design.  After the foundation and basement of the building had been built, the new City Hall Commission canceled the contract and tore out the basement and first floor at an expense of $125,000. 

The Democratic Party I knew changed with Obama.  The  Democrats  altered their platform about Jerusalem in 2012 by taking out the sentence  that was there in 2008 that said that Jerusalem is and will remain the capital of Israel.  The Republicans criticized this so much that Obama had them put it back in.  At the very end of Obama's term, he turned against Israel at the UN, showing his true feelings about this tiny country that President Harry Truman had voted for as a Democrat.  

City Hall is where I attended meetings pertaining to Israel where the city was involved.  It was then
that I saw so many people against Israel as speakers "about the incident in which the Portland City Council decided to withdraw its investment in Caterpillar Company because Israeli authorities use Caterpillar equipment in building security walls to control Palestinian terrorists and to build residential developments in “disputed” lands. "

Only 51% of the people living in Oregon today were born here.  I'm one of them but had left several times to live in Anchorage, Alaska and Israel.  Like the swallows of Capistrano, I have returned to my son and many cousins; my Portland home,  but can hardly recognize it.  Being older now, I am happy to stay on Division and Powell in my driving, instead of the freeway.

                                                     

Issues about Jerusalem 

My yardstick  in deciding on what party is best is how they treat Israel. The other issues will survive and be dealt with fairly because we are brilliant Americans.  Israel needs our backing.   I have put it on my list at the top of the page.  The Republicans won that battle with hands tied behind their backs. I was so impressed by the two Senators of Cuban parents, Marco Rubio and Ted Cruz.   All 18 candidates were terrific-well, at least 17 were on that score.  At my doting age, I have decided that the best speaker is not always the greatest president.  Obama was a great speaker but Trump is the doer. Obama did not follow through but backed down.  To me, Hillary, from the same Obama Party, was his female Rep.   Though I had been on the Democratic Central Committee long ago in Ontario, Oregon, I now want to help Trump out, so am writing this article.  Oregon has changed, and I want to know why.  As the majority changed and moved left-I have moved right. I'm not alone.  There are others like me here.                                                                    

 It's like asking, is the glass half full or half empty?  That explains the difference we have between the left and the right; how we see issues.  Maybe it's genetic.  Some people have a judgmental personality, some don't.  Some are more trusting.  More likely it has something to do with how your parents voted.   My conclusion is that California has helped to bring about the change in Oregon.  Farmers and gold miners- two types of people-and they needed each other to survive.  

Resource: 

 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Governors_of_Oregon

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Victor_G._Atiyeh

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/06/us/politics/pushed-by-obama-democrats-alter-platform-over-jerusalem.html

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Julius_Meier
http://www.jta.org/2015/03/12/default/from-the-archive-when-oregons-governor-moonlit-as-synagogue-president
http://money.cnn.com/2016/02/05/pf/oregon-unaffordable-california/index.html
https://oregoneconomicanalysis.com/2015/09/08/migration-in-defense-of-californians/
lhttp://www.npr.org/sections/itsallpolitics/2013/08/29/216150644/how-california-is-turning-the-rest-of-the-west-blue
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portland_City_Hall_(Oregon)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neil_Goldschmidt
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barbara_Roberts
https://www.google.com/#q=John+Kitzhaber
http://www.oregonlive.com/politics/index.ssf/2017/06/federal_prosecutors_decline_to.html
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ted_Kulongoski
http://www.oregonlive.com/front-porch/index.ssf/2016/04/get_californians_out_of_oregon.html
http://www.cnbc.com/2016/01/05/why-people-are-flocking-to-oregon.html
Victor Sharpe-Leftist Portland, Oregon essay.  
https://suburbanstats.org/population/how-many-people-live-in-oregon
http://worldpopulationreview.com/states/california-population/
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2016/11/10/1595709/-Time-for-the-Left-Coast-to-SECEDE-It-is-possible-Here-s-how-Calexit
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/06/us/politics/pushed-by-obama-democrats-alter-platform-over-jerusalem.html
http://www.larrylmeyer.com/bio/