We know the zeitgeist these days is Barack Obama-style hope. But we’ve never been ones to embrace the zeitgeist.

In fact, we think it could be very likely that Nevada is more royally screwed than ever before, no matter what happens in November’s presidential contest.

The following scenario hinges on several factors, some of which may not come to pass. But if the deadly dominoes fall where we suggest they might, our recommendation is prepare to flee Nevada. Allow the dark cloud of depression to start forming:

First, what if ex-Reno Assemblywoman Sharron Angle’s property tax limitation cap makes it to the ballot, and is approved, this year and again in 2010? (An expected legal challenge from the state teachers union may keep it from the ballot.)

According to the initiative, property taxes could rise only 2 percent per year (for all property, commercial and residential) until it’s sold and reassessed. The net effect would be to cut the follow of dollars from a pipeline that directly supports critical services like police, firefighters, schools, county hospitals and local road-building.

Angle borrowed her solution from California, which unlike Nevada can rely on other streams of tax money, including state and corporate income taxes. And even with those other revenue streams, California’s deficit is nearly three times Nevada’s general-fund budget.

Second, what might happen if the state Supreme Court rules that a trio of initiatives backed by Las Vegas Sands Chairman Sheldon Adelson should go on the ballot? (They’ve been blocked by a court ruling that found the petitions failed to meet standards, but that ruling ma be overturned.)

The Las Vegas Visitors and Convention Authority would have to shunt more dollars to local services, but the real kicker is the one that would require a two-thirds vote on any tax measure proposed by initiative. And since our feckless Legislature isn’t about to propose a tax increase, the initiative process is the only way one will even see the light of day. But with a two-thirds supermajority required for passage, it would be all but impossible to get anything save perhaps a casino tax increase enacted.

Oh, by the way, the two-thirds initiative would need only be adopted by a simple majority. Irony!

So, with property taxes capped, initiative taxes requiring two-thirds and a similar two-thirds requirement on the Legislature (thanks to then-Congressman Jim Gibbons), the odds are that Nevada — the second-most lightly taxed state in the nation — would never see another tax increase.

Third, even though there are some very well-meaning, intelligent and compassionate people serving in the Legislature, all of whom know the only way to fix some of Nevada’s most pressing problems is to create a tax structure that was made for the 21st century and not the 18th, silence will replace advocacy in legislative chambers.

In the state Senate, Majority Leader Bill Raggio was forced to utter a no-tax pledge in his primary race with Angle. Even so, more conservative members of his caucus (say, state Sen. Bob Beers) would stiffen spines even if Raggio had lame-duck second thoughts. If Beers were to lose re-election this year, that might change. But we’re thinking he won’t.

In the state Assembly, you have the potential for a Democratic supermajority. And you have Speaker Barbara Buckley talking about statewide town hall meetings to discuss the very issue of taxes, and a vision for Nevada that’s been so sorely lacking under the Gibbons maladministration.

But even with looming term limits, you have two basic necessities nagging at the majority party: Re-election, and the future. If nothing else, Republicans have been able to use anti-tax rhetoric to great effect in elections (look no farther than the recent primary). Assembly members who aren’t term limited will be thinking about that when they decide how they’ll vote. And Buckley herself, though term-limited in 2010, has aspirations to run for governor. The last person who ran from her party was defeated, in part, by a silly tax nickname. Would she risk a big tax fight in 2009 before she makes a bid for the highest office in 2010? Especially since her chief Democratic rival — Rory Reid — doesn’t have to tackle the issue at all from his perch on the Clark County Commission?

And Buckley can’t ignore the fact that the party re-elected in 2010 will draw district lines for the next decade, an awesome power that nobody wants to seen thrown away on a debate that may not be winnable. Decisions made in the 2009 Legislature will reverberate well beyond the 2010 election cycle, and we can’t help but think Madam Speaker would like her legacy to be a Democratic Assembly through 2021, at least.

And, many may argue, with Gov. No New Taxes in power, any efforts that don’t at least secure a solid two-thirds in both houses will be fruitless, thanks to both the two-thirds requirement and an almost certain gubernatorial veto of any tax plan.

Fiction? Not really. Watching Face to Face with Jon Ralston last week, we spotted at least two Democratic candidates who reacted to the word “taxes” the way vampires react to sunlight. We won’t use names, since we think their fear is probably (and unfortunately) shared by a lot of other candidates.

The remedy, alas, is undoing four decades of Republican rhetoric that taxes are bad, government is too big and inefficient and the private sector does things better. Each of those assertions is demonstrably false, but in politics, as our rabidly anti-tax friend Chuck Muth often says, if you’re explaining, you’re losing.

Finally, there’s the economy, which doesn’t look like it’s getting better any time soon. We’ve got major casino projects halted (Echelon) or having trouble finding credit (CityCenter). We have malls postponed (The Shops at Summerlin Centre). We have banks with huge losses (Silver State Bancorp). We still lead the nation in foreclosures, our unemployment is up, gaming wins are down and there’s a ticking time bomb in the state’s budget made up of retiree health care costs.

All of that means less money for a state that didn’t have much to begin with, and doesn’t show much promise of getting more. And, for the next two years at least, the response will be to cut budget so severely that Nevada may take decades to recover, if at all.

To conservative Republicans, this no doubt sounds like the perfect storm: Less tax money means shrinking government, and more free market. To humans, however, it’s a prescription for a very dismal future, in which “freedom” becomes a synonym for “you’re on your own, bitches; civilization is what you can afford!”

Anybody got the 800-number for U-Haul?