We're a bit light on material but there's plenty of great analysis for this week. The big news this week is Lincoln's mayoral primary, so we'll spend quite a bit of time on that. Also: Adrian Smith hates your dog, Jeff Fortenberry is an "enemy of the middle class," Chuck Hagel's writing a book, and I met Lee Terry this past week.
More after the jump...
Lincoln:
Beutler 48% Svoboda 35%
The final results for last Tuesday's primary are in, and Democrat Chris Beutler came out on top, 48-35%, against Republican Ken Svoboda in the race for mayor of Lincoln. Independent candidate Roger Yant finished third with 14%, and endorsed Svoboda in the general election.
Ryan and Kyle at the New Nebraska Network give a more detailed analysis:
With turnout at an abysmal 18%, Lincoln Democrat Chris Beutler managed a convincing 48%-35% victory over Republican Ken Svoboda in last night's mayoral primary. As the Lincoln Journal Star notes, this will likely result in even more good news for the Beutler campaign in the coming weeks as voters and donors seek to hitch their wagons to the prospective mayor-to-be. But make no mistake: this race isn't over, and if the recent history of the Lincoln GOP is any indicator the next 28 days are going to get messy. Or, as NNN blogfather Kyle Michaelis put it on Monday: Svoboda has long thought he had this race in the bag. When that proves not to be the case on Tuesday, expect alarms to be going off at GOP HQ.
Drawing off a discussion at a local right-wing blog, Kyle continues:
In other words, Republicans have lost the capacity for self-criticism and long ago started valuing blind party loyalty above all else, so there's bound to be some pain, discomfort, and hopefully some further losses as they wake to the consequences of their having violated every campaign promise and every trust imaginable.
Chris Beutler is a great candidate for mayor of Nebraska's capital city, but Svoboda's coming in with only 35% in the primary against Beutler's 48% is an absolutely dreadful performance. Anyone who has been a party to Lincoln politics the last three years, witnessing the negativity directed at Democratic Mayor Coleen Seng in the media and across the city, has to admit that this sort of performance suggests a total failure by Svoboda and the Republican Party to connect with voters on any level.
The general election will be held on May 1.
NE-01
Enemy of the Middle Class
The New Nebraska Network passes along this bit of information, Jeff Fortenberry has been named Enemy of the Middle Class by Americans United for Change, prompting a partisan response from Fortenberry and the Nebraska GOP:
Soon, a liberal 527 group called Americans United for Change will initiate negative media attacks against United States Congressman Jeff Fortenberry (R-NE-01). Americans United for Change is another left-wing organization in the same mold as Moveon.org that caters to liberal conspiracy theorists. Their mission is simple: to smear, attack, distort, and misrepresent Rep. Fortenberry’s vote on the minimum wage increase.
As a concerned voter in Nebraska I affirm my support for Rep. Fortenberry and hope that Americans United for Change will keep their ultra liberal agenda out of our state.
Labor leaders and Democratic activists are "ultra-liberal" to the extremist, reactionary, Nebraska Republican party. Wanting to enact a higher minimum wage, or make it easier for folks to unionize? Catering to liberal conspiracy theorists. The rhetoric from the Nebraska GOP can come as hard as they want it to, but Fortenberry's record speaks for itself: he's the one who is out of touch.
NE-02
What else about the people of your district is bland and indistinct?
Not much to report on this end. I did have a conversation with Rep. Lee Terry in my class last week, but out of respect for the class, I'm not posting any of that online. We talked for a while about campaign finance, the 2006 election, and what he thinks 2008 will hold. (I get the feeling he's not wild about his choices in the Republican field right now).
Paging Power reminds us of this classic Better Know A District segment.
NE-03
Adrian Smith Hates Your Dog!
Smith Watch focuses on Adrian Smith's vote against a bill strengthening anti-animal fighting laws. Also, a number of discrepencies in Smith's online bio.
NE-Sen
The Next Chapter
Hagel will be writing a book, to be published early next year. The NNN has more:
Now I'm not one to cast doubt on the power of the written word -believe it or not, at times I've even fancied myself a writer. But Senator Hagel isn't a blogger or a columnist, he's a public servant, and one would think his legacy might be built around that service. The man's been in the Senate for a decade now... did that not seem to him the proper forum for introducing these "nonpartisan policy prescriptions"?