I'm talking about places like Madison, Denver, Austin, and Minneapolis which lean strongly D and lack any sort of substantial R vote netting suburbs at this point.
On the flip side, you have cities like Cinci, Dallas, Pheonix, Houston, and Charlotte, which are growing, college educated, and have clear industries, but are just so much redder and have all these R suburbs and exurbs that almost cancel out the D votes from the city.
The difference seems to be strongest amonst white voters, which have huge variations in their political leanings across these different metros.
Is it a self-sorting cultural thing, or is there some sort of "formula" that leads to certain metros becoming liberalized over others.
In your second list are a lot of metros with large populations of suburban evangelicals, who are still very much a key part of the GOP coalition (and in some ways are more influential than rural voters).
With the exception of Austin (where these voters still exist but are just outvoted), they don't exist in your first list.
