Poll: Young Voters All Talk No Action?

A new poll by Gallup suggests that the young voter may be all talk and no action this year.
Far and away, younger voters prefer Obama but in the 18-29 year old group, only 66% intend to vote, which lags behind all the other age categories. It's always been my contention that if the younger voter gets out to vote then Obama will win.
But these numbers don't look good. Pester your young friends and neighbors. Get them to vote early and drive them to the polls if you have to. Then again, it could be that Gallup's numbers are off.

Gallup: Obama leads McCain by 62% to 34% among registered voters 18 to 29 years of age, based on Gallup Poll Daily tracking interviewing conducted Oct. 1-20. That's a much larger margin than in any other age group. Among those aged 30 to 49, Obama maintains a 6-point margin. His lead is similar among voters between the ages of 50 and 64 (7 points). The two candidates are essentially tied among senior citizens. (Over this same period, Obama is leading McCain among all registered voters by 9 points, 51% to 42%.)

But

Gallup has found similar patterns by age in past elections, and the current data suggest younger voters still have a way to go to match the levels of registration, interest, and intention to vote of older Americans. That is not to rule out the possibility that young voters' propensity to vote could increase in the final two weeks of the campaign, or that massive Democratic "get out the vote" efforts on Election Day could motivate many latent Obama supporters to officially register that preference in the voting booth.

Most People Under 30 Support Obama

not because they're inexperienced, as some would like to frame it, but because they're tolerant. that's right, they don't look at race, religion, womanhood. they're not using a bunch of excuses to hate on obama. isn't that what all this controversy about?

hillary (and bill) have exploited that to the top of the hill and for that reason alone, i find her a horrible human being, let alone a worthy presidential candidate. i know there are some people who are tolerant who support hillary. i don't know why but is suspect it's because she's a woman. all things equal, say they both looked like rocks, obama is the far better candidate.

npr: "We have a woman candidate running against a black candidate for president," Zukin says. "If you had advanced that idea 25 years ago, people would have said that can't happen. And the young people today are so tolerant that they don't even think of that as an issue."

There have been "youth candidates" before in the Democratic Party, including Eugene McCarthy, George McGovern and Gary Hart. But this year, young voters are doing more than just getting excited about a candidate. They are actually turning out to vote.

Young Lean Democratic

In primaries and caucuses all over the country, voters under 30 have doubled and, in some places, tripled their turnout participation. Traditionally young voters have very low turnout, but now their participation nationally is reaching their share of the population. And the young voters who are turning out largely are Democrats, Zukin says.

"If young people come into politics and identify as Democrats, there's going to cause a sea change in politics," he says. "What we've seen with George W. Bush is that he has made Democrats out of young people the same way Ronald Reagan made Republicans out of young people."

People tend to form their partisan preferences in their 20s and stick with them, so this trend could be the beginning of a long-term political realignment. In the short term, if Obama is the nominee, age will be a big issue.

new poll shows most young voters vote democratic.

Young Voters Could Be Key in Pennsylvania

here's to hoping that all of the college students and 20-somethings get out and vote on tuesday. i wish i lived in pennsylvania cause i'd drive you en masse to the polls. but that doesn't seem necessary. young voters are motivated. the question is, who has the bulk of young voters? obama or clinton?

philly inquirer: Democratic strategist Neil Oxman said that most polls do not sample enough younger voters because they usually are not a factor in primaries. Obama changes the dynamic, he said.

"If all of those kids who registered come out, he could steal the election," said the Philadelphia-based Oxman, who is not working in the race. "And if everybody over 60 votes, she could blow him away. Each of them has enough voters to win this thing."

another unknown: who did all those new democrats sign up to vote for? and who did those independents and republicans switch party affiliations to vote for? these people make up about 325,000 un-polled people. then there are the "undecideds," there are about 15% of these voters who have left pollsters guessing.

philly inquirer: "The election has stabilized, with no movement among any of the big voter groups in the last week," said G. Terry Madonna, director of the Franklin and Marshall College Poll. "It's a battle of the east versus the west and a battle of defined demographics, and everybody is trying to figure out what will make the difference."

Two things that could: the 15 percent of voters who tell pollsters they remain undecided, and the roughly 325,000 newly registered Democrats in the state, a mixture of first-time voters and those switching affiliation to participate in the closed primary.

In previous races this year, undecided voters have broken toward Clinton. An estimated 24 percent of newly registered Democrats in Pennsylvania are younger than 35, a group that has overwhelmingly supported Obama.

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.