Young Voters Abandoning Democrats?
Guess Obama’s two-thirds share of the (late teen and) twentysomething vote in 2008 didn’t signal a generational shift to the left:
The college vote is up for grabs this year — to an extent that would have seemed unlikely two years ago, when a generation of young people seemed to swoon over Barack Obama.
Though many students are liberals on social issues, the economic reality of a weak job market has taken a toll on their loyalties: far fewer 18- to 29-year-olds now identify themselves as Democrats compared with 2008.
Emphasis added to suggest that the GOP emphasis on fiscal issues can help them woo voters disinclined to support a party defined (even if primarily in the media) by social conservatism.
And recall, that Obama only narrowly edged John McCain among voters over 30. Even if a majority of the youth vote (but smaller than Obama’s 2008 tally)
remains Democratic , if the shift away from the president’s party is paralleled among older demographics, the Democrats’ majority vanishes.
Seems the surge in support among young people for Obama was based more on his personality and the imagery of his campaign than on the candidate’s (carefully concealed*) ideology.
*by his campaign the media.
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Wonder if that’s proportional to the unemployment rate among 18-29.
Comment by ThatGayConservative — September 3, 2010 @ 5:29 am - September 3, 2010
“ThatGayConservative” is right. Unemployment is a great teacher.
Great post btw.
Comment by Ben — September 3, 2010 @ 6:16 am - September 3, 2010
What is that old saying? “A conservative is a liberal who got mugged by reality,” I think.
Comment by The_Livewire — September 3, 2010 @ 6:25 am - September 3, 2010
As I predicted, young voters favored Obama because they were too young to remember the last time leftists had complete control of the government (the Carter years). Now that Obama is showing them what real progressive government looks like, the smarter ones are beginning to realize that things like gay marriage and global warming don’t really mean much if you can’t find a job.
Comment by V the K — September 3, 2010 @ 7:05 am - September 3, 2010
I cannot recall political momentum swinging this wildly, can you? With 60 D senators, I thought we were in the thickets for at least twelve years. It’s the most incredible squandering of political capital in my lifetime for sure.
Why are the kids shifting? Well, no one likes a loser.
Best wishes,
-MFS
Comment by MFS — September 3, 2010 @ 8:48 am - September 3, 2010
TGG is correct; unemployment & job atrophy is the real persuasion from the superficial, superfluous Cult of Personality of President Obama. Obama’s artificial mojo is gone to reveal it was nothing more than smoke & mirrors. I wonder how many people will start saying now they never voted for Obama because they are too ashamed to admit it?
Comment by Sebastian Shaw — September 3, 2010 @ 9:15 am - September 3, 2010
[…] rich white people to give him money — doesn’t really have the chops to run the country. Even the yewts are defecting, as they discover assuaging white guilt isn’t worth a lifetime of unemployment and […]
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Pingback by Rut-Roh Obama & Dems, Fewer Young Voters See Themselves as Democrats | Scared Monkeys — September 3, 2010 @ 11:23 am - September 3, 2010
The young voters who supported the OBAMANATION are disenchanted with politicians in general. The economy is not as promised to them as children and the idea of going to collage and not having a job or much of a future is not appealing to them. What will come of this disenchantment will not be a fresh crop of GOP supporters but a group of independent thinkers that don’t follow a single party and will hold those they do elect accountable.
Comment by Joe — September 3, 2010 @ 11:31 am - September 3, 2010
Of course, the article says nothing of more college kids identifying themselves as Republican. Do you suppose the fact less people overall identify themselves with either party has anything to do with it?
Anyway, you all do realize that picking and choosing when the NYT is a reliable source of news and opinion and when the NYT is a filthy, Marxist newsletter perverting our traditional values is a constant source of amusement for all un-American, abortion loving, freedom hating terrorist sympathizers, right?
Comment by Remarkulus — September 3, 2010 @ 11:56 am - September 3, 2010
Anyway, you all libs do realize that quoting your NYT filthy, Marxist newsletter to you makes you squirm like a worm on a hook. Don’t you just hate it when your NYT prints something that makes you look, well, petty. It is a constant source of amusement for all wide awake Americans who watch you ideologues stammer and stutter.
Comment by heliotrope — September 3, 2010 @ 12:45 pm - September 3, 2010
Remarkulus, good point in 1st ¶, but even that is devastating to Democrats, dependent as they were in 2008 on overwhelming support among young people. A swing away from them necessarily helps the GOP, even if marginally.
Comment by B. Daniel Blatt — September 3, 2010 @ 1:10 pm - September 3, 2010
Obama has done more than anyone could have imagined to damage and destroy a BRAND. Whether it is liberalism, the Democrat party or socialism, he has turned out to be a great, real life teacher for the young college grads of America. The kids who have worked for me and now graduated for a year or two, are stunned at the lack of jobs. Most with great degrees are finding themselves fighting with 40 and 50 year olds for a decent job. This is Obamas America. Dependency, fear, hopelessness. No one could have painted liberalism in this stark a fashion except someone like Obama and Pelosi. Now Americans know what to vote AGAINST in the future.
Comment by Gene in Pennsylvania — September 3, 2010 @ 1:46 pm - September 3, 2010
I am a young adult person myself and I voted for President Obama in 2008. But I have strong concern about his economics and jobs policies. I changed my political affiliation to “Republican” this year just to weaken the Democrat Party a little bit. Carly Fiorina for California sounds like a good choice to me so that’s another reason I made that shift. One single vote could make a difference. But I am going to stay an Independent thinker for now. I am not putting my hopes up for the Republican Party and I am turned-off by the strong socially conservative rhetoric from that Party. I am also turned-off by the strong leftist progressive rhetoric from the Democrat Party – and their “gay rights” policies doesn’t improve my life even one bit.
That’s why the non-political, fiscally conservative TEA Party was formed, the all-American movement is fed up with both parties in Congress. I hope the TEA Party maintains its mission statement and stay a completely non-partisan and independent movement.
Comment by Totakikay — September 3, 2010 @ 1:48 pm - September 3, 2010
The Democrats need ignorant youths who have never had real jobs or real responsibility for the same reason they need felons and illegal aliens… mainstream Americans do not want what they’re selling.
Comment by V the K — September 3, 2010 @ 2:18 pm - September 3, 2010
Republicans have to overcome the public education system. So they start out in the hole. As ppl get real life experiences.. they become conservatives. Unless of course they are trust fund babies.
Comment by Gene in Pennsylvania — September 3, 2010 @ 5:46 pm - September 3, 2010
I think many of the “youngest” voters in the 2008 voted emotionally as did many of their elders. In the recent primary in Florida, I was a poll worker who worked the sign in desk. Many of the younger voters who did show up to vote in a primary were Republicans. In between voters, I scanned the registration pages looking for the younger voters to see what party they were registered in. In my polling place it appeared that about 30% registered independent but probably voted D in 2008. It will be very interesting to see if the young vote comes out in November in the numbers they did in 2008. I’m bettin not. And I’d place a bet on seniors coming out in bigger numbers in November than they did in 2008. My late 80s parents and many of their peers are deathly afraid of how badly Obamacare is going to gut Medicare benefits for them.
Comment by Mary — September 3, 2010 @ 6:17 pm - September 3, 2010
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I have to laugh at the absurd idea that the state of the economy is even partly President Obama’s fault. Republicans did this and their prescriptions to ‘fix’ it will only make it worse. Did Republicans control the Presidency and the Congress for the bulk of the last decade or am I remembering that wrong?
Comment by Levi — September 4, 2010 @ 12:13 pm - September 4, 2010
Wow, Levi, so, Obama who has been in the White House for well over a year and half, got nearly all of what he wanted on economic issues, bears no responsibility for the state of the economy. And not only has he enjoyed larger Democratic congressional majorities during his entire presidential tenure, he was part just such a majority for the two years prior to his taking office.
Your comment offers a wonderful window into your worldview, blame Republicans first, foremost and always, even when Democrats are in power.
Comment by B. Daniel Blatt — September 4, 2010 @ 1:10 pm - September 4, 2010
Dems have controlled the purse strings since fall of 06.
Obama didn’t campaign on ….”hey give me two years and nothing new will happen except unemployment will go from 7% to 10%!”
He wanted the job, trouble is liberals didn’t know he was a boob and only a communtiy organizer.
The average unemployment rate for Bush 43 was 6.2% in 8 years.
What’s the average for Obamas 22 months…(And I count when he got elected because that’s when businesses started to fire and lay off people in anticipation of his anti business agenda.)
Obama has averaged 9.8% unemployment. Duhh
It’s not that hard. Unless you went to the corrupt bankrupt public school system. hehe
Comment by Gene in Pennsylvania — September 4, 2010 @ 1:36 pm - September 4, 2010
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I have to laugh at the absurd idea that the state of the economy is even partly President Obama’s fault.
And we are howling uproariously at the deluded Obama worshipers like you, Levi, who insist that Obama had nothing to do with the state of the economy.
Answer the question, Levi: at what stage in a Presidency does the President start taking any fault whatsoever for the state of the economy? Will you publicly state that nothing that happens during the first eighteen month’s of a President’s term is in any way his or her fault, and is all to be blamed on their predecessor?
Because we want to demonstrate once and for all the hypocritical, racist double standard that is at the soul of your “progressive” movement — that your black Obama cannot be held responsible because he is a black man and therefore is inferior.
Comment by North Dallas Thirty — September 4, 2010 @ 6:28 pm - September 4, 2010
NDT, you do realize President Obama will be blaming President Bush even after he’s out of office. Levi is just an Obama zombie. Levi, go dine on some brains; you need some.
Comment by Sebastian Shaw — September 4, 2010 @ 7:48 pm - September 4, 2010
Levi you must be as thick as a plank or as thick as two bricks if you think that Øbama has no responsibility for the state of the economy. The Congress has been in the hands of the Dummycrats since 2006… and there is a correlation between the worsening in the economy and when they first had power again.
Comment by StraightAussie — September 5, 2010 @ 3:51 am - September 5, 2010
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If that’s the case, then you must be able to point to a few specific pieces of legislation that was passed by the Democratic Congress and signed into law by the Republican President that has ruined the economy. Can you do that?
Comment by Levi — September 5, 2010 @ 10:44 am - September 5, 2010
If that’s the case, then you must be able to point to a few specific pieces of legislation that was passed by the Democratic Congress and signed into law by the Republican President that has ruined the economy.
Levi, you stated above that nothing the President does can ever affect the economy, remember?
So since the President is never responsible, it is the Obama Party Congress that has ruined the economy. You admit that the bills your Obama Party Congress passed are the ones that ruined the economy.
Comment by North Dallas Thirty — September 5, 2010 @ 12:33 pm - September 5, 2010
Wow, NDT, so Levi’s pro-life “no one should profit from the death of others” and blames Clinton for 9/11, since apparently it’s the faullt of the party that controlled the government for “most of the previous decade.”
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