But Salt Lake County Democrats fell just short of nabbing the big one: Control of the Salt Lake County Council. GOP incumbent David Wilde in District 3 seat, the swing seat, was beating Democrat Diane Turner early Wednesday.

In his exit polling for KSL-TV, pollster Dan Jones learned that "Democrats in Salt Lake County were especially energized — looking for change. The rest of the state, not so much so."

All three tax-hike propositions passed in Salt Lake County — the ZAP tax and open space preservation come with small property tax hikes, the transit and roads sales tax hike at .25-cents.

Likewise, the .25-cent sales tax hike for transportation passed in Utah County.

Controversial 3rd District Judge Leslie Lewis (the district is mostly in Salt Lake County) was losing her retention election late Tuesday. Lewis would be one of just a handful of judges kicked out by voters in retention election history.

Lewis has angered several groups by her harsh courtroom demeanor and was investigated by authorities when she apparently inappropriately reduced a sex offender's sentence. A pro-hunting group put up on the Internet a video recording where Lewis chewed out a relative of a defendant and ordered the man, who was not charged with anything, to be held in a cell for 20 minutes because he dared speak back to the judge after she asked him a question.

State Rep. LaVar Christensen, R-Draper, didn't press Matheson as hard as GOP leaders had hoped. Christensen's poor showing may be due to a number of factors — he tends to talk in generalities, pushes the Constitution and Founding Fathers, and never took a hard line against the Democrat.

Matheson killed Christensen in the 2nd District's eastside Salt Lake County precincts, winning 68 percent of the vote and helping Democratic legislative candidates.

Christensen, who spent $600,000 of his own money on the race, said he didn't have the funds to get his message out. "The amount of money it takes to communicate is most unfortunate. It is more like an exercise in marketing than politics." Christensen didn't close the door on running for a major office again, saying: "I will serve whereever we can do good."

In addition, the national Republican Party and other pro-GOP groups stayed out of the 2nd District race. Whereas in elections past they've dumped $1 million or more in anti-Matheson or pro-GOP nominee ads, it was just a two-man race this time.

"I'm glad we had that (two person) race this time," Matheson said Tuesday night. "It was good that outside groups didn't come in."