Mark Simon writes an interesting perspective on how liberal Bay Area politics are, compared to the rest of the state.

I’ve often taken this factor about the region for granted, but I’ve also wondered about it, too. When the 2000 presidential election was just around the corner, students at my college campus dismissed Bush as a prospective win altogether and argued that it would either be Gore or Nader. When I visited a friend who lived in Central California this past May, I couldn’t help it - I was pretty amazed that there were actually Republicans around. And when I was playing beat reporter for the Ingleside district a year ago, one of my sources and I were talking about the Democratic Club, an interest group in the neighborhood. I asked her (somewhat naively) if there was a Republican Club or something like it, too. She laughed. “Republicans? Are you kidding? Do you have any idea how many Republicans live in San Francisco? Probably a handful!”

But despite the slanted political view here, I don’t think I’d want to live anywhere else.