All west coast states are largely rural where public transportation is ineffective and cars are a basic necessity of life.

Specific cases do work - or at least work better than the car-owning alternatives, for example major transit directions for short-ish distances in San Francisco. If your life revolves around a few of these, you are doing pretty well without a car ... and you still can't escape from that area without one. A significant additional "sweet spot" zone is where car usage has been made - deliberately and assiduously - unbearable. The choice is then about a lesser aggravation, rather then desirable service. And so we get the quality of life we deserve, and that's not great.

Nobody is arguing that YOU should own a car. If you are happy without one that's great and carry on. But that's rather specific situation.

like the Muni is cute and all but it’s a joke compared to the east coast systems i grew up with (wmata, mbta, nyc mta) many of which are in smaller cities.