” . . . the weather and the physical landscape.’
Bird in gilded cage.
I don’t know you, but my first thought is that anyone whose reasons for staying in a liberal hell hole like California include such hedonistic reasons probably belongs there, and is usually loathed when they show up and “californianize” some previously conservative area that’s not as “special.” Hope I’ve got you wrong, and sorry if I do.
I had to come back to California as the jobs in Colorado were drying up and my family needed me.
It is nice being close to friends, half of whom are solid conservatives and Republican, and don't mind gutting it out in California.
My experience in Colorado was a bit depressing when it came to politics, although everything else about Colorado was a blast.
There were candidates that pretended to be conservative in the primaries, but were just in it for the fame/fortune. The truly conservative candidates that won the primaries had a hard time winning in the main election. Even a few years ago there were just too many Democrats, moderate Republicans, and moderate independents.
There was a group of cantankerous individualists, but they were no match for the hoards of locusts that built up covenanted communities all around them and then eventually squeezed them out. One-by-one the gun ranges became tract home communities with all sorts of nannyish rules that had to be followed: no parking on the street, fines for not keeping your front yard in pristine condition, but no one cared if your neighbor's backyard was full of weeds descending on your property. It was all about curb appeal.
When I got there when Colorado was still nominally Republican, every city had its own multimillion dollar rec center. What does a city need with a rec center when there are a score of private companies in the exercise gym business? There was definitely a sense that people in town expected more of their government than is healthy, while the hermits lived out of town hoping against hope that the plague of houses wouldn't reach their doorstep.
Even Texas will be a Democrat state within a couple of election cycles. Did you see all the blue on the south Texas election maps?
I'm staying put in the heart of the beast for now. Maybe I can take some stabs at it. Those of you living out near its appendages are safe for now, but not for long I'm afraid.