Oligarch Valley
A Journey Through Oligarch Valley: End of the Road
One day out here is enough to get you down. A few days can turn into full-blown depression.
A Journey Through Oligarch Valley, Pt 8: Redwood City (Detour)
You can pick up the scent of Oligarch Valley overlords in the most unexpected places.
A Journey Through Oligarch Valley, Pt 7: Corcoran (Exit 334)
Here in Corcoran, everything except the air belongs to the Boswell clan, an old slave-plantation family hailing from the state of Georgia.
A Journey Through Oligarch Valley, Pt 6: Cowschwitz (Exit 334)
The stench—the awful stench—was better than any visual landmark. Welcome to Harris Ranch, California...
A Journey Through Oligarch Valley, Pt 5: Resnicks (Exit 253)
The economic viability of this piece of Oligarch Valley depends on Iran being kept in a state of a permanent economic blockade.
A Journey Through Oligarch Valley, Pt 4: Moron (Exit 225)
Taft is an oil town, swept up in the toxic fracking revolution that’s taking the U.S. energy sector by storm.
A Journey Through Oligarch Valley, Pt 3: Septic Tank (Exit 244)
Green Acres is not so much a farm, as a place where the great big city of Los Angeles dumps just about all of its shit.
A Journey Through Oligarch Valley, Pt 2: Tejon Ranch (Exit 215)
Tejon Ranch shows how a small clique of lowkey aristocratic families continue to plunder California, all because one of their ancestors got here earlier than anyone else.
A journey through Oligarch Valley
I head up California's I-5 to discover the putrid truth lurking beneath Central Valley.