Forget politics. Govern.

For those who had high hopes that the great minds in the editorial department of the Reno News & Review would let Election Rejection 2012 pass without offering final thoughts, well, sorry.

First thought: good riddance. Good riddance to all those woman-hating Neanderthals who got their asses handed to them. Think you’ll hear the word “Feminazi” in polite conversation anytime soon? We’d like to point out that you never did.

It would certainly be in better taste to let the majority of the Reno City Council leave and simply thank them for their service, and we would certainly have done that if one of their last official acts hadn’t been to vote a million dollars a year in corporate welfare for 30 years to the billionaire owner of the baseball stadium. So, let’s get this straight, a million a year for the life of the stadium and then Reno taxpayers own it for the pleasure of paying to demolish it? Thanks. At least there’s political cover for the people who appear to think they’d like to be mayor. Awesome.

Let’s add that to the millions upon millions given to corporate interests at the expense of quality of life for the people who actually own and fund the Reno city government: The Mapes; the Riverside theaters (seems likely we’ll discover how much that “incentive” to Oliver McMillan cost the taxpayers now); the giveaways of city streets and airspace to business interests, the parking “stadium,” special assessment districts, STAR bonds, downtown redevelopment effort numbers two and three, the freaking train trench, secret dealings with Apple, and taxpayer frottaging at the hands of developers and casino owners for the last 20 years—possibly as much as a billion dollars over the years. And then there are the things we were promised but were not delivered—like useful amenities across the street from City Hall and on the train-trench caps. And now what?

Across the country, we saw many signs of hope, but even those signs of hope illustrate how Nevada has chosen to continue to brood over its 1980s eggs of hatred and fear. Why couldn’t Nevada have been on the forefront of recreational marijuana legalization? Nevada had plenty of opportunities, but business couldn’t see that our traditional flouting of convention—like with easy divorce, legal prostitution and the gambling explosion—could have been our salvation.

Instead, the conservative values of government intrusion and fear over innovation has left Nevada with the worst economy in the nation. “Oh, we can’t tax multinational gold miners. They might leave.” We should be kicking their asses out of this state and digging our own gold with an eye toward developing local economies and tax bases.

Yes, congratulations to Maine, Maryland, Minnesota and Washington where marriage equality ballot initiatives passed. Nevada voters had our chance, but we chose discrimination. A coma victim can sense that tolerance is as much a capitalist value as it is an American one.

But to paraphrase a corporate hack who can best remain nameless: “The United States, and Nevada, cannot afford four more years of the same. The change promised four years ago is needed right now.”

Change, Nevada. Change.