re: Have any of you lost close friends or family relationships over politics?

No close friends. Raging liberals usually announce themselves pretty quickly, looking for confrontation. Miserable humans.

Most people that I end up being friends, I gradually find out that they're pretty conservative when politics eventually come up in conversation, calmly and rationally.

People who are laid back, polite, and freely offering to help w/ things or include someone new in their circle of friends rarely turn out to be raging liberals.

There are a couple relatives I don't make any effort with anymore - they showed little interest in my life and were always ready to pounce on politics, so they're easy to ignore.