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The sobering reality: just 55.3 percent of Americans between 16 and 29 have jobs. And earlier this year, Americans’ student loan debt surpassed credit card debt for the first time ever. In 2008, the youth vote helped sweep Barack Obama into office. Americans 18-29 spread the word on social media, energized fundraising and went to the polls. In 2012, the youth vote is moving on and throwing those omnipresent “Hope” bumper stickers and t-shirts in garbage bins. Not because of apathy. Not because another candidate generates more enthusiasm. Not because of his character. Not because they think voting is pointless....

Voter turnout will likely drop substantially in the 2012 U.S. presidential election, due in part to decreased interest among young people who flocked to the polls in 2008 to help elect President Barack Obama. A report this week by the Center for the Study of the American Electorate at American University predicted that the drop in turnout among young people will likely contribute to a decline in overall voter turnout in the November election after near record numbers in the last two presidential elections. "The election is likely to offer a minimum of hope and a maximum of televised invective...

When it comes to foreign affairs, Ron Paul is the most mocked of the GOP field. The argument could be made that Paul only wants to follow the Constitution. He does not believe we should fight a war unless it is declared a war by Congress. As a former military man, Paul says he wants a strong defense, but wants to bring troops back home from around the world. Paul's philosophy on foreign affairs continues to be his biggest stumbling block with older voters and his GOP rivals. An article earlier this year in USA Today stated that Paul has...

James Taranto has a good piece in the Wall Street Journal today that highlights a recent debate online about the Obama coalition and whether it can hang together to bring him victory next year. The "Government Party" which is made up of minorities, college educated adults, single women, and the intellectual class will all probably give Obama less support than in 2008. But it is the youth vote, that went 2-1 for Obama in the last election, that may tell the tale and give the GOP nominee the presidency: If you're too young to remember and want to see it...

President Obama coasted into the White House thanks in part to the youth vote, individuals aged 18-29 who bought into his vague promise to bring change. During Mr. Obama’s term in office, however, many of this group - known as Millennials - have been forced to learn how to subsist on pocket change. This isn’t quite what they were expecting when they turned out in historic droves in 2008. According to a recent poll commissioned by Generation Opportunity, 57 percent of Millennials participating said they will learn more about the policy positions of presidential candidates in the 2012 election than...

Most presidents affect the standing of their political parties. Ronald Reagan advanced his party's standing among young voters. So did Bill Clinton. In his first term, George W. Bush helped Republicans equal Democrats in party identification in the 2004 exit poll -- the first time that happened since polling began. But in his second term Bush proved toxic to the Republican label. The Pew Research Center showed Democrats with a 51 to 39 percent party identification edge over Republicans in its 2008 polls. Now Pew Research has come out has come out with figures for 2011. They're not good news...

A very large proportion of recent university graduates have soured on President Barack Obama, and many will vote GOP or stay at home in the 2012 election, according to two new surveys of younger voters. ...The scope of this disengagement from Obama is suggested by an informal survey of 500 post-grads by Joe Maddalone, founder of Maddalone Global Strategies. Of his sample, 93 percent are aged between 22 and 28, 67 percent are male and 83 percent voted for Obama in 2008. But only 27 percent are committed to voting for Obama again, and 80 percent said they would consider...

Obama Losing The Youth Vote 'Because White Students Don't Think He's Cool Anymore' By PAUL BENTLEY 7th June 2011 President Barack Obama famously won the 2008 election on a wave of support from America's youth. But any hopes the 49-year-old had of keeping down with the kids appear to have faded - his support from young people is rapidly waning, a poll has found. And for a man known for his 'jacket off' casual style the reason for this slump may be particularly hurtful - students are abandoning the President because they do not think he is cool anymore, it...

President Obama poll numbers are nearing the levels he enjoyed in 2008, with one glaring exception: young people. Especially young white people. His approval rating is at 56 percent approval rating among people ages 18 to 29. That's higher than the 51 percent national average, but that's a decline of 10 points compared to the 2008 exit polls, according to the National Journal's Ronald Brownstein report. And if you want a look into the reason for the slump in one of the demographic groups that most strongly embraced Obama in 2008, it may be this: Obama's simply not cool anymore....

....Part of Paul's fervent support in 2008 was grounded in college-aged voters, a constituency that also largely favored Barack Obama. In this campaign, the 75-year-old Paul said today, Mr. Obama won't be able to hang on to the youth vote. "I think that Obama will not be able to hang on to that enthusiasm of the young people because of what's happened in the last couple years," Paul said in Des Moines, Iowa, after his exploratory committee was announced. The financial crisis, the bloated deficit and the ongoing wars make the libertarian views Paul is known for -- such as...

President Barack Obama will visit Penn State University's main campus on Wednesday as part of a push for his new energy goals laid out in Tuesday's State of the Union address. Details about the president's State College, Pa., visit will come later this afternoon, but Obama is expected to tour the campus and make remarks, said Jen Psaki, a White House spokeswoman.

Yesterday, CNN and Time released their final joint polls from five states in the midterm cycle, mostly with good news for Republicans. However, in Nevada, veteran political journalist Jon Ralston pronounced the poll “crap� — and he has a point. In an e-mail newsletter quoted in Politico’s own daily e-mail blast, Raslton blasted the methodology and the media for buying it: “But, once again, the methodology is so screwy (Angle losing both urban counties but rurals carry her to victory?!) and almost unfathomable that it is impossible to divine anything from it. … I have never seen such bad public...

For months now President Obama has been out on the campaign trail attempting to rally support prior to November’s mid-term elections. Democratic candidates are avoiding Obama as if he has the plague. Bill White refused to campaign with him in Texas, Roy Barnes, Jim Marshall, John Barrow, John Lewis, and Hank Johnson refused appearances in Georgia, and the stories go on and on. Across the country, Democrat candidates are not running on the merits of the legislation the passed. In fact they are doing their best to avoid discussing healthcare, the stimulus, and Wall Street reform. According to Joe Biden,...

Tonight in Ohio, President Barack Obama will make another speech to another predominately college-aged audience hoping they are young enough and foolish enough to vote for those who will support his already failed agenda. But according to a recent poll, only 44% of college students approve of the job Mr. Obama is doing; down from 60% in May of 2009.

My FBN show tonight asked: "Do we really want everyone to vote?" Lots of people don’t know much at all about even basic American history. And why vote when we have such lousy choices? At the moment, the choice is between Democrats who gave us stimulus, Obamacare and a trillion dollar deficit...and Republicans who gave us prescription drug entitlements and the largest increase in federal spending since LBJ's Great Society. Whichever choice we make, the only result seems to be MORE government. The show re-airs tonight at midnight EST; Friday at 10pm EST; Saturday at 9pm and midnight EST; and...

This should come as NO SURPRISE, young people are VERY CONCERNED about their FUTURE in a America which so much of its economy has come under the CONTROL of President Barak Obama’s White House and the Democrats and RINOS. From the video I had watched, it is apparent that young people, whom President Obama had turned to get him into office are frankly are disappointed to say the least. Also with big concerns are their future in the working world and being able to find and keep work. Add that there are young people who come from families that have...

Young voter trends have fascinated me ever since the Obama-McCain bloodbath of 2008. As bleak as the statistics were two years ago, I've been building a case that Obama's youth landslide did not, and will not, guarantee permanent electoral or ideological doom for conservatives among Millenials. Virginia offers a case in point. In 2008, voters 18-29 in Virginia backed Obama over McCain by a 21-point margin. One year later, the same cohort supported conservative Republican Bob McDonnell for Governor by ten points--a 31-point (D) to (R) swing. Last week, the New York Times ran a piece describing younger voters' disenchantment...

As college students prepare to enter a threadbare workforce, some are learning what outsiders have long suspected: Their professors were wrong. “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,” Kirk Johnson reports in The New York Times. “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.” “Is the...

Call it buyer's remorse or just growing up fast in the economically painful Age of Obama. Fewer young voters are identifying themselves now as Democrats than just 2 years ago. While college students and young Americans new to the work force played a large part in the election of President Barack Obama, their attachment to the Democratic Party has weakened considerably since he took office.

FORT COLLINS, Colo. — 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. “Is the recession, which is hitting young people very hard, doing lasting or permanent damage to what looked like a good Democratic advantage with this age group?”...

The road to success is filled with a lot more potholes than any college freshman might have imagined four years ago. Welcome, graduate, to the world of very hard knocks. An average of 9.1 percent of college graduates were unemployed in 2009, up from 5.5 percent in 2005 and 4.4 percent in 2000, according to the Department of Labor's Bureau of Labor Statistics. For those with some college experience but without a degree, that figure averaged 14.1 percent last year, compared to 21.5 percent of high school graduates with no time on a higher education campus. (For comparison, the current...

WASHINGTON -- Young voters who had been enthralled by Barack Obama's "Yes, we can" message are now saying "Maybe not" -- and are backing away from the president in a worrisome new poll for the White House. Obama is losing in a match-up against a generic Republican challenger by 37 percent to 34 percent among voters in the 18-34 age group, according to a stunning Quinnipiac University poll released yesterday. In March, voters in this group approved of Obama by 54 percent to 37 percent. "The youngest age group may be the most impatient and the most easily disillusioned among...

This week marked the 39th anniversary of the ratification of the 26th Amendment to the Constitution which lowered the voting age from 21 to 18 years of age. At the time we wondered how long it would be until the Democrats nominated the right Piped Piper to lead them, and ultimately our nation, over a cliff. When two of three voters aged 18 to 29 voted for Barack Obama in 2008 those of us who were older and wiser knew they were making their inevitable terrible mistake. They were like men and women running blindfolded through a dark basement which...

A crowd of twentysomething true believers followed Obama from the campaign to Washington. But 18 months in, the "Yes We Can" crowd is losing faith. Joe Boswell quit his job at Camp David. But first, he played a tennis match with Michelle Obama. Her second chief of staff, Susan Sher, is an avid tennis fan, and Boswell, her assistant, was game for a doubles match. After a straight-sets victory, he leveled with the first lady of the United States. “I was tired of going through the motions,” he remembers. “She told me to go out and save the world and...

Barack Obama won two groups at unprecedented levels in the post-war era -- blacks and youth. This feat carried with it two stark realities for the next contest. Both blocs have a low turnout rate in midterm elections. And both blocs were particularly personally attached to Obama and the change he personified.Obama's absence from the 2010 ballot was, therefore, always to be a problem for Democrats. But the gravity of that problem has grown with Democrats' larger problems.Next month, the Democratic National Committee will begin a $50 million program to turn out the Obama base in November.

I'm always entertained when older folks try to reach out to people my age. It's hardly ever a pretty sight and most of the time these attempts end up being hilarious. I found myself chuckling at Barack Obama's most recent effort to beg young voters to come out to the polls this November. No one is buying it anymore, especially young people. Even the most liberal of my generation are frustrated with the President... The radical environmentalists on college campuses across the country were furious when Obama opened up the coasts for limited drilling. Young Americans are realizing they did...

Democrats are getting desperate. Thanks to mountains of unpopular legislation, they’re careening full speed ahead towards huge losses in November. They’re looking towards their charismatic Dear Leader to help save them, and so Obama is trying to recapture the magic from his campaign. So, Obama sent out a call for pretty much everyone except older white people to help out his buddies when election season rolls around. Unfortunately, he’s already lost one of those groups: the young voters. Cue the hysterical “Get Out The Vote” campaigns! Less than 24 hours after President Barack Obama announced his plan to re-build the...

Republicans are enjoying new popularity among 18- to 29-year-olds, which may signal the first step in a Republican resurgence among young adults, a new poll suggests. The poll finds young Republicans are more politically energized than young Democrats, and they’re more likely to say they will “definitely be voting” in this November’s midterm elections. Forty-one percent of young Republicans say they plan to vote in November, compared with 35 percent of Democrats and 13 percent of Independents, according to the poll conducted by Harvard University’s Institute of Politics (IOP), a nonpartisan group. Fifty-three percent of those who voted for Sen....

The "generation gap" endures as a staple of American political and social analysis. The notion that the special circumstances and experiences of each succeeding cohort imbue it with different perceptions, beliefs and values seems intuitively reasonable and appealing. It's also flattering. In a mass-market culture, belonging to a distinct subgroup, even if it numbers many millions, contributes to a sense of identity. In a 1969 Gallup poll, 74 percent of Americans believed in the generation gap. A poll last year found that 79 percent now do. Between then and now, of course, generations have shifted. Then, it was baby boomers...

On Friday, Washington Post film critic Michael O'Sullivan reviewed the new movie for teens and tweens, Percy Jackson & The Olympians: The Lightning Thief. This line tended to stand out. A couple of characters get off some real zingers here. Grover actually suggests, at one point, that President Obama might be a demigod.

At 18, Ben Taber soaked up the stadium-size vibe of Barack Obama's nomination with a sense of wonder as he joined an unprecedented wave of young voters that would help carry their candidate to the White House. By the time he turned 20 this week, that emotional and philosophical bond with the president had been tempered by a steep learning curve about governance, and a stern reality check about the scope and pace of hope and change. "For the most part, the general tenor of this administration is something I like," says Taber, who worked as a U.S. Senate intern...

In Texas we have an expression: Saying it don’t make it so. The proof of the saying is all around us. Take for instance the latest video from that national treasure Naked Emperor News which shows then candidate Barack Obama pledging eight times to play out the health care reform debate on CSPAN, or MSNBC’s assurances that the Ft. Hood shooting spree was not motivated by religion. For a real case-study, however, spend

www.catholicnewsagency.com New survey shows youth becoming more pro-life Young pro-lifers march in the 2009 March for Life New Haven, Conn., Jan 21, 2010 / 07:44 pm (CNA).- Just one day before the March for Life in Washington D.C. and the anniversary of Roe v. Wade, a new survey shows that the number of Americans who say they are pro-life is continuing to grow. Members of the Millennial generation say abortion is “morally wrong” at a rate of 58 percent.The survey, which was conducted between December 2009 and January 2010, was co-sponsored by the Knights of Columbus and the Marists....

The health-care-reform bill has passed in the Senate, but it has fallen short of the real reform President Obama promised on the campaign trail. The bill is now headed to a conference committee where it will be amended further. Meanwhile, a majority of Americans (55 percent, according to recent polls by Rasmussen Reports) disapprove of the Democrats' reform efforts. From its inception, the movement toward health-care reform has suffered from a dearth of leadership. The powerful Obama campaign machine that once gauged the pulse of the young, Internet-savvy generation has broken down, leaving in its wake the hordes of young...

Monday, 21 Dec 2009 12:11 PM Article Font Size By: James Hirsen Despite widespread public opposition to the current healthcare reform package, which is slated to be passed by the Senate on Christmas Eve, advocates have a new tool in their arsenal to court younger voters. Sex, what else? Rock the Vote, the celebrity weighted group that tries to reel in votes for Dems, recently released a video that encourages young folks to use sexual favors, or the withholding thereof, as a means of persuasion. Libs of the past made a career out of ridiculing abstinence programs. But some Rock...

The political advocacy group "Rock the Vote" has a new video out encouraging young people to abstain from having sex with folks opposed to healthcare reform. Sadly, this isn't your run of the mill call for celebacy, for the video also instructs youth to use sex to get people to change their minds on this issue.

I just saw this on another board, and just posting it here because Parents need to see the propaganda being shoved on their kids. Eva Amurri (Susan Sarandon's Daughter) is in an ad about health care, of course they cite statistics like 2/3 rd's of young adults don't have health care, but refuse to cite that these kids CHOOSE not to carry health care, they all have new cars. flat screen plasma tv's, computers, IPOD's, and cool cell phones though. This Ad even goes so far as saying to with hold sex from someone who isn't in favor of health...

Job Market Worsens For Recent College Graduates Unemployment among young adults is worse than the U.S. average. Don Lee December 14, 2009 Reporting from Washington - The unemployment rate dropped last month for men and women, blacks and whites, lifting hopes that the long dry spell in the jobs market may be coming to an end. But for recent college graduates and other young adults, the labor situation didn't just remain dire -- it got worse. For 20- to 24-year-olds, the jobless rate rose four-tenths of a percent to 16% in November, even as unemployment nationally slipped to 10% from...

Barack Obama was the Political Pied Piper of 2008. His campaign motivated millions of young people to finally come to the polls and pull the levers -- and not just for Obama but other party members down the ticket, yielding sweeping power for the Democrats in Congress. A year of Obama has come and gone and so have many of his youthful supporters. This does not bode well for 2010 and beyond. Obama owes his presidency to the ranks of 18-24 year olds who overwhelmingly supported him over John McCain (66-32 percent). He tapped into their idealistic yearnings with promises...

National polling done by John Zogby for the League of American Voters following a TV and Internet ad campaign in Arkansas, North Dakota and Maine found that 65 percent of the youngest voters are opposed to Obama’s healthcare initiative, compared to 55 percent opposition among senior citizens.

PHOENIX -- A new statewide poll suggests John McCain could get a fight in his bid for another term in the U.S. Senate. And it would come from his own party. A telephone survey of 570 likely Republican primary voters conducted by Rasmussen Reports found McCain the favorite of 45 percent of those questioned. But former Congressman and current radio talk show host J.D. Hayworth was backed by 43 percent, well within the 4 percentage point margin of error for the poll. Hayworth told Capitol Media Services late Friday he has not made a decision, saying he is in the...

Mitt Romney is heading to Reagan country. The former Massachusetts governor is scheduled to speak this Friday to the Young America's Foundation at the Ronald Reagan Ranch Center in Santa Barbara, California. Romney is expected to be the dinner banquet speaker for the foundation's West Coast Leadership Conference, which consists of young conservatives from 44 colleges and universities across 12 states. "Young people provide much of the energy in the conservative movement, and if we are going to be successful as a party we need to harness that energy and put it work on behalf of the principles we all...

In November 2008, 658,000 Americans under 30 voted in New Jersey and 782,000 did so in Virginia. In November 2009, 212,000 Americans under 30 voted in New Jersey and 198,000 did so in Virginia. In other words, young voter turnout this year was down two-thirds in New Jersey and three-quarters in Virginia

RICHMOND, Va. - Last year, 23-year-old Rashida Hill watched the presidential debates, visited the college political party meetings and put a Barack Obama bumper sticker on her townhouse door. She voted for Obama because she felt like the election was about "being a part of something." But on Tuesday, the Virginia Commonwealth University student didn't bother voting in the governor's race because, she said, the candidates didn't give her anything to get excited about. "The simple fact is, unless you put it in front of somebody, they're really not going to seek it out," Hill said. Many of the young,...

Gubernatorial candidates Creigh Deeds and Bob McDonnell have toured, tailgated and twittered to win an elusive, college-age voting bloc. Efforts from the campaigns, both Democrat and Republican, to improve student voter turn-out, however, may only go so far at the University, where apathy, registration confusion and pre-voting numbers seem to foreshadow a potentially low turnout. Charlottesville General Registrar Sheri Iachetta said gubernatorial races historically bring in fewer voters than presidential elections, and that this year, absentee turnout might fall to 40 percent, lower than what it has usually been in previous years.

The love affair between Barack Obama and young Americans may be on the rocks. Recently released figures from the Department of Labor reveal staggeringly high joblessness numbers among America’s youth. Indeed, 53.4 percent of young Americans are without a job – a post-World War II high. With over half of 16-24 year olds jobless, even after stimulus package after stimulus package supposedly meant to create jobs, one has to wonder how Barack Obama’s approval ratings are doing among his strongest supporters. Unsurprisingly, the answer is “worse.” According to Gallup, approval of President Obama among young adults aged 18 to 29...

Last year the media did not mince words in their race to announce that young voters were flocking to Obama. In fact, a google search I conducted while doing research for this entry yielded 210,000 results for the very specific search phrase "young voters flock to Obama". The link provided is to the first one on the list. It was hardly surprising after young people's ridiculous choice at the polls in 2006, when they helped usher in a new era of governmental horrors by voting in droves for Democrats thus handing them control of Congress. Back in 2007 the new...

The unemployment rate for young Americans has exploded to 52.2 percent -- a post-World War II high, according to the Labor Dept. -- meaning millions of Americans are staring at the likelihood that their lifetime earning potential will be diminished and, combined with the predicted slow economic recovery, their transition into productive members of society could be put on hold for an extended period of time. And worse, without a clear economic recovery plan aimed at creating entry-level jobs, the odds of many of these young adults -- aged 16 to 24, excluding students -- getting a job and moving...

CHICAGO -- Young Americans showed their collective power when they helped vote President Obama into office. Inspired by his message of "change," they knocked on doors, spread flyers, voted for him by a 2-1 margin, and partied like rock-the-vote stars when he won. Since the election, though, that fervor has died down _ noticeably. And while young people remain the president's most loyal supporters in opinion polls, a lot of people are wondering why that age group isn't doing more to build upon their newfound reputation as political influencers. "It's one thing to get excited about a presidential candidate. It's...

Young Americans showed their collective power when they helped vote President Obama into office. Inspired by his message of "change," they knocked on doors, spread flyers, voted for him by a 2-1 margin, and partied like rock-the-vote stars when he won. Since the election, though, that fervor has died down _ noticeably. And while young people remain the president's most loyal supporters in opinion polls, a lot of people are wondering why that age group isn't doing more to build upon their newfound reputation as political influencers. "It's one thing to get excited about a presidential candidate. It's another thing...