National
Journal Group
Learn more about our publications and sign up for a free trial.
E-Mail Alerts
Get notified the moment your favorite features are updated.
Need A Reprint?
Click here for details on reprints, permissions and back issues.
Advertise With Us
Details on advertising with National Journal Group -- both online and in print -- can be found in our online media kit.
Go Wireless
Get daily political updates on your handheld computer.
|
Last Updated May 16, 2005
Silicon Valley is a place and a state of mind, an area that had no distinctive identity three decades ago but which people all over the world have recognized, admired and tried to imitate. In the 1980s and 1990s Silicon Valley emerged as the center of America's computer industry, a place where creative minds have developed products that large corporations never thought would sell. Its beginnings can be traced back to 1939, when William Hewlett and David Packard started their electronics firm in a Palo Alto garage, or perhaps to 1891, when Stanford University was founded on the estate of a California governor and senator. Not every aspect of the computer business is centered here. Microsoft, routinely disparaged in every Palo Alto espresso shop and bar, is up in Redmond, Washington, and IBM is off in Armonk, New York. But Silicon Valley is where most of the giants, and very much of the creativity, of the high-tech business--as well as the ghosts of dot-coms whose stock has melted down to zero--have been based. How did Silicon Valley come to be where it is? One reason is Stanford, the students it attracts and produces, and fact that it has always encouraged profit-making activity by faculty. Another is venture capital, widely available from innovation-minded old San Francisco money, dispensed mostly from nondescript office buildings on Sand Hill Road off I-280 on the reclaimed flatlands along San Francisco Bay. A third, perhaps the greatest, is that Silicon Valley is the kind of place where smart young innovators like to live. Elite law and medical school graduates head to the prestigious, high-salary jobs of central cities; but techies are free to live in this pleasant, healthy environment. Sheltered by hills from coastal fogs and rains, Silicon Valley boasts a sunny climate with perceptible but gentle seasons, perfect for year-round outdoor sports; there may well be more jogging trails and bicycle paths here than anywhere else in the country. There is a sort of pure Americana here: these communities were rustic but never poor, rural but never bigoted, country-like but still easily accessible to the luxuries of civilization. People here were ahead of the rest of the nation in fighting for the environment, in favoring natural over processed foods and in indulging in regular exercise. And they have been quick to adapt to change. In the 1970s Silicon Valley thrived when the semiconductor business took off. In the 1980s, in the face of threats from Japanese firms, Silicon Valley shifted to microprocessors and personal computers. In the 1990s, when PCs became a low-profit commodity business, Silicon Valley shifted to the Internet. Yahoo and Hotmail reportedly were conceived at Buck's restaurant, the networking nexus in Woodside. When the Internet bubble burst in March 2000, Silicon Valley fell on hard times. By one estimate, it lost 127,000 jobs, more than half of the total created between 1998 and 2000. Stock prices plummeted and real estate prices have too, though they are still the highest in the nation; the Valley actually lost population from 2000 to 2003. Billions in paper wealth disappeared, and technology exports from California fell from $61 billion in 2000 toward $40 billion in 2002. The question became whether Silicon Valley still had the ability to adapt. In 2004 the Valley seemed to be on the upturn, with rising profits and Google's hugely successful public offering. No one knows what the next big thing in high-tech will be, but there are still lots of people working in Silicon Valley's bland office parks or in someone's garage who think they're on the way to it, and perhaps some are. The 14th Congressional District of California includes much of Silicon Valley, with Menlo Park, Palo Alto, home of Stanford, and most of Redwood City, where tech office parks went up on the old salt flats and large condominium projects followed. Further south along El Camino Real are Mountain View, Los Altos and Sunnyvale (the district's largest city). There are some ultra-wealthy enclaves here: Woodside, with its 1850s country store and mansions dotting the hills; Portola Valley and Los Altos Hills, with stark contemporary homes overlooking the Bay. Atherton, with its stone-walled lots, ranked as the most expensive zip code in the nation in 2004, with a median home-sale price of $2.5 million. Over the mountains it includes the little town of Half Moon Bay, with its pumpkin farms rising over the ocean, and the mountains where imposing redwoods grow within five miles of spectacular beaches. The 14th's political heritage is progressive: a sort of environmentalist, dovish, healthy-lifestyle, but entrepreneurial Republicanism, typified by former Congressmen Pete McCloskey, Ed Zschau and Tom Campbell, each of whom quit the House to run unsuccessfully for the Senate between 1982 and 2002. But this kind of Republican is virtually extinct, and Silicon Valley has become heavily Democratic. It is liberal on cultural issues and was enchanted by the attention it received from Bill Clinton and Al Gore. In 2004 George W. Bush got only 30% of the vote here. The congresswoman from the 14th District is Anna Eshoo, a Democrat first elected in 1992. Born back East, she is the only member of Congress of Assyrian descent. She was a full time homemaker, then chaired the San Mateo County Democratic Party and was elected to the San Mateo Board of Supervisors in 1982. In 1988, she ran for the House against Tom Campbell. The two spent a total of $2.5 million, and Eshoo was the first congressional candidate to distribute videotapes to voters. Campbell won 52%-46%. But in 1992 he ran for the Senate and Eshoo ran for the House again. In the primary she beat an assemblyman redistricted out of his seat by 40%-36%. In the general, Eshoo outspent her opponent and won 57%-39%. She has not faced a serious challenge for reelection. In the House, Eshoo's voting record has been mostly liberal and occasionally moderate on foreign policy. She was a bit nervous in 1993 about supporting the Clinton budget and tax package, which hit this high-income area hard, and hesitated before supporting NAFTA and fast track. She joined Republicans and high-tech interests on securities litigation, liability relief for Y2K computer problems, normal trade relations with China and electronic signatures. Despite local pressure, she voted against trade promotion authority. Eshoo has been among the House Democrats willing to pursue bipartisan deals. On Energy and Commerce, she has worked with Joe Barton to get quicker FDA regulatory approval for medical devices. With Richard Baker, she passed a House bill to oppose the FASB accounting board proposal to charge stock options against earnings, which would hit hard in Silicon Valley. With John Shimkus, she won House passage of a bill for enhanced 911 service as part of a national cell phone tracking system. With Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi's help, Eshoo got a seat on the Intelligence Committee. They have been close friends and confidants since they first met at a Democratic event in the Bay Area in the early 1970s, and their families have spent time together. Eshoo was part of Tim Roemer's short-lived campaign for the chairmanship of the Democratic National Committee.
Committees
National Journal Group offers both print and electronic reprint services, as well as permissions for academic use, photocopying and republication. Click here to order, or call us at 877-394-7350. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
NEW FEATURE
[ Site Index | Staff | Privacy Policy | E-Mail Alerts ]
[ Reprints And Back Issues | Content Licensing ]
[ Make NationalJournal.com Your Homepage ]
[ About National Journal Group Inc. ]
[ Employment Opportunities ]
Copyright 2013 by National Journal Group Inc.
The Watergate · 600 New Hampshire Ave., NW
Washington, DC 20037
202-739-8400 · fax 202-833-8069
NationalJournal.com is an Atlantic Media publication.
