It is almost fitting that the state which is home to the entertainment industry be governed by people who seem to be content with creating illusion rather than dealing with reality. California is on the verge of a monumental financial collapse and Sacramento is filled with blissfully unaware legislators whose only coherent response seems to be crossing their fingers and hoping the bailout fairy comes swooping in for a magical Hollywood ending.

One of the many progressive policies signed into law by faux Republican Arnold Schwarzenegger was AB 32, a law known better by the story book name “The Global Warming Solutions Act” (“See that? If we just say it’s solved, it’ll be solved-magic!”). The law is designed to reduce California’s carbon emissions to 1990 levels by the year 2020. It was foisted upon the public with the worn out “stimulate green jobs” sales pitch that, so far, has proven to be more of a dream than a reality.

The bill is supposed to have created an economic green tech boom in California through the research and development of solar and wind power (the latter of which is becoming increasingly problematic).

As everyone knows, the only “boom” being heard in California’s economy at the moment is the sound of its implosion. Proposition 23 seeks to suspend AB 32 and its literal tilting at windmills until the state’s 12.2% unemployment rate drops to 5.5% for four consecutive quarters.

As with any ballot proposition in California, a lot of money to counter it generally shows up in a hurry. The biggest financial backer of the No on 23 movement is hedge fund manager Tom Steyer. Steyer heads up Farallon Capital in San Francisco and is spearheading the campaign to portray Prop 23 as a danger to public health and a job killer. Noble, right?

The fly in Steyer’s ointment of concern here is that he doesn’t seem to be at all averse to investing in allegedly health harming technologies as long as they aren’t in his back yard. His crusade seems to be one of financial convenience, not altruistic concern for the welfare of the general public.

Farallon owns almost ten percent of a company called FreightCar America, a company whose website boasts, “No one builds more aluminum, steel, and stainless steel coal cars than FreightCar America.”

Farallon has also invested in the second largest coal company in Indonesia, Adaro. One look at the picture on the website doesn’t give one a gooey green jobs feeling.

Not limiting itself to coal investments, Farallon has stakes in two oil and natural gas exploration companies: Sandridge Energy and Energy Partners, Ltd

One of the favorite lines of climate change hysteria skeptics is “I’ll believe there’s a crisis when the people who say there’s a crisis start acting like there’s a crisis.” This certainly seems to apply here.