The Growing Strength of the Democratic Party is Anti-Bush Youth!

[Dancing_Dave]

And we will need their energy energy in any voting reform movement.

Under 30 voters were the ONLY age group demographic which very clearly voted for Kerry over Bush by a large margin...about 54%-44%.
Among college students the trend was even stronger. Straw polls of highschool students showed the same trend--and think how many of them will be able to vote in 2006. The Iraq War is one concern of this age group, the economy is another, and the growth of a police state that locks up an outrageous percentage of this generation is another. Many would have liked Dean better, but the majority nevertheless voted for whoever could really defeat Bush.

There certainly were attempts to surpress the college student vote, and this is an issue we absolutely need to take up, in order to keep this now discouraged anti-Bush youth movement alive!

Music for America is one eye-opening source of progressive youth culture perspectives. http://www.musicforamerica.org/

:yourock:

[JI7]

1. Kerry won young voters in the Primary also

he had a good GOTV for young voters in the Primary and GE.

[Dancing_Dave]

4. I felt that Kerry and Edwards didn't connect with youth until late

In the campaign. The debates helped, as did the interviews that Edwards did at sites such as mp3.com. He explained that he'd never need to support a draft, but Bush's policies would require that.

Michael Moore was a help all along, he understood that kids would never want to be Sacrificed to the Bush/neo-con Regime's imperial aspirations.

Young Republicans tended to be a certain priveleged group who understood that they would always be excerpted from real service just as Bush was.

[msongs]

2. Let's hope bush brings back the draft because

that will end the republican reign of terror sooner than anything else.

young people do not want to die for bush.

Msongs
www.msongs.com/political-shirts.htm

[Dancing_Dave]

9. Young people can face much more of the terrible truth about Bush

Than most of us over 30 people can bear.

Check out this truely AWESOME song!
http://www.guerrillafunk.com/audio/paris/Sonic_Jihad/what_would_you_do.wav

Then watch this awesome VIDEO!
http://plaguepuppy.net/public_html/video%20archive/Secret-Evil-of-911.wmv

Now that's Consciousness Raising for you! Get in a groove where you can face the terrible reality of what our bogus "leaders" have done. Don't be just another media deluded political sucker.

[American Tragedy]

3. I'm on board.

Our generation gets trashed all the time, despite the fact that we are a small, comparatively progressive demographic. I agree that we could do much better, but we're decidedly not the only problem.

What disappointed me most was the apparent shift of the elderly population. Where did they go? I thought the Dems had a lock on them.

[Dancing_Dave]

5. There was a song on an album called "Free" from the '60's

"I've been a constant disappointment all my life/ for the people in my life/ who say they really care./ They say that I could do much better than I do/ and it's true/ so they've made me quite aware....I live the kind of life/ that's best for me."
:)

[EFerrari]

6. Wrote this to the Chron on 11/6. "Getting it wrong on the youth vote"

For the last two years, our young people have registered to vote, they've registered their friends and neighbors. They've phonebanked and fundraised. They've listened to debates, invited candidates to speak to them and helped maintain the broad progressive coalition that swept over this country. They got out the vote last Tuesday. They helped mind the polls, often travelling to other states to go where they were needed.

They did an amazing job. So, when the pundits say, they were unnoticed, someone is looking in the wrong direction. And missing the as yet untold story of this election and the youth vote.

Because our young people were also targeted for voter intimidation and suppression. They got robocalls threatening their student financial aid. As a group, somehow their absentee ballots went missing at a higher rate. Their registration forms where shredded in Oregon and Washington. Precincts closest to their colleges were understaffed and underequipped. In Ohio, they were made to stand in alternate lines and to wait for hours as they watched other voters come, cast their vote and go. And as the reports come in, this list will get longer.

But, in other words, on Tuesday, the youth vote was Black in America, had their rights violated in the same old ways that the black community has been fighting for decades. So, if we don't see the difference our young people made on Nov 2, it may be because we may be too ashamed to look and see what really happened to them, after they worked their hearts out for our election.

They were there. Where were we? Where is the leadership that should be helping our youth understand the lessons learned last Tuesday? To point out to them that they just went through a trial by fire, and that we're all proud of them and grateful. Most of all, to promise them that together we will continue fighting for fair elections. And to mean that.

[Dancing_Dave]

7. Right on!

:yourock:

[EFerrari]

8. Do you remember how wierd that week was? And the press went

out of their way to DISAPPEAR all those young people. It was insane.

And that made me more mad than anything. Because they worked so hard, and then suddenly, they were in a ditch being told they didn't show up for the dance.

That was it for me. (Mess with our kids, just try!)

[Dancing_Dave]

10. If young voters had made the decision, it would have been a blue landslide

Here's what the electoral map would have looked like: