Just say no works, apparently. Who knew Nancy Reagn’s famous words would resound so clearly all these decades later?

That’s one of the messages you could take away from last week’s election. So Bob Dylan was wrong; negativity will get you through.

I mean, Republicans acted out the No Play (sorry, Japan) for six years, and it brought them, or bought them, the Senate. Good work, guys.

Of course, “No” as a guiding philosophy isn’t going to work very well anymore.

Meanwhile, according to NPR, national exit polls indicate that 60-some percent of U.S. voters believe the economic system is tilted in favor of the wealthy. They’re probably right.

But then they voted for Republicans, who consistently vote in favor of measures that ensure the economic system is tilted in favor of the wealthy.

You just gotta love Americans.

More exit polls from Nov. 4 (and Sartre thought there were no exits; silly Frenchman) — when the nation threw an Election Day and pretty much nobody showed up — show that slightly more than 50 percent of Iowans said they did not follow the campaigns closely or, in some cases, at all.

No wonder the Republicans won. Know Nothings leading Know Nothings. That’s the formula for success. No, really. (That “No” word again. That word is probably the sign of our times.)

Democrats can’t twig this, but then, they’re Know Nothings, too. They just don’t know how to lead Know Nothings, or much of anybody else. They’re too busy trying to herd cats.

Hint to Democrats: Cats can’t vote. They’re illegal immigrants, or should be. The first thing Republicans will do, led by Iowa’s own Rep. Steve King (not to be confused with the bestselling horror-book author, though you’d be excused if you did), is to round up all America’s cats (herding cats resurfaces; the more things change, etc.) and throw them across or into the Rio Grande.

Meanwhile, Sen. Mitch McConnell, the incoming Senate majority leader, warns President Obama about using his executive authority by saying, It’s like waving a red flag in front of a bull.

McConnell forgets that, in a bullfight, when they wave the red item, the bull generally dies. Soon. Also, I’ve never been to a bullfight, but it’s not a red flag, is it? It’s a red cape.

In any case, the bull dies.

But maybe it’s about time in the country that some bull dies.

Speaking of some bull, Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, will probably become the head of the Senate Judiciary Committee, just as Rep. Bruce Braley, D-Iowa, had predicted. Braley lost the election for Sen. Tom Harkin’s open Senate seat partly because he noted that if Republicans took over the Senate, Grassley, a longtime Iowa farmer, though not a lawyer, in addition to being an amazingly longtime politician (when does he have time to harvest stuff, outside of political idiocies?) would become just that.

Grassley will be the first non-lawyer to head the Judiciary Committee ever, according to NPR. That’s like me becoming the head of the Senate Agriculture Committee, and I’ve never been on a farm in my life. What’s the difference between a tractor and a combine? I don’t know. I think combine, I think NFL.

Might as well think NFL. It’s the only game in town, now that the Hawkeye football team disappeared in the witness-protection program.