Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

Skip to comments.

Youth vote may have been key in Obama's win
MSNBC ^ | 2008-11-05 | Melissa Dahl

Posted on 11/04/2008 10:39:03 PM PST by rabscuttle385

Early reports are indicating that the youngest members of the country's electorate voted Tuesday in higher numbers than in the last presidential election — and they voted more Democratic. Youth turnout appears to be exceeding 2004 levels, which was itself a year with a big surge in voters ages 18 to 29.

“We expected record turnout, and that is what we’re seeing right now,” says Heather Smith, a spokeswoman for Rock the Vote, an organization that works to encourage young people to register and vote in every election.

What’s more, young voters may prove to have been the key to Barack Obama's victory. Young voters preferred Obama over John McCain by 68 to 30 percent — the highest share of the youth vote obtained by any candidate since exit polls began reporting results by age in 1976, according to CIRCLE, a non-partisan organization which promotes research on the political engagement of Americans between ages 15 and 25.

(Excerpt) Read more at msnbc.msn.com ...


TOPICS: News/Current Events; Politics/Elections
KEYWORDS: 2008; collegevote; election; electionpresident; elections; va2008; youthvote
Navigation: use the links below to view more comments.
first previous 1-2021-4041-6061 next last
To: Jeff Chandler

Ah, it’s easy to bash the loser.


21 posted on 11/04/2008 10:44:28 PM PST by SolidWood (Sarah Palin - Everything that is Sweetness and Light)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 3 | View Replies]

To: rabscuttle385

Fox said the percent of young voters went from 17% to 18%. They rose slightly more than the voter rolls overall.

This election was won because some GOP voters crossed over, some didn’t vote, and many GOP voters from 2004 are either IND or DEM now. We have lost a lot of ground.


22 posted on 11/04/2008 10:45:03 PM PST by ilgipper (Does Obama have even ONE friend who is PRO America?)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: SolidWood
Ah, it’s easy to bash the loser.

I have NEVER liked McCain, but I stopped bashing him when he got the nomination.

The election is over.

23 posted on 11/04/2008 10:45:43 PM PST by Jeff Chandler (Bush Sr, Bob Dole, Bush Jr, McCain...)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 21 | View Replies]

To: rabscuttle385

The Democrats really need to push the voting age down to 5. The base of politically brainless would expand their base even more.


24 posted on 11/04/2008 10:47:12 PM PST by Proud2BeRight
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: pepperhead

sadly the youth will pay the highest price of all—poor job market due to poor economy, national debt that will choke the nation going forward, eroding moral base for their children. Basically, they bought ocean front property in Kansas—as the say a sucker born every minute. Sad, Very sad!


25 posted on 11/04/2008 10:47:32 PM PST by Freedom56v2
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 6 | View Replies]

To: Def Conservative
Fact is the Dems have expanded their base. They have the blacks, the youth and now the hispanics.

The GOP has to somehow succeed in reaching out to minorities or else we are screwed. It is so frustrating since blacks and Hispanics are acutually socially conservative on issues like gay marriage or abortion.

I don't know what it will take to win them over.

26 posted on 11/04/2008 10:47:50 PM PST by eekitsagreek (Give me a Stanley Cup (or Amy Grant) PLEASE!)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 7 | View Replies]

To: I see my hands

The college students I am exposed to wanted someone “smart” running the country. Never determined if they had any other reasoning.


27 posted on 11/04/2008 10:49:50 PM PST by ican'tbelieveit ((Join FreeRepublic's Folding@Home team (Team# 36120), KW:Folding))
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 18 | View Replies]

To: rabscuttle385
Dumb little shits with heads filled with mush by Public Indoctrination Centers - TRAINING instead of EDUCATING as prescribed by none other than AYERS....

Yes, AYERS —— that Communist who lives in Obama’s neighborhood......and was a ghost writer for Obama’s books....

The Nation's Teacher's Unions in large measure OWN the Obama Albatross hanging around the nation's neck.....

28 posted on 11/04/2008 10:50:50 PM PST by river rat (Semper Fi - You may turn the other cheek, but I prefer to look into my enemy's vacant dead eyes.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: eekitsagreek

Forget the blacks.

Focus on the Hispanics, especially those coming from socialist countries...they are OUR voters we just have to reach out to them.

I also think that we need to stop chiding GOPers who speak to largely Hispanic audiences.


29 posted on 11/04/2008 10:50:58 PM PST by Def Conservative (Run and hide 08)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 26 | View Replies]

To: Danae

I can proudly say, my son, voting for the first time today, voted the way I educated him to vote (homeschooled and so very proud of him).

Needless to say, he is heartbroken tonight. For so very many reasons.


30 posted on 11/04/2008 10:51:20 PM PST by ican'tbelieveit ((Join FreeRepublic's Folding@Home team (Team# 36120), KW:Folding))
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 4 | View Replies]

To: ilgipper

I think you should add some people voting for one of their own instead of their morals, ideals. When I saw many young black people on Fox today so proud they had voted for the man that is so aggressively for destroying their unborn children, that had to be the only explanation.


31 posted on 11/04/2008 10:54:02 PM PST by ican'tbelieveit ((Join FreeRepublic's Folding@Home team (Team# 36120), KW:Folding))
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 22 | View Replies]

To: Def Conservative

NO! The fact is that since the beginning of the primaries, the MSM ran the campaign. CUT AND DRY!

They purposefully wasted resources on non-stories while at the same time completely ignoring or dismissing important stories of Obama’s true agenda, associates, and background starting with what he did in Columbia and Harvard and how and by whom that was even funded.


32 posted on 11/04/2008 10:59:53 PM PST by diverteach (http://foolishpleasurestudio.com/eyewool/slap_hillary.html)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 7 | View Replies]

To: ican'tbelieveit
"The college students I am exposed to wanted someone “smart” running the country. Never determined if they had any other reasoning."

And, pray tell - what possible evidence of "smart" did they have????

He froze access to all his school records.
He is suspected of having a ghost writer for his book -- Ayers..
He hasn't proposed a single piece of significant legislation his entire time in public "service"..
The Chicago neighborhood he "organized" is still a ghetto slum and crime ridden mess..
He wasn't smart enough to realize after 20 years, that his pastor was a black racist, Communist and probably a closet Muslim..
He wasn't smart enough to discover his friend Ayers was NOT reformed - and even stated so repeatedly while Obama knew him..
He hasn't explained why he refused to make public his medical, CAMPAIGN DONATION RECORDS FOR ALL DONORS or birth records.

Cunning and Corrupt is NOT "smart"....it's clever....but not intelligent...

There IS a difference.

33 posted on 11/04/2008 11:00:05 PM PST by river rat (Semper Fi - You may turn the other cheek, but I prefer to look into my enemy's vacant dead eyes.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 27 | View Replies]

To: ican'tbelieveit

Well, the youth vote may not have been much higher than in ‘04 - probably because they couldn’t wait in line once their iPod batteries ran out - the GenYers are used to being taken care of and told they are the greatest thing under the sun and so much smarter than the grown ups - this plays right into the liberals’ hands. I was born in the early 70s and remember not always getting my way and being taught that nothing in life is free. It makes sense that Obama is the choice for a generation of serfs.


34 posted on 11/04/2008 11:00:37 PM PST by nickm71
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 30 | View Replies]

To: rabscuttle385

I wonder how they’ll feel in a year or two when they’re all unemployed?


35 posted on 11/04/2008 11:02:16 PM PST by PLMerite ("Unarmed, one can only flee from Evil. But Evil isn't overcome by fleeing from it." Jeff Cooper)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: rabscuttle385

Not surprising. Individuals without much responsibility, little to no experience in the private sector, little to no experience having to support themselves, and susceptible to peer pressure and the influence of the usual cast of left-wing professors who are also without much responsibility and experience in the private sector. When life consists of a subsidized existence in which you are free to screw around every day, then yeah, the hope and change candidate probably sounds pretty good.

I still believe we should amend the Constitution such that if you did not pay federal income taxes last year, you are not eligible to vote. Yeah, I know the million reasons that would never come to pass, but it’s clear that our nation’s future is increasingly being shaped by a large group of people who are not subject to reality and who do not have to pay for the results of their electoral decisions.

Of course, perhaps some day some of them will actually have to take care of themselves. If the Messiah gets his way and their upper middle class parents end up getting soaked by Uncle Sam, then perhaps these kids will find out sooner rather than later. Then again, a lot of their parents are also lining up with their hat in hand looking for the government to give them shit.

I think we as a nation need to rethink the extended childhood many of our nation’s young enjoy.


36 posted on 11/04/2008 11:02:58 PM PST by Harry Wurzbach (Joe The Plumber & Rep. Thaddeus McCotter are my heroes.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: diverteach

Well if the MSM was the cause of this mess then we deserved to win. We’ve known that they have been in the tank for the libtars for over 20 years...

We should stop giving the media outlets ANY credit, stop acting shocked by their moves, just refer to them as the wing of the Democrat party they are.


37 posted on 11/04/2008 11:04:03 PM PST by Def Conservative (Run and hide 08)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 32 | View Replies]

To: rabscuttle385
Yeah, and it had nothing to do with

A. ACORN
B. A spectacularly dickless Justice Department
C. A stupendously complicit media

38 posted on 11/04/2008 11:04:27 PM PST by Lizavetta
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Harry Wurzbach

And we should call them the dumb welfare kings and queens they are. They’ve managed to paint the GOP as out of touch, stupid and uber rich...we should do the same.


39 posted on 11/04/2008 11:04:58 PM PST by Def Conservative (Run and hide 08)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 36 | View Replies]

To: river rat; All

The reason Hussein is tyrant extraordinaire is because of massive voter fraud, not because the youth voted.


40 posted on 11/04/2008 11:05:22 PM PST by This Just In
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 33 | View Replies]


Navigation: use the links below to view more comments.
first previous 1-2021-4041-6061 next last

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.

Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

FreeRepublic, LLC, PO BOX 9771, FRESNO, CA 93794
FreeRepublic.com is powered by software copyright 2000-2008 John Robinson