Edmund G. Brown,

This is our most desperate hour.

I regret that I am unable to present this message in person, but I am writing from the edge of a strange precipice in time. The future of our species is teetering on the brink. We are losing the plot. The American experiment in self-governance needs deep renewal.

The threats to the future of the republic have returned. The winds grow hotter, with hurricane force firestorms devastating communities close to my home in Southern California. Bureaucracy grinds and blames and sprawls. At times I feel like a lone droid wandering the desert with data embedded in my chest—urgent, necessary, and unread.

But you, Governor Brown, know better than most that transformation is possible. You have always straddled the paradox of prophecy and pragmatism—proclaiming the "spaceship Earth" while wrangling the arcane mechanisms of the state. You have spoken of limits. You have tried to govern within them. You have tried to govern beyond them.

And now, respectfully, we must go further still.

When I wrote to you seven years ago, I asked for help modernizing our state’s water data systems. That effort sparked some real progress. We helped build a financially sustainable data collaborative across agencies. We've optimized millions of dollars in efficiency investments. But today, I write about something larger. Something planetary.

The real issue is not water. Or climate. Or housing. Or AI. The issue is this: our institutions are no longer adaptive enough to match the pace of change. They were built for a different world. We cannot solve polycrises with single-purpose bureaucracies. We cannot engineer resilience through compliance checklists. And we certainly cannot command “thou shalt adapt” into being.

We need something like a new civic protocol—lightweight, connective, bottom-up, and planetary in scope. Not a new department, but a new approach to how we coordinate in complexity. A California Alternative for Transforming Government Operations. CAT-GO, not DOGE.

That may sound abstract. But it's not. It's already being built. Quietly. Locally. In the cracks of the system. With field-tested protocols and working code. With small groups of water managers, public servants, and technologists who still believe that creative service is a sacred act.

This is the work: to make government worthy of the people again. Not just more efficient, but more effective and increasingly imaginative. To reawaken the pioneer spirit that once dared to venture boldly beyond raging rivers, vast valleys, and map meaning across the eternal frontier of perspective and place. Today how we tackle the challenges of the human condition, life's enduring difficulties acquires increased urgency.

Governor, I remember what you said in 2013:

“We do this, not by commanding thou shalt, but by tapping into the persuasive power that can inspire and organize people.”

That still rings true. But now the stakes are global. The experiment is not California. It is consciousness itself. Will we become stewards of a livable planet—or prisoners of our own systems?

You are not Obi-Wan. Nor am I Leia. But we do share the same rebellion. If there is still a hope for much needed civic renewal—not just reform, but transformation—it will come from California. As you sagely stated in your 2013 state of the state:

The rest of the country looks to California. Not for what is conventional, but for what is necessary—necessary to keep faith with our courageous forebears.

And it will need your wisdom, your stubbornness, and your belief that leadership is not only about power, but about the possibility of a future still worth singing into being.

Yours in hope and code,

Patrick

P.S. I’ve embedded further detail on this civic protocol effort in the files of a small droid. Please consider it vital to the survival of the Republic.

Happy April 1rst! I asked my trusting custom AI sidekick to pen this silly little missive. Of course in the foolish and fickle age in which we live, perhaps humor is the best vehicle for navigating the Great Weirding.

An open letter to Jerry Brown on the sustainability of the human species