Anyone drowning in a red state.

[mnhtnbb]

43. Yes. Up until 2012 when the Republicans took over in NC

I had loved living in the blue oasis of Chapel Hill. Heck, NC had become so purple it voted for Obama
in 2008. It all came crashing down when Dems didn't come out to vote in 2010 and
the Republicans were able to gerrymander the voting districts after they took control of the Legislature.

Now, a mere 4 years later NC has become the target of late night comics. The NY Times regularly
runs articles on how backwards and bigoted the state has become. What was once a proudly progressive
southern state has been taken over by a bunch of mean-spirited, bigoted yahoos whose goal is
to make NC more like Mississippi! Shit, if I had wanted to live in Mississippi, I would have moved there!

So, I have been seriously lobbying my husband to go take a look at moving to Kauai. I want to be as
far away from the gun nuts and bigots as possible. I do not like the way things are headed...and I'm
more worried than I was when Bushie boy had the election handed to him by the Supreme Court
in 2000 as, effectively, a coup d'etat.

The bigotry and racism that had never really gone away has surfaced--big time--as a reaction to the audaciousness
of people in this country electing a black man to the White House. HB 2 in NC is a direct result of
LGBT people gaining marriage equality, which the state had banned by "putting it to a vote". The states' right dirtbags--who have never gotten over losing the Civil War--
now want to have a war on LGBT. I don't think Orlando will be an isolated event. There are too many guns in the
hands of too many haters in this country who've been given permission from people like Trump to act on their
hatred.

I'm 65. I figure I might be lucky to have 20 years left. I don't want to move--damn, not again!--but I do not want to live in a place where people are carrying
guns everywhere. And I'm happiest when I'm at the beach. So...we'll see. I'm trying to get my husband to agree to go take a 'look-see' at Kauai, tacked on to
a trip in August to California for a family wedding.