Reno on my mind

If the Democrats are going to win the White House in 2008, they're going to need a strategy to win the west. And to do that, they would be well-advised to start by examining a post-election analysis of the vote in Nevada by The Nation's Sasha Abramsky. His analysis of the result is similar to mine: the Dems botched Clark County and lost the rurals heavily while keeping the lid on the Republicans in Washoe. The result: a "morals and terrorism voter" landslide and an overall election edge for Bush. I question his analysis on Washoe: "When the votes were tallied, the Democrats had managed to narrow Bush's margin in Washoe County to 4 percent, down from 9 percent in 2000; but that achievement was diluted by the fact that 67 percent of Washoe County's registered voters came out to vote, a lower percentage than in any other county in the state--thus numerically diminishing the signficance of Kerry's percentage gains there." Huh? Wasn't it better for the Democrats to have a low turnout in a heavily Republican county? And if Bush won the county, why would the Dems want MORE people showing up to the polls and adding to Bush's statewide vote count? He does, however, successfully pick up on the strange political vibe I felt in Reno:

Three days after the election I headed to Reno and parked myself in the gaudy Circus Circus casino-hotel--one of only two fully unionized casinos in the city--for four days, in a twelfth-floor room looking out across the gridlike streets to the snowy slopes beyond. The casinos were in full swing, and the video arcades at Circus Circus--with games-of-the-times like Target Terror--were jammed, as were the bars, st rip clubs and instant-wedding chapels around town. As I listened to conversations, hardly anybody seemed to be talking politics. Reno must be a particularly galling town for obsessive political types to live in; it is, after all, where people come to deliberately block out the "real world," the world of politics and wars (the Falluja offensive was just getting under way) and economic uncertainties, behind a great canopy of blinking, twitching neon pizazz. There was an irony in talking with residents about the electoral victory of moral fundamentalism while garrisoned in a junior version of Sin City, surrounded by casinos and bars and topless cabarets, by porno booths and, in the desert counties outside town, legalized brothels. Quite clearly, these sin palaces were not about to go out of business anytime soon. In fact, the economic elite of northern Nevada that profits from the "sin" business loved the Republican victory--loved the lower taxes it heralded, the deregulation of the workplace, the tilting of the playing field ever more steeply against organized labor.

Just found this article in the Reno Gazette-Journal, and since the electoral votes have just been certified there, I guess this is the final post-game report.

Bush defeated Democrat John Kerry 50 percent to 47.4 percent in Nevada to win a second term. That’s the fourth-narrowest margin in 36 Nevada presidential elections dating back to 1864. Bush’s win keeps Nevada’s streak alive as a presidential bellwether. Since 1912, only one candidate has won the presidency without taking Nevada, the exception being Democrat Jimmy Carter in 1976. And Nevada has never defeated a wartime president. Nevada voters have backed candidates across the political spectrum — liberals, moderates and conservatives. ... In the past 17 presidential elections, Democrats have carried Washoe County only twice: Franklin Roosevelt in 1940 and Lyndon Johnson in 1964. “People worked hard to try to swing Washoe County” in 2004, said Nevada state archivist Guy Rocha. “That’s like trying to turn around a battleship, but they made a little bit of inroad. Northern Nevada, Washoe County, this is Republican country. Overall, that’s a fact.”

Note Nevada's status as a bellwether, and the trends going the Democrats' way in Washoe. If the Democrats are going to win again, they are going to have to figure out how to turn the Silver State blue.