I was planning on only one election-related posting to the Fozzolog -- mostly to spare many of my friends the pain to their brains -- but I feel compelled to make a couple comments in the first few moments after election day. Okay, that's not quite right. This is going to be a long rambling entry. Be warned.

We knew Pete was surely not going to win. I was hoping his supporters would do a little better, but all things considered, Pete and his team did an absolutely amazing job of going up against the petrified Senator Hatch. Pete's first, and undoubtedly not his last, foray into the realm of politics and public service left no small mark.

In my other post about the election, I characterized the Democrat party, at the national level, as being more socialist and anti-religion than ever before. In retrospect, I feel that claim needs some adjustment and clarification. The leadership of the Democrat party are the ones who are way-left-leaning socialist whack jobs who seek to purge us all of theistic impulses and seek to rewrite and/or obliterate the constitution.

The gains made by Democrats in this year's election were not made by the whack jobs. They were made by many conservative and moderate Democrats.

Unfortunately, the party leadership will benefit from these gains, nonetheless. It is a viable argument to vote along party lines for all federal offices because, when it all comes down to it, party affiliation is where the power is in Congress.

Of course, all those propositions for Salt Lake County passed. Higher sales taxes on everything and bonds for recreation and open space will solve all our problems. The folks with the Salt Lake Chamber who worked on the Proposition 3 did an excellent job in their campaign. It helped that nobody really organized any substantial opposition.

That brings up what is probably the biggest caveat of local public policy: accountability. Or rather, the ugly lack of it. That, probably more than any other reason, is why we should -- and I realize I am playing armchair quarterback as much as anyone here -- be more involved in local civic issues.

Who is going to make sure the UTA doesn't horde (and waste) all the sales tax revenues generated from the rate increase resulting from the passing of Proposition 3? Who is going to see that UDOT gives viable east-west corridors options their due time under the microscope? We have to be more involved.

I was listening to the radio in the car for a couple minutes tonight and heard a reporter interviewing a republican congresswoman about various things. During the course of the interview, she mentioned that local issues on the ballot are often there for carefully crafted reasons - to draw out voters who will be more sympathetic to one party or another; it's all party of a grand scheme orchestrated by "those in charge" to (legally) influence elections.

Several states had gay marriage referendums on the ballot in 2004 and many believe that played into the strong republican winnings from that year.

Speaking of gay marriage, I guess Arizona had a ballot initiative to amend the state constitution saying "marriage is only between a man and a woman." It appears to have lost, surprisingly. I was intrigued and looked into it to see if there was an obvious reason it lost. I discovered Arizona already has laws which make gay marriage illegal in the state, but this constitutional amendment would have banned anything remotely like gay marriage -- like civil unions or domestic partnerships. So, I guess I'm glad it didn't pass. That's bordering on bigotry, I think.

Meanwhile, Arizona voters did vote to make English the official language of the state. Three other immigration measures also passed in Arizona: A ban on undocumented immigrants from using state funds for adult education and childcare; A measure preventing illegals from receiving bail, thereby allowing them to flee the country before cases go to trial; A ban on illegal immigrants suing for punitive damages. All steps in the right direction.