A friend sent me a link to a Catalist analysis of what happened in the Virginia governor's election last year. There are lots of takeaways, but here's one of them:
Between the presidential election of 2020 and the gubernatorial election of 2021, youth turnout dropped 34 percentage points. Among boomer adults it dropped only 17 points. Among the elderly, it barely dropped at all.
This is totally normal. Progressives always swear that this time they can keep young people engaged in off-year elections, and every time they're wrong. Whatever our problems, depending on the young in non-presidential elections is a fool's venture.
Well, young master Youngkin tried twice to vote in the old dominion & claimed that his 17 YO friend had voted, so there's hope for the future??
Whatever our problems, depending on the young in non-presidential elections is a fool's venture.
I think the larger problem in Virginia, and probably what contributed to much apathy among younger voters, was that the Dem candidate was Terry McCauliffe. Between that and Youngkin successfully styling himself as a "pragmatic" (i.e. non-threatening) conservative, I can see why a lot of young voters probably didn't feel much urgency about the election.
This is a systematic pattern (and not one only of USA land, the same in other countries), so ad hoc per election explanations are really excercises in self-deception.
Nah. Mc Auliffe was fine. & the lt gov candidate was Hala Ayala, a true prog in the Bernie tradition.
The solution to this problem is for young people to also vote in primaries.
I guess those young folks really aren’t so woke after all. If old folks keep voting or republicans then why do democrats defend SS and Medicare? Let the republicans do their thing.
Presumably because younger people voting for Democrats might eventually want to have SS and Medicare exist when they're older? Pretty much the same reason why people not using unemployment insurance, public schools, 911 call centers, etc. right now might still vote for politicians who support unemployment insurance, public schools, 911 call centers, etc. existing in the future. This may be hard for you to grok, since your comments often suggest that you don't value anything in the future or in the past and live solely for the here and now, like some kind of human fruitfly with the memory of a few minutes and a lifespan of only about 14 days. But there is value to some (most?) people in knowing that something that existed for a large chunk of their past will continue to exist in the future, even if they themselves aren't using it right at this very moment and even if they themselves get to the end of their lives never having used it. I've never used the fire department before and I know many (most?) of their employees in this area are Republicans, but I like politicians who support it and wouldn't vote for ones proposing to eliminate it.
Haha, by the time young folks get to SS and medicare age it will be gutted.
"Among boomer adults it dropped only 17 points. Among the elderly, it barely dropped at all."
???????? I'm a boomer, age 73. Good to know I'm not among the elderly yet. Pretty sure Kevin is a boomer. We're the forever young crowd.
I recently saw an article that quoted a progressive, who is pushing for student loan forgiveness and said if Biden doesn’t do through executive order, the youth won’t turn out for midterms. Okay, so the “youth” who have so far contributed very little in taxes and just benefitted from over a decade of subsidies for public education can only be bothered to turn out if you wipe out their debt and if not they will stay home? I mean good gravy, they have to have their votes purchased? I don’t know who started this whole cancellation things, I don’t see any groundswell groups driving it, just pandering Progressive policiticians who completely ignore public opinion
"Okay, so the “youth” who have so far contributed very little in taxes and just benefitted from over a decade of subsidies for public education..."
Let's be clear... public education benefits all of society at all age levels. Very few people - even the childless - wants to live in a society where all the schools were shut down after they themselves got through graduation. A society with educated people generates more economic activity which in turn generates more tax revenue for supporting older generations in retirement and better quality of life for all 18-99+ year olds. We didn't do the youth a favor by educating them and previous generations didn't do us a favor by educating us... all of us educate young people because the societies with lots of uneducated people suck ass for everyone (but perhaps the richest of the rich) to live in.
And I'm sorry we don't live in the era when youth work for their keep. I understand that used to be the case in the 1800s... families had tons of kids to serve as unpaid labor on their farms and then when we urbanized, poor families still sent their kids out to earn money for the household. We evolved into a more decent society that doesn't expect kids to generate anything useful for the rest of us until they turn 18, and I'm OK with that. You might not be... and you're welcome to move to a shittier country in which child labor still contributes to GDP.
"I mean good gravy, they have to have their votes purchased?"
Everyone sells their votes to politicians. Evangelicals who had qualms about Godlessness in their national leaders were bought by Trump for the low, low price of just 3 Supreme Court justices. Anti-tax Republicans who had National Review subscriptions were bought by Trump for the price of just trillions of dollars in deficit-financed tax cuts. The youth wanting their votes purchased for the price of tuition is pretty cheap compared to the 2017 tax cuts. Not sure how selling your vote compares to selling your soul, so I don't know if the evangelicals got a bargain or not... I guess they'll find out when they die.
"Yeah, Republican dominance in Congress and at the statehouse level is pretty awful for most people. But I'm not going to turn out and vote agin' 'em unless you gimme something."
That clarify things for you? Good grief.
Call it what it is: extortion.
Civilized countries don't have studebt debt issues so my loan and I say: fuck you.
Civilized countries don't have studebt debt issues so my loan and I say: fuck you.
Civilized human beings don't say: give me what I want or I'll support turning my country into an autocracy*. So fuck you right back.
*Yes, that's exactly what not showing up to vote Dem does to America. We're very likely a single milquetoast turnout election away from Hungary or Turkey status.
PS—The biggest single impediment to enacting progressive policies in America these days is insufficient Democratic numbers in Congress, especially in the Senate. So, not showing up to vote is the exact opposite of what you should be doing if you want the country to head in a more Social Democratic direction.
It's irony of democracy: the people who will actually have to live in the political future are the least interested in shaping it.
It's not just in the US (the Brexit vote was pretty dominated by the old), so you can't get too worked up about it. It's just the way the kids and the oldsters roll.
"It's irony of democracy: the people who will actually have to live in the political future are the least interested in shaping it."
This is so astounding true, I just had to look at it again...I see no magical cure for this stupid malaise on the part of the young.
But I appreciate you making me ponder on this again.
Best Wishes, Traveller