'Democrat Dan' and more: Top terms from the Ricketts-Osborn State Fair debate

Word counts as political analysis. That's where we've landed. Some outlet ran a transcript through a counter and decided the fact that Pete Ricketts said "Democrat Dan" a lot and Dan Osborn said "work" a lot tells us something meaningful about the Nebraska Senate race. It doesn't, not really, but it's worth pausing on why each man chose his favorite word, because that part actually is revealing.

Ricketts wants Nebraska voters to remember one thing about Osborn: he is not actually independent, whatever the ballot line says. Calling him "Democrat Dan" over and over isn't lazy messaging, it's the whole strategy in two words. Osborn has spent this campaign trying to convince a red state that he's a union guy and a fair-minded outsider, not a Chuck Schumer vote waiting to happen. Ricketts clearly thinks that label sticks better than any policy argument would, and frankly he might be right. Nebraska hasn't sent a Democrat to the Senate in almost two decades, and Osborn knows it, which is exactly why he never runs as one.

Osborn's word, "work," is doing its own kind of work. It's the pitch of a guy who fixed machines at a Kellogg's plant and wants that to matter more than his voting record would if he had one. It's a good pitch. Whether it survives contact with the fact that most of the money and enthusiasm behind him comes from national progressive groups is a different question, one no word cloud is going to answer.

What this little exercise actually shows is a race being fought over identity, not issues. Ricketts is betting Nebraskans care more about what Osborn is than what he'd do. Osborn is betting they care more about who he seems to be than who's funding him. Come November we'll find out which bet was smarter, and no transcript analysis is going to save either side the trouble of making their actual case.