Early this week I was in Menlo Park, “The Capital of Venture Capital.” It’s a place so lovely, leafy and wealthy, so obviously preserved in amber by anti-growth regulation, that it might have been created by Walt Disney. It’s America’s real California Adventure. Coming down the elevator of my jewel-box hotel in the city’s Tiffany...

During an otherwise quiet September morning some years ago, I received a curious call from then-California Gov. Jerry Brown’s legislative team. We had just finished the legislative session, and this junior staffer was deciding on whether to recommend the governor sign or veto a bill sitting on his desk. I knew the drill after working...