Four more years of blaming Bush

What does America want after four brutal years of high unemployment and an economy still on the brink of a double-dip recession? More Obama cowbell.

The great American electorate has decided to again send the economic failure known as Barack Obama into the breach for another term.

You will please forgive my lack of exuberance. I have zero confidence this president will change his strategy to get the economy right this time around. He's an entitlement guy who doesn't really get the invisible hand of a free market.

He's a make-work job creator.

He's a fax machine in an Apple store.

So I stand by expecting, on a monthly basis between now and 2016, to hear the president and his acolytes explain their lack of performance with this sad refrain:

"It's George W. Bush's fault."

With that cheery thought, here are a few other random post-election observations.

Color Nevada blue?

Has Nevada officially become a blue state, meaning it is a reliable Democratic state in national elections? I think we're very close to making that call. Three factors drive it: The rise of Latino voting power, the Californication of Nevada and the absence of leadership within the state Republican Party.

It's hard to effectively convey the joy of Nevada-style conservatism when GOP meetings resemble an episode of "Here Comes Honey Boo Boo."

Bye-bye, Shelley

For a politician who has faithfully raised millions of dollars for Las Vegas Democrats, Tuesday was a brutal way to end a career. Call it the Shelley Berkley heave-ho. As much love as Nevada Democrats bestowed upon the president, they withheld it in the same measure from Rep. Berkley in her U.S. Senate bid against Republican Dean Heller.

Remember the much-touted Mark Mellman polls? They showed Obama up on Romney by 6 percentage points and Berkley beating Heller by 3 points. It turns out Mellman's final polls showed Heller winning by 1 to 2 points, but Berkley and Mellman's firm didn't disclose it.

Well, Obama ended up winning Nevada by that 6-point margin. But Berkley lost by 1.20 percent.

That's a brutal goodbye kiss from Nevada Democrats. Or, perhaps, a hug and a kidney punch.

The Big Empty

As vote-rich as Las Vegas and Reno still are in "The Big Empty" called Nevada, it never pays to underestimate rural Nevada. In a tight race, votes are votes, whether you find them at the Culinary union hall or in downtown Pioche. Lots of politicians can win election statewide - Jim Gibbons and Harry Reid come to mind - but you can't be truly loved in the state like a Gov. Mike O'Callaghan or a Sen. Richard Bryan without a little love from the rural counties.

One of the ways candidates make themselves known in rural counties is to hit the Fourth of July parades and quaint county fairs in places like Caliente, Ely and Hawthorne.

Nobody in my memory enjoyed these festivities more than O'Callaghan. He'd visit rural communities even when he wasn't running for election and drink, laugh, swap stories and call the people by their first names. Contrast that with Reid, who rarely sets foot in most rural counties anymore.

Reid may be a big shot in Washington, D.C., but he's nobody special in Eureka.

Somewhere in the middle of Reid and O'Callaghan rest Shelley Berkley and Dean Heller.

Berkley, with her "she's had work done" look and piercing voice, rode in a car and did what amounted to the princess wave at rural residents. Heller, meanwhile, cowboyed up and rode a horse - his own horse!

Don't mean to be cruel, because there's a lot more to Shelley Berkley than first impressions, but that contrast left an impression.

Sherman Frederick, former publisher of the Las Vegas Review-Journal and member of the Nevada Newspaper Hall of Fame, writes a column for Stephens Media. Read his blog at www.lvrj.com/blogs/sherm.