Caucusing For Barack in Nebraska

Being a Democrat TOTALLY ROCKS!!! You guys, we are so cool!!! :) Here's my experience at the first-ever Democratic caucus in Omaha, Nebraska, legislative district #9.

We dropped my daughter off at a piano festival at 9:00 this morning and hightailed it to our caucus location, Norris Middle School. Got there about 9:35, and there was already a HUGE line. The volunteers and some of the people in line were laughing about "who knew there were so many Democrats in Nebraska?"



There were lots of Hilary Clinton yard signs along the walk. The only Obama sign was this one, held by two lovely campaign volunteers.



They had run out of blue preference cards by the time we got in the building, but they were very well organized and had already photocopied enough cards for everyone. The volunteers were SO on top of things and had clear directions for us and really knew what they were doing. It was so amazing, considering it was everyone's first time for this.

We went to the gym. Obama supporters on the right, Clinton supporters on the left, with space in the back for undecided people. Here were the Clinton people--they took up about half the bleachers on their side.



On OUR side of the gym, different story entirely...



When we walked in, the Obama bleachers were already entirely filled. We had to stand or sit on the floor.



More Obama supporters, as far as the eye could see...



We took up not just our side's bleachers, but over half the gym floor as well. There were not a lot of undecideds. Most of the Hilary people were older women. Some men, and a few younger people of both genders. Mostly Caucasian. I think I saw one African American man over there. The Obama side was much more diverse--some older people, some younger, some young families, African Americans, some Latinos. A lot of the Clinton people had signs--all the same, obviously had been passed out to them when they came in. Not many Obama signs, but plenty of bodies--which is the most important. :)

Our state senator moderated the meeting. Lots of excitement, especially on our side of the gym (or at least the 3/4 of the gym that we had taken over.) The Clinton folks all cheered in the right places and the right times, waving their signs, but it was obvious they were severely outnumbered. We were even wondering if they'd have the necessary 15% to be viable or not!

When it came time to choose group leaders, some people on our side started yelling out "Jim Esch!" That surprised me and made me very happy. Jim is the one who ran against our congressman, Lee Terry, in 2006. Obviously, he didn't win, but he had a very good showing. I didn't realize he lived in our legislative district, and it was very cool that he was there and got to be our group leader.

During the speech time, the Clinton group leader read a letter from Hilary and then gave a short statement of her own about why she supports Hilary. Polite applause. Then Jim Esch spoke, and we were all trying very hard not to cheer too much because he was only given about 90 seconds to speak. Frankly, I could have given a better speech, but he did a pretty good job.

Realignment #1: I think we got about half the undecideds. Some went over to Hilary's side, too. I would love to know the psychology behind that because there really was no time for either side to get into specifics on candidate positions, so this was purely an exercise in group dynamics.

Then we counted. The bleacher people numbered off out loud with campaign volunteers directing. Those of us on the floor had to stand until a volunteer came by and counted us. Then we sat down. Very much like gym class in elementary school!

One bizarre moment came when it was time for this lady wearing a pink hat to count off on the Obama bleacher side. Everything was relatively quiet at the moment so we wouldn't disrupt the count. Instead of saying her number, Pink Hat Lady started screaming that "Obama is a Muslim, and the Muslims blew up the World Trade Center!!!" The people around her tried to shut her up, but she just kept shouting and disrupting the meeting. Finally several people, including a petite blond woman, shoved her out the gym doors (to the outside, I think) and slammed the door behind her, to much shouting and applause from the rest of us. One woman near us said, "Democracy at its finest, right there!" :) Pink Hat Lady was totally psycho.

Final count was 1,062 supporters for Obama, and 300-something for Clinton. Percentages were 78% Obama, 22% Clinton. My husband estimated that if there had been about 50 fewer Clinton supporters, she probably wouldn't have hit the required 15% viability margin. Wouldn't that have been amazing?

There were about 15 undecideds remaining, so the campaign volunteers went to speak with them. We got about half of those folks, I think. One person remained undecided, so that vote was forfeited.

That meant that out of the 10 delegates our district was allowed to send, Obama got 8 and Clinton got 2. Each group decided who those delegates to the county convention would be, and we turned in our preference cards. And then it was over!

It was so much fun! Lots of cheering, lots of shouting. Really positive energy and enthusiasm. I think everyone, even the Clinton supporters, came away with a sense of pride about being Democrats. It was encouraging to see our neighbors and friends (I saw several people I knew, mostly on the Obama side) and realize that no matter how it feels at times, we are not the only Democrats in the state. There are a lot of us.

I'm hearing from other people in the state today that what happened at our location is similar to what is happening at other locations. At least in the Omaha area. And the state Democratic office in Lincoln yesterday ran out of voter registration forms because they had so many people registering or switching party registration. Most of those people, from what I've heard, were signing up so they could vote for Obama.

I don't know what is happening in the western/rural parts of the state, but at this point, it looks to me like we may be able to give Nebraska to Barack Obama.

GOBAMA!!! :woohoo:

Thank you for being there to caucus, thank you for reporting on the wild & crazy doings there, thank you for posting all the pics -- and, most important, thank you for helping to propel the Big Mo for the Big O. in Omaha.

GOBAMA!

I don't know how you can build a party if you don't create some of these events where people can get together and not feel so all alone. Looks very exciting! Great pics and "storytelling", hehe.

;-) Thanks for sharing! :woohoo: :bounce: I'm totally loving this.

amazed because it sounds fun and hopeful instead of just routine and dark--like the one caucus I attended last year. (backroom type garbage happened at my caucus last year.)

and pics of actual on the ground activity. Change is on the way. We have our primary on Tuesday here in Virginia and with stories of 700 people showing up to vote last Tuesday in our area thinking it was our primary day, I can only imagine and hope that we will have a large turnout.

Will be reporting tomorrow night on the Obama appearance here in Virginia Beach and Tuesday cannot get here soon enough.

GOBAMA!!!

thanks so much for your post!

Remember when you mentioned how alone you felt living in Omaha and feeling like the only Democrat there--the only Kerry supporter there? Well, I hope you took names, numbers, and so on while you were at your caucus. Because it seems to me you just found a whole lot of people to hang around with who have your values and your hope for the future too.

Something tells me you're not the lone-storyteller over there anymore.

You painted a picture of the day's events beautifully! I love the photos too - lots of energy and passion in that room. It's good to see that george w. bush's attempts to kill democracy have failed! It's alive and well and living in Nebraska.

Thanks for sharing. The pics are lovely.

Voting in a primary is going to be boring compared with all these cool stories I hear from people who had caucuses. :)

Obama just won Nebraska! :bounce: :bounce: :bounce:

Great pics and an awesome story StoryTeller! :hi:


http://my.barackobama.com/page/community/post/samgrahamfelsen/CyyJ













edit to add link

I concur with you. It was a great experience!

Thanks For sharing!

Dem in Nebr

Thank you for helping to change our country!

Great to hear from another Nebraskan. Check out the Nebraska forum on DU, too. We can always use more posting there.

So which caucus location were you at?

Same as you!! ;-)

It was Awesome!

I've read most of the posts in the NE forum. Moot of the time I don't comment -- I'm more or less a confirmed lurker!

from your post subject, but I wasn't certain. That means we must live pretty near each other.

Howdy, neighbor! :)

Looks like there's more Dems in Neb. than people realized.

Thanks for coming and posting here. We look forward to hearing more from you.

:hi: :hi:

.

:applause: to everyone in Nebraska who participated and thanks for getting those delegates to Barack!

Those of us in Primary states are really missing out on the excitement.

as is your story. It really sounds incredible.