It sounds as though your wife is bemoaning not so much the lack of "big city" culture there as the presence of "small-town" culture. So: What aspects, specifically, of small-town life does she hate?
Secondly, how could a split-up (your wife and children return to CA; you stay in ID) possibly be even "on the board" here? This fact, alone, points to grave problems having nothing to do with the choice between CA and ID.
Regards,
She knows I hate everything but the weather in CA.
She knows I will be miserable there.
She hates it here, even in a nice home with good schools.
There are other CA refugees here she knows (all women) who want to go back to Walnut Creek/Lafayette area. People here are not very open and are very happy with quads and Bud Lite.
I don’t want to lose my family.
Our compromise is to buy a small investment house we can keep here if SHTF.
This is what jumped out to me as well. Take care of this #1. Move to a more red part of CA and forget about that argument. Your marriage needs immediate attention. Drop everything else and focus on that. Get counseling and speak with your priest/pastor.
Ending a marriage should only ever happen in extreme cases like serious abuse, unrepentant infidelity, and discovery that the marriage was under false pretenses. Otherwise, every possible effort should be made to salvage this sacred bond. Forget Idaho. Forget the move. Focus on that marriage!
The same reason many conservative voters gagged on Palin’s ‘golly, gee whiz’ persona. George Will is their template for ‘literate discourse’.