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Hillary Clinton, Youth Candidate
The American Prospect ^ | April 15, 2014 | Paul Waldman

Posted on 04/15/2014 5:15:41 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet

Republicans will nominate someone younger than her, and it won't make a difference to young people.

Our old colleague Patrick Caldwell has an interesting article up at Mother Jones about the way the Hillary Clinton campaign—or whatever we can call it at this point, since it isn't actually a campaign but it isn't exactly just a bunch of independent people doing their own thing either—is going after college students. I had forgotten how idiotically hostile the Hillary '08 campaign was toward college students in Iowa, but that's just one of innumerable mistakes that one presumes she'll attempt to correct this time around. This, though, is the part that caught my eye:

"I was an Iowa college student myself during the last Democratic nomination, and I remember all my friends rallying around Obama with only a handful of holdouts canvassing for Clinton. She represented everything old news to my generation. We came of age during the tail end of Bill's presidency. The Clintons were our parents' Baby Boomer obsession. The old fights over draft dodging and inhaling were quaintly out of touch when Barack Obama owned up to being a stoner in high school and having experimented with cocaine. The Iraq War, launched while we were in high school contemplating our futures, was the initial moment of political awakening for many of us; Clinton's vote in favor of the war destroyed her chances of winning over the college-age crowd last time around.

Republicans have already signaled that they plan to highlight Clinton's age and Baby Boomer status should she become the Democrats' nominee. "The idea that we're at the end of her generation and that it's time for another to step forward is certainly going to be compelling," Karl Rove has said.

Yet that argument appears to hold less weight among the college kids of today. She receives rapturous applause when her speaking tour takes her to college campuses, an increasingly frequent occurrence. Polls have found that voters ages 18 to 39 are more likely to view Clinton favorably than their parents."

I don't doubt that the Republicans will highlight Clinton's age. And it will have no effect. It will be a bunch of ugly comments about her looks and her wrinkles (just you wait), with unflattering pictures passed from one AOL account to another. The problem they'll have is that although their nominee will be younger than Clinton, perhaps significantly so, none of the contenders for the GOP nomination has much appeal to the young beyond their chronological age.

This SNL skit about Paul Ryan and Jeb Bush trying to pitch the kids at Coachella wasn't particularly funny, but it captured the problem. Just like with any other group of voters, style matters to young people, but so does substance. The GOP's basic policy profile just isn't going to be a hit among the young. A lot of what the party believes isn't even appealing to young Republicans; for instance, a recent Pew Research poll shows that 61 percent of Republicans between 18 and 29 support marriage equality. So it isn't as though millions of college kids are going to say, "Man, that Paul Ryan guy [or Ted Cruz, or Scott Walker, or whoever] is awesome! He's only, like, 25 years older than me!"

In 2008, Barack Obama was stylistically appealing to young people in lots of ways. But he also wasn't held back by an ideology pitched to the concerns and fears of angry, 75-year-old white guys. I don't know if college students will go nuts for Hillary Clinton, but I'm pretty sure they won't be turning away from her in favor of whoever the GOP nominates because they think she's too old.


TOPICS: Campaign News; Issues; Parties; Polls
KEYWORDS: 2016; democrats; gaymarriage; hillary; homosexualmarriage; millennials; tedcruz; youth
Trying to inoculate her against such attacks? And what "substance" does Hillary Clinton signify? What accomplishments? Beuhler? Beuhler? Oh, and Ted Cruz is only 43 and Sarah Palin is barely 50.
1 posted on 04/15/2014 5:15:41 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
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To: 2ndDivisionVet
Republicans will nominate someone younger than her

So will the rats.

2 posted on 04/15/2014 5:17:38 PM PDT by Impy (RED=COMMUNIST, NOT REPUBLICAN)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

Hillary Clinton is an worn out drunk.


3 posted on 04/15/2014 5:23:19 PM PDT by VRW Conspirator ( 2+2 = V)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

Youth candidate??? That’s rich. She looks older than her advanced age. As Texans say, “She looks like she’s been rode hard and put up wet.”

The youth voting for this Communist troll, who has never accomplished a thing other than hanging on to her HINO, are obviously looking for a scolding nanny to harangue them to atone for their past sins….one of the most grievous being voting for Democrats.


4 posted on 04/15/2014 5:24:52 PM PDT by txrefugee
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To: Impy

5 posted on 04/15/2014 5:25:29 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet (I will raise $2M for Cruz and/or Palin's next run, what will you do?)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

She’s an old spouse of a former president, thats it


6 posted on 04/15/2014 5:29:44 PM PDT by ronnie raygun
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

I don’t think that creature will run.

But I do think if (yes, I say if) Hillary runs some younger man will beat her, just like Obama did.

She leads right now on name recognition, meaningless. No ancient looking old bag is gonna get elected President, not now. Image is everything, especially with rat primary voters.


7 posted on 04/15/2014 5:30:30 PM PDT by Impy (RED=COMMUNIST, NOT REPUBLICAN)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet
...a recent Pew Research poll shows that 61 percent of Republicans between 18 and 29 support marriage equality.

Another lie from the leftist, aptly-named Pew outfit. I know plenty of young people and they're solid Christians, opposed totally to homosexualism and abortionism. If Pew were doing honest polling, they'd find that same-sex "marriage" is as popular as pedophilia. After all, homosexuality and pedophilia are just branches of the same tree of evil.

8 posted on 04/15/2014 5:41:39 PM PDT by re_nortex (DP - that's what I like about Texas)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

If HRC is the nominee for the DNC, just get a good debater who can eviscerate her, that’s what I think. I think debates can be real important in the next presidential election.


9 posted on 04/15/2014 5:51:09 PM PDT by BeadCounter
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To: BeadCounter

You mean like North American debating champion?

While at Princeton, he competed for the American Whig-Cliosophic Society’s Debate Panel and won the top speaker award at both the 1992 U.S. National Debating Championship and the 1992 North American Debating Championship.[31] In 1992, he was named U.S. National Speaker of the Year and Team of the Year (with his debate partner, David Panton).[31] Cruz was also a semi-finalist at the 1995 World Universities Debating Championship, making him Princeton’s highest-ranked debater at the championship.[32][33] Princeton’s debate team later named their annual novice championship after Cruz.[32]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ted_Cruz


10 posted on 04/15/2014 5:55:43 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet (I will raise $2M for Cruz and/or Palin's next run, what will you do?)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

Actually, that is what I mean, even if Senator Cruz might not have the exact experience of running the government as some governors have, I think in our soundbyte society, the debates are gigantic. Governor Walker is a fine man but from what I can tell, somewhat cool as a cucumber. God Bless Him, might be good in the Veep role.

However, this is really looking ahead, we will have a whole primary system and set of debates to make further determinations.

And I do think Ted Cruz says a lot of similar things to Rush Limbaugh, whether that is more than coincidence, I don’t know.

And all that is to say is that I think Rush has influenced the conservative movement.

Sorry for the long answer.


11 posted on 04/15/2014 6:09:40 PM PDT by BeadCounter
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To: txrefugee

http://prospect.org/article/hillary-clinton-youth-candidate

http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2014/04/ready-for-hillary-clinton-campus-organizing-2016

“That dog won’t hunt.”


12 posted on 04/15/2014 6:11:26 PM PDT by smokingfrog ( sleep with one eye open (<o> ---)
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To: ronnie raygun

No doubt in the years to come the wookie will be paraded around


13 posted on 04/22/2014 3:09:58 AM PDT by ronnie raygun
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To: 2ndDivisionVet; ntnychik; potlatch

I'm young! And I love to be young!

14 posted on 04/22/2014 3:24:24 AM PDT by PhilDragoo (Hussein: Islamo-Commie from Fakistan)
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