Reply #6: Added note: I have never heard anyone in Southern California call the [View All]

[Peace Patriot]

Inland Empire "L.A. and Orange County's New Jersey."

I presume what is meant by this is a lower middle class/working class region, not at the center of power, money and big city glamor. That is true enough. But I never heard it said. And I'm not sure that most of the people it was said about could find New Jersy on a map. So it's a snob remark--the remark of New York carpetbaggers trying to figure out where the Beverly Hilton is located, and finding themselves in Claremont. Perhaps this is more the key to the origin of "empire" and "imperial" than the real estate developer of Imperial County--"empire" being the working class' resentful/envious reply to big city snobbery.

The wikipedia article says "citation needed" for this phrase, and I wonder if it was ever spoken by anyone. Or maybe this just tells you who I mostly hung out with, in my Southern California days. (And it weren't the nabobs.)