Layoffs. Cutbacks. Bankruptcies. Bailouts (for some). Foreclosures. Never-ending wars. Dick Cheney, still popping off about how we should torture people. Health care, just barely. Jim Gibbons and John Ensign.

What a year, huh?

If you’re like us, you’re ready to see it off.

We’ll be signing off now until Monday, Jan. 4. Lots of new and interesting things coming in the new year. Let’s hope it’s better than this one, shall we?

See you in 2010, and, as ever, thanks for tuning in!

Gov. Jim Gibbons wrote in a letter to state employees — and the Review-Journal dutifully reported today — that it would take two votes of the people to increase the state’s mining tax.

That’s not entirely accurate.

Yes, amending the state constitution — where a 5 percent net tax on mining profits is enshrined — would take two successive votes of the people. But there’s a much easier and quicker way to do it that wouldn’t require a statewide vote at all.

You see, the mining industry enjoys a series of very generous tax deductions in the Nevada Revised Statutes, which allows the industry to write off a goodly portion of its expenses. As a result, the effective tax rate for the industry is very low.

The NRS could be changed with a simple majority vote of both houses of the Legislature, although it’s likely Gibbons would veto such a move and thus require a two-thirds majority to override. But even a supermajority in the Legislature is easier than two statewide campaigns.

Sadly, because of deference to a monied industry and fear of being called names, nobody in the Legislature has seriously advanced a bid to eliminate mining tax deductions. But if anybody ever did, say in the 2011 Legislature, we could be seeing bigger tax revenues by summertime. No statewide vote required.

UPDATE: Don’t take our word for it. Take it from the Las Vegas Gleaner, which has been on the case even longer than we.