Victor Davis Hanson, the Martin and Illie Anderson Senior Fellow at Hoover, presents a brief history and geography of California before launching into his talk about California droughts. Hanson notes that people in California  live where there is no precipitation and that droughts are not unusual. 

According to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, California droughts are both age-old and common. Predictable California dry spells -- like those of 1929-34, 1976-77 and 1987-92 -- more likely result from poorly understood but temporary changes in atmospheric pressures and ocean temperatures.

The truth is, an “exceptional” drought such as California’s doesn’t require extraordinary measures. The proper remedy, in addition to the heavens crying, is for the leader of one party to step up to the challenge, while those in the party out of power step out and beyond their comfort zone.

For Terry Anderson, an economist at Stanford's Hoover Institution and co-founder of the Property and Environment Research Center, the biggest challenge is to get past such battles by incentivizing change with free market principles.