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posted by jakethorn on January 9, 2008 - 5:39am

Tags:

• 2008 election
• Barack Obama
• Bill Clinton
• Hillary Clinton
• meta
• voting

So Hillary beat Obama 39-37 tonight. Stunning upset. Hats off. But there's one demographic she can't seem to reach: us. As in, ages 18-24. Every other age bracket, she's doing fine.

According to CNN exit polls, we broke 60-22 in favor of Obama. That's on top of Iowa where the entrance polls said ages 17-29 went 57-11 in favor of Obama. Those are outright landslides. And boy does it matter --- turnout is up, WAY UP. New Hampshire --- youth turnout DOUBLES. Iowa --- youth turnout TRIPLES. So we have what amounts to a tidal wave of millennial support for Obama; we're seriously the backbone of this guy's campaign right now. How come? There's gotta be a damn good reason, right?

It's because we want change. Yeah, I know, no fuckin duh. There's been a lot of cranky debate about what exactly "change" is lately. Well, I'll take a stab at it: change means not having a Bush or a Clinton in the White House. For example, I was born in 1985, so that means the last time a Bush or Clinton wasn't my president, I was in preschool. Some of you guys around here are '87 and '88 babies... You were in DIAPERS!

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As we all grew up and gained awareness, a certain kind of politics was dominating the country. There was bitter division. Big money dominated. Good people with good intentions were constantly being turned against each other, often over issues we didn't even have any business talking about. One of my earliest political memories was Bill Clinton's impeachment... made possible by 1) his lying to the whole country about his affair and 2) the Republican Party's OBSESSION with taking him down.

And then it got worse. I remember 2000 --- Bush2 vs Gore. They both seemed like hacks as far as I was concerned; Rage Against the Machine even told me so. Turned out Bush was slightly worse...huh. Four thousand dead soldiers, one recession, one trashed Constitution and two unfair elections later, our generation's first chance to speak loudly and clearly has arrived. We've traded in our diapers for ballots, and we're choosing NO on everything we've seen.

Barack Obama is a remarkable contrast to Clintons and Bushes. He's open and honest, even admitted he did drugs. His whole campaign is based on change, and not just bullshit lip-service change, PROGRESSIVE change. ACTIVE change. Not as a side theme; it's the centerpiece. Obama is a clear, undeniable break with the past. He's not even white! Hillary on the other hand, evades questions and (besides yesterday) hides her emotions, especially anger. It's practically impossible to read how she feels about some issues because she won't deviate from strict cliche talking points. Keeps her out of media trouble, but it makes her seem so distant, like we're not good enough to hear her real opinions, or worse, that she doesn't have real opinions. Her supporters tout her experience, but for us, experience means 'years spent as part of the DC establishment'.

Perhaps the greatest contrast between these candidates is that while Hillary Clinton is running a brilliant campaign, Barack Obama is building a movement.

I think he's tapped into something incredible. Remember, one of the things about these Iowa and New Hampshire results --- the colleges aren't even in session and youth turnout still doubled! Doubled! Just think about that for a second. Imagine what's going to happen when on February 5th, 22 states hold primaries, and ALL the colleges are back in session.

I'm usually pretty cynical about politicians (and politics in general, for that matter), but one thing I believe in is our generation's good judgment. This is one of our defining moments. The only historical parallel I can think of is 1968, when Bobby Kennedy crafted the same coalition: young people, blacks and liberals, rooted in passionate antiwar sentiments but much, much bigger than that. If that's what we're all a part of, you cannot even imagine how totally stoked I am right now.