The president-elect, Barack Obama, received 73.5 percent of the vote in Sonoma County on Tuesday. If you want to know why this is called a Democratic county, now you know.

Supervisor Valerie Brown of Sonoma won re-election, but only barely. For the person who is about to become the president of the National Association of Counties, this was something less than a ringing endorsement. The knock on Brown, who also represented Sonoma County in the state Assembly, is that she didn’t spend enough time tending to hometown concerns. Her friends says she has learned her lessson.

The break-out performers in this election were new comer Gary Wysocky and police Lt. Ernesto Olivares, the newest members of the Santa Rosa City Council.

It may not be long before election winners bright with ideas for new programs are having second thoughts. Later today, the Sacramento Bee reports, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger will call a special session of the legislature to deal with the gaping holes in the state budget. How gaping? $11.2 billion is this budget year and $13 billion in the next.

It won’t be long before this pain is shared with local government, which means new council members and county supervisors will be confronted by a list of unhappy choices.

In other words, real life in local government will have almost nothing to do with what the candidates talked about during the campaign.