What kind of person stereotypes an entire state of 40 million people based on their experiences in one small town?

The kind that uses logic and reason instead of rhetorical appeals to emotion. The 'personal is the political' is part of the culture in california and is common throughout the state. And if you don't believe me, you should go on a job hunt and tell every interviewer who talks to you that you're a republican.

Now that I think about it, I want to do just that and document the results. Should be interesting.

There is a group of guys where I work who call themselves VRWC[1] when they go to lunch together. This is in San Diego County. There may be liberal pockets in California but there are also conservative ones. Though Jerry Brown is governor now, we also have had such bleeding heart liberals as Reagan, Deukmajian, Wilson, and Schwartzenegger hold that title.

[1] VRWC refers to a Hillary Clinton sound-bite about a "vast, right-wing conspiracy."

While I don't entirely disagree, I wonder how you would run that sort of experiment. I've been on the interviewing side of the hiring table and if someone had brought up politics—either side—I would probably leave with a sour taste in my mouth. Bringing up a politics in such an unprompted and unprofessional fashion is a big red flag, whether I agree with their stance or not.

You might not bring the political questions at all. You might just casually mention a small detail, like "when I last visited [certain city] for a Republican convention,..." or something even more innocent and passing.

Interviewers are generally not allowed to ask you about your political positions or take them into account in any way. Frankly, talking about one's politics at an interview for an apolitical position would be so inappropriate as to reasonably raise concerns about the interviewee's impulse control and judgment.

Clarification (at least from a USA perspective): Interviewers are not generally banned from asking about your political affiliation. In many states, there are protections against discrimination based upon political leanings, but they are not implemented across the board nationally.*

As a good rule of thumb: if you really want the job, do not volunteer potential employers anything about yourself that you don't think would help you get hired. They aren't cops or courts; depending on how laws are crafted state-to-state, they are legally allowed to consider some categories of information that they aren't legally allowed to ask you outright if you volunteer it.

*There are protections in place for the bureaucracy itself, but they were implemented for practical reasons early in the country's history when it was observed that a party change leading to a clean sweep of the federal government right down to the last front-desk agent regardless of their capabilities in the task at hand was highly inefficient.

I meant most interviewers are forbidden from discussing it by company policy, even if it isn't forbidden by law. My state doesn't ban asking about political positions in interviews, but I know I'd be canned if I ever asked an interviewee about that.

Agreed on everything else.

I disagree with your idea that other states don't have some sort of pet peeve they will 'dock you points' for.

Go to Austin and look for a job while spouting off right-to-life and anti-gay marriage nonsense.

Go to Houston/Dallas and espouse the opposite opinion.

Go to Washington DC or Virginia and look for a job while being vocally against government involvement in your personal life and the spy state of affairs, or the military industrial complex.

Hell, let's take it further than job acquiring or state scope; ask anyone with lightly browned skin how they were treated nationwide after September 11th.

'personal is the political' is a nationally accepted doctrine, sadly. In my travels I haven't witnessed much different from state to state.

DC is definitionally composed of people carrying opinions across the spectrum. Being vocally opposed to those things you list is actually a job requirement for some places. DC's stereotype is a bit unnuanced.

In DC the unacceptable opinions don't include the things listed above, but that doesn't mean there aren't any unacceptable opinions there.

Try going to D.C. and preaching that the government should be forcibly (or even peaceably) overthrown and abolished, and see how tolerant those "folks" actually are.

D.C. is a cesspool of iniquity and filth.