Youth Vote Strong Showing For Obama

a full report of the youth vote in indiana and north carolina

By Jason Zimmerman, University of Florida Law

62% of the youth vote in Indiana. 74% of the youth vote in North Carolina. Chris Cillizza at the Post cited young people as winners in last night’s primaries. In Indiana, there was an increase in the youth vote by more than 30,000 over the 2004 presidential campaign. This primary, an event that typically has a significantly lower turn out than the November general election, showed that all of you decided to roll up your sleeves, and work hard for a candidate that plans on working hard for you.

I don't think it's simply Obama's eloquence, or his ability to inspire is what is drawing these amazing amounts of new and young voters to the Democratic process. Rather, I think its Obama's willingness to talk about the problems affecting our generation, and his willingness to listen to us and speak to our issues.

Take for instance the growing student loan issue. Just today, an article on Mobilize.org, a site geared towards informing young voters about issues affecting them, wrote up a brief on the impeding student loan crisis. This is a real issue that would affect the young voters who are coming out in droves for the Obama campaign. The brief, entitled “We’re Broke, Let’s Fix It: The Student Loan Crisis and Its Impact on the Millennial Generation”, gives an insight on a crisis that we as a generation have to deal with. Cost of higher education is going up, while amount of long-term government assistance is going down. Interest rates are going up, so the loans that we need are getting harder for us to pay back.

Obama has a plan to fix this; a plan that has thousands upon thousands of college students working hard to ensure that plan is brought to life. Increasing the amount of Pell Grants, while streamlining the financial aid process by eliminating the over-complicated FAFSA are just some of the fixes Obama has in store. However, the centerpiece is the American Opportunity Tax Credit. This credit will write-off the first 4,000 dollars of your college education. To earn this credit, all you have to do is participate in 100 hours of community service. All you have to do is roll up your sleeves, and give back to the community that is helping you get a higher education. College is being made more affordable to all groups of people, while strengthening community bonds and relationships.

This idea directly helps the millions of youth in our generation who are struggling to get to college. This idea is one of the many Barack Obama has that will directly help the people of America. This idea is just one of the reasons why new and young voters are overwhelming the expectation game with their involvement.

Obama Getting Bulk of 18-29 Voters

young voters are expected to give obama a boost in pennsylvania. let's hope they make up for those who wouldn't vote for obama because he's black.

mcclatchy: In 2000, among 18- to 29-year-olds, nearly 575,000 voted in the California primaries; this year, 850,000 did. The Georgia number tripled; so did Massachusetts', traditionally one of the states where young people were already active.

"The thing young voters most say they're looking for is change," said Emily Kirby, a senior research associate at the Center for Information & Research on Civic Learning & Engagement, which compiled the data.

In most states, young voters want to vote Democratic, and so far, they have overwhelmingly sided with Obama — by margins of 20 percentage points or more over Clinton in Alabama, Arizona, Connecticut, Georgia, Illinois, Missouri, New Jersey, Utah and elsewhere.

Will the Youth Vote Save the Day?

we can only hope.

from seattle p-i:

Four students in my freshman class could barely sit still during their test Feb. 8. I had put them in the back of the room because I knew they wanted to bolt out the door to get to the Barack Obama rally. As I watched them furiously checking off answers, I thought back to April 2006 when I had agreed to meet with students for Civics Week at my university. The organizers reserved an auditorium for 150 people. Six students showed up.

Robert Putnam recently wrote in the Boston Globe about the "rebirth of American civic life" and those of us on the front lines with today's college population are indeed witnessing an upsurge of interest. But I am not sure we have a handle on the reason this is happening. And why am I seeing such support for Obama among evangelical students at my Christian university?

While turnout among Democrats has increased 90 percent since the last presidential primary year, among under-25 voters, it is up 135 percent. Not being in the Obama camp yet, I wanted to understand and invited my students for cookies and conversation. Tell me, I said, why you are so enthusiastic?

What they told me was all about finding their own voice in politics, and it was a voice full of optimism. As each spoke at the table, it was clear that Obama inspires a belief that they matter. Michelle said, "I stood with 20,000 people in KeyArena and felt he was speaking just to me."

I asked them about this support, given their evangelical background: Didn't society assume they should be Republican voters?

The students told me their generation did not grow up with a tradition of being Republican. Obama, they said, took on issues of poverty, war and justice -- aren't those the very themes they were reading in Scripture?

It was 40 minutes into the conversation before any of the students at the table mentioned the issue of race. New York Times columnist Maureen Dowd wrote that Americans will have to choose in this election which of our sins is greater, racism or misogyny. Were the students supporting Obama to make a statement about racial justice?

No, they answered. Of course, it would be wonderful to show the world Americans were capable of choosing an African-American president, but they did not view their vote as a symbol against racism. We are the post-protest generation, they told me. Again, Michelle said, "I will vote for him because he is a good candidate, not because he is black." more

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