5.07.2012

Here are some FACTS to consider. The data in the graphs and charts below are derived from records provided on the Nebraska Secretary of State's website and from the Nebraska Legislature's Blue Books.

The Nebraska Democratic Party has been in a steady decline for the past thirty-plus years, as is readily visible in the two graphs. The real difference can be seen when one compares metropolitan (RMLO) vs. rural Nebraska. While rural Nebraska has nearly as many Democrats as Douglas and Lancaster counties combined, the party has been dominated by a series of metropolitan oligarchs that, for the most part, ignore the rural membership, causing it to lose ever more ground.

Obviously, continuing to run the party in the same way that it has been for the past thirty years will result only in further decline and even more marginalization of Nebraska's rural Democrats. It is time for a Revolution. It is time for Nebraska's rural Democrats to say, "Enough is enough. We will either be recognized as having an equal share in the NDP, or we should consider the formation of a Farmer & Labor Party, as the marginalized Democrats in Minnesota did many years ago." (Hubert Humphrey was one of the more prominent F&L Party leaders) Such a party could attract many of the centrist and liberal segments of Nebraska's Republican Party, as many of them are feeling disaffected by its leadership.

The NDP will be holding a state convention this week and NOW is the time to get people armed with knowledge and valid information so that they may fight for their rights. It is NOT time for calls for everyone to "just get along" and have warm fuzzy feelings for one another. It is, rather, a time to call for a radical reinvention of our party, a time to throw off the dusty, ineffective leadership of the past and forge a new coalition capable of advancing the Democratic cause in this state. Our choice is to either revolutionize the party, rendering us a party capable of electing statewide and federal candidates, or surrender to the inevitable decline of all but one Congressional District that can deliver a solitary electoral vote for a presidential candidate, and  possibly fill the mayoral seats in Lincoln and Omaha.