2008

How does one know when a politician isn't up with the times? I suspect there are a number of devices that get to this metric, but one might be looking for someone harping about the nation being "center-right."

John McCain, of 2008 "Country First" fame, appeared with Sarah Palin yesterday to speak to a crowd of Tea Partiers. While Palin continued to gloss over the constant references to violent acts in her exhortations to teabaggers over the past couple days, McCain railed against health insurance reform, vowing a repeal of the newly-passed law.

When McCain spoke, he responded to President Obama's speech yesterday, in which Obama defied Republicans to campaign on a platform of repealing the health care reform law, in light of the various benefits included within it. "And my attitude is, 'Go for it,'" Obama said.

McCain declared: "We're gonna 'go for it,' an we're gonna repeal this bill. We're gonna stop this spending."

McCain also said: "Our answer is, yes, we're gonna 'go for it,' and we're gonna get it, and we're gonna restore the government back to the people of this country, because this is a right-of-center nation, and this president is governing from the left, and it will not stand."

When I finish reading that, the question that immediately pops into my head is... "What happens if it does stand?" What happens if people like this health insurance reform, given that a majority of Americans had already liked the bill's individual previsions or believed they weren't liberal enough? What happens if the world does not end? More broadly, what happens when the entirety of the nation's most diverse generation ever comes of age and is largely politically active, expressing its left-leaning viewpoints?

I think this all comes back to many members of the GOP and the conservative fringe being unable to zoom out and view these events over the long-term. We saw this with McCain himself in his poorly-run campaign in 2008 -- the difference between tactics and strategy. Yes, Obama faced some trouble with the Rev. Wright controversy, but he gave a forward-looking and eloquent speech that muted much of the criticism. Yes, the McCain campaign was enjoying success in its portrayal of Obama as a celebrity political novice that summer, but because it wasn't rooted in anything, the McCain camp apparently didn't think anything of choosing a mayor with frighteningly little experience as their vice presidential nominee. Yes, health insurance reform has had its troubles, and while the GOP was responsible for many of those Democratic struggles, their refusal to do anything other than saying no left them without any input whatsoever. And now, there's this call for repeal, a move to take away all the benefits given to 32 million people. A conscious choice to choose the student loan industry over young Americans.

As the GOP leans more to the right, its rhetoric closer and closer to a boiling point, it will increasingly place itself in untenable political positions. The GOP chooses to live in the moment, ignoring the political realities around the corner. Contrary to John McCain's wishes/statements, this is no longer a center-right nation. As the Millennials come of age politically, their size and pro-government/socially liberal positions will tip the country to the left, a la the 1930s.

So, again John -- what happens if it does stand? What's the contingency plan?

More than twice as many 18-29 year olds voted for President Barack Obama as for John McCain in 2008, and one year later the party preferences of college students remain similarly lopsided in favor of the Democratic Party and its political point of view.

The most recent data from communication research company Frank N. Magid Associates' show an equal percentage of students, 18 and older, call themselves liberals or progressives (31%) as describe their political philosophy as moderate (30%). By contrast, only 20% describe themselves as conservative, while another 20% haven't learned enough in college yet to say just what their ideological orientation is. Survey research data from 2008 and 2009 actually showed self-described moderates as the most common philosophical designation by Millennials, born between 1982 and 2003, with liberalism in second place. But those studies included Millennials who were not on campus, which suggests either that college students are a more liberal bunch than non-students by nature or there has been further movement toward liberalism among Millennials during the first year of Obama's presidency.

Almost all students on campus today are members of the Millennial Generation and bring that generation's commitment to civic engagement and consensus decision making to the political process. Unlike many members of Generation X or Baby Boomers who preceded them, a majority of Millennials believes in using government to help address societal problems and economic inequality. These philosophic touchstones form the basis of their political identification and belief system.

Millennials were inclined to be Democrats before Obama ran for presidency and both his campaign and his presidency have solidified that tendency. Beginning in 2006 as Millennials made their presence known among 18-29 year old voters, partisan identification among this age group moved from a roughly 50/50 split to a clear preference for the Democratic Party. In 2008, Millennials voted more than 2:1 for Obama over McCain (66% vs. 32%) and by roughly the same percentage (63% vs. 34%) for Democratic congressional candidates. Magid's 2010 data shows this same level of Democratic identification persisting among Millennials who are attending college. Twice as many college students call themselves Democrats as Republicans (47% vs. 24%). Only 15% are independents, with a similar percentage unwilling to identify with any of those three choices.

These numbers suggest the Young Republicans have a lot of work to do just to break even, while Young Democrats should have a rockin' good time of it on college campuses across America.

Crossposted from HuffingtonPost

A new report out of Southern Illinois University, delivered at the Harvard Political Networks Conference, attempts to quantify the use and effectiveness of Facebook support pages in the 2008 House elections: Explaining Facebook Support in the Congressional Election Cycle.

The report is a useful, if incomplete look at the factors behind congressional campaign support on Facebook during the 2008 cycle. It looks primarily at the advantages/disadvantages of money, incumbancy and district demographics. Where it fails short (and the authors readily admit there is much more research to be done on this issue) is in how campaigns actually used Facebook to organize - via the "Events" function, cleaning up young voter lists, etc. The effectiveness of those types of activities strikes me as much more useful data for campaigns staffers looking ahead to 2010.

That said, here's a look at some of their findings:

• "Only 8% of Americans reported using social networks to learn about campaigns during the 2008 election cycle."
• "The Facebook community is skewed in favor of college educated, more affluent, white, urban and younger citizens. The closer a congressional district resembles this profile, the larger the pool is from which to draw potential Facebook supporters."
• The candidate with the most Facebook supporters tends to win the election, but this does not mean Facebook support is predictive. The community is too demographically skewed for this to be considered an accurate measure.
• 79% of Democratic House Candidates had a Facebook Supporter page in 2008, compared to just 66% of Republican House Candidates.
• Facebook was decidedly NOT a tool of insurgents in 2008. "Fully 93.2% of incumbents had Politicians’ Pages, while only 70.8% of candidates for open seats did so, and the percentage for challengers drops to 48.9%."
• Incumbency and money (more media exposure) were factors in the number of supporters a candidate had on Facebook. Incumbents typically had over 165 more supporters than challengers.
• On average, Democratic candidates had 120 more supporters than Republicans.
• More college educated voters in a district tend to increase the number of Facebook supporters in a race, while a greater percentage of young people generally decreases the number of Facebook supporters for incumbents. (To be perfectly honest, this is SUPER counterintuitive and the authors do a terrible job of explaining what this means or how they come to this conclusion.)
• More activity on the page (from the candidate or from supporters) tends to increase the number of total supporters. Wall posts and videos are the most effective forms of activity for expanding a support base. Fan photos had little effect in growing a support base.
• The average congressional campaign grew its FaceBook fanbase at a rate of 4 - 6% per month.

A good mix today -- some technology, service, and policy for you. Enjoy!

• Gavin Newsom, Mayor of San Francisco, uses technology to announce his campaign for California's governorship, with his campaign focusing on generational change as a message.
• Steve Schmidt and David Plouffe took the time to sit down and talk about the 2008 election at the University of Delaware Thursday night. Plouffe talked about the importance of young voters to the campaign and the point in time when the Obama campaign sensed the momentum changing.
• Youth Service America's Global Youth and Service Day events are being held this weekend. From a press release: "During GYSD, the largest service event in the world and an initiative of Youth Service America (YSA), young people will participate in and facilitate projects with families, schools, community and faith-based organizations, and businesses; they focus on serious issues such as climate change, education, poverty, health, hunger and homelessness." Over 1,800 projects were planned around the world for this event -- double the number of projects held last year.
• techPresident covers the signing of the Serve America Act, specifically the development of serve.gov, a Web 2.0 clearinghouse for service opportunities run by the government.
• Google and Personal Democracy Forum are launching a fellowship program for those interested in developing new ways of using technology to make change and influence government and policy:
  

  Google and Personal Democracy Forum are teaming up to offer registration fellowships that cover the full forum registration costs and a meal with Googlers for twenty well-qualified, creative political entrepreneurs to attend this year's conference on June 29-30 at Jazz at Lincoln Center in New York City.

  Fellows will be chosen based on evidence of how you've turned ideas into action and into new applications of technology in the political or civic arena.

  Go to the link and apply by May 8th if interested.

• The House Financial Services Committee passed the Credit Cardholders' Bill of Rights (H.R. 627) on Wednesday. The House passed similar legislation last year, but it stalled in the Senate.
• Sen. Ben Nelson (D-NE) is a bit upset that he won't be able to reap the benefits of serving as a hero to the private student loan industry. Obama and the House and Senate negotiators in the budget process have agreed to use budget reconciliation for student lending legislation, effectively diminishing Nelson's influence. Ezra Klein reports.
• Speaking of Ezra Klein, someone got a new gig at the Washington Post. Klein's post on this can be found here. Klein starts May 18.
• An alternative view of Ashton Kutcher's Twitter quest at AdAge.

Air Traffic Control, a group that monitors music and politics, and helps artists find ways to become politically engaged, recently released a survey of how music and politics collided in the 2008 election. Here's a quick snapshot of their findings (pdf), taken over a 12 month period leading up to the election:

• Total Activities Documented: 1,895
• Participating Artists: 1091+
• Participating Organizations: 72
• Swing State Activities: 532 (CO, FL, MI, MN, MO, NV, NH, OH, VA, PA)
• Songs Written For Candidates: 62

As in 2004, one organization did the vast majority of the organizing within the music industry. ATC notes that in 2004 that organization was Music for America. In 2008, that organization was HeadCount, which accounted for 82% of all music related activities during the 2008 election cycle. Rock the Vote came in a distant second with 7% of all activities, and no other organization accounted for more than 2% of all other music and politics events.

Other observations:

• As in 2004, approximately 1/3 of all events were held in swing states, and the majority of events occurred in September and October, the final two months of the election cycle.
• Many of the organizations (Punk Voter, Music for America, Bands Against Bush, Concerts for Kerry/Change) that worked in this field in 2004 had disappeared by 2008.
• Unlike 2004, there were far fewer events held in 2008 (well over 1,000 fewer).
• Despite the fewer number of events, there was a far greater number of unique artists participating in events, but in many instances they participated in new ways (meaning other than by allowing an organization to table at one of their concerts).
• One very cool difference between 2004 and 2008: most concerts organized in swing states were put together by local organizations utilizing local bands. As a huge proponent of local, peer to peer organizing, I see this as welcome news indicative of the further potential for young people organizing themselves in politically powerful states.

The report offers a few potential explanations for these differences:

These changes may be the result of a number of different factors including: artists and organizations focusing their efforts online instead of at concerts, fewer effective nonpartisan or partisan organizations working directly with the music community, fewer organizations going on a full length tour with artists but focusing their resources on local shows or festivals, lack of reporting back by the organizations, engaged artists turning to the campaigns directly to offer their support and/or more self-produced events and locally organized activities using local artists.

Based on my observations, I would agree that most of these played at least some part in the different role that musicians played in 2008. Far fewer of the organizations listed above had any capacity for field operations - HeadCount being the notable exception - than did organizations like MFA, Concerts for Change and Punk Voter in 2004. And while those now defunct organizations certainly used the web to organize in 2004 (via online volunteer/event coordination), alternative forms of engagement via social networks, YouTube, Eventful, and other platforms just weren't an option four years ago.

What I would also add to the mix is that a number of organizations likely made a conscious choice to focus on large-scale events or paid/earned media that cashed in on celebrity culture rather than make a determined effort to organize in the field via a concert-based model. What I would love to see is a dollar for dollar analysis on which model is more effective. For instance, Rock the Vote raise and spent $X million dollars this year and registered X number of voters. HeadCount raised $X hundred thousand dollars and registered X number of voters.

While such an analysis would be the easiest basis for comparison, it would hardly be comprehensive. There are a wide range of other measures - both qualitative and quantitative - that any side by side analysis would also need to take into account. Here are other questions I would love to see answered:

• How "real" (as in, can they be moved to action) are names on lists built via celebrity media and stadium events (Rock the Vote) vs. those built via a peer to peer field model (Head Count)?
• Is there a saturation point at which it becomes less effective to pump organizational dollars into paid/earned media via celebrity events, and after which dollars would be more effectively spent on field operations?
• How scalable is HeadCount's field-based model?

The Air Traffic Control report offers one final qualitative difference between music activism in the 2004 election cycle and that in the 2008 cycle. They sum it up quite succinctly with this quote:

However, the most inspiring change we noticed was not in the volume of support but in the content of that support. We often explain the shift in artist activism around this election as the difference between dedicating a song to Kerry in 2004, and writing a song about Obama in 2008.

As I've written in the past, getting artists to become politically engaged in 2004 was like pulling teeth. It speaks volumes for how far the industry and culture has come that in 2008 the Democratic candidate literally become a pop culture and music phenomenon. While there's still a lot of work to be done (pdf) to make artists and activists work together more effectively, kudos to everyone for all their work - in 2004 and 2008 - getting us this far.

I'm leaving to catch a train down to DC in about an hour. I'm going to try to do some number crunching on the train. If that works out, I might have something interesting to report Thursday morning. Otherwise, I've got meetings tonight and all day tomorrow, so posting may be light depending on how much down-time I get.

• Nate Silver has some excellent data on how young voters - of all races - drove the opposition to Prop 8 in California. While we are all disappointed at the moment, that bodes well for the future. (h/t Jesse Singal)
• The University of Michigan College Democrats didn't like my post about the Dingell/Waxman fight, however their opposition seems based more on blind loyalty to Dingell than on the merits of my argument.
• In the NY Daily News, Gen-We authors Eric Greenberg and Karl Weber talk about what young voters will expect from an Obama administration.
• This is a little old and I can't believe I missed it. Columnist E.J. Dionne swipes our brand and writes a column about Obama and the Future Majority:
  

  Since the Nixon era, conservatives have claimed to speak for the "silent majority." Obama represents the future majority. It is the majority of a dynamic country increasingly at ease with its diversity. It reflects the forward-looking optimism of the young. It draws in new suburban and exurban voters whose priorities are resolutely practical -- jobs, schools and transportation -- and who dislike angry quarrels about gay marriage, abortion and religious orthodoxy.

• NPR's Farai Chideya says America's youth vote grows up, wields power.
• Slate has a great article about the potential and pitfalls of transitioning Obama's participatory, tech-driven campaign into a new era of participatory governance.
• King Politics provides us with a more nuanced view of the 2008 "youth only" electoral map:

Check out this incredible, powerful video featuring Reynalda, a youth volunteer with New Labor in New Jersey. It reminds us what voting is all about:

And check out more up-to-the-minute news on Election Day from community organizers at our Blog:

http://www.communitychange.org/vote.

Note - this post got front-paged on Daily Kos.

In 2004, youth turnout was wildly misreported - in the media and in the blogosphere. That reporting was summed up most aptly by this famous quip from the late Hunter S. Thompson:

"Yeah, we rocked the vote all right," quips Hunter S. Thompson, the gonzo journalist himself. "Those little bastards betrayed us again."

Of course Thompson, and the media reports, were wrong. The youth vote did turnout and was the only age demographic to vote for Kerry over Bush.

This year, expectations for the youth vote are higher than ever - perhaps unrealistically so - and the expectations game is already beginning to result in "youth don't vote" stories in local and regional media. For instance, in Florida, the Orlando Sentinel had this to say:

Young people are turning out in disproportionately low numbers. Though major registration efforts this year boosted their totals to nearly 25 percent of the total electorate, voters younger than 35 represent only 15 percent of early voters, making them the worst-performing demographic group in the analysis.

This is incredibly misleading. Here's what the Young Democrats of Florida found when they ran the numbers on early voting in Florida:

According to the Florida voter file, (which should be viewed as relatively but not 100% accurate) in 2004, approximately 392,888 voters between 18-35 voted early or absentee. So far 499,867 voters between 18-35 have voted early or absentee this year. This is a 27 percent increase over 2004.

What happened was a common mistake in which the media used misleading, and not terribly informative, "share of the electorate" data to describe youth turnout instead of more accurate figures like the hard number of votes or % turnout of eligible voters. Unfortunately, such mistakes are all too common in reporting on youth turnout.

The following is a hard nosed look at what we might realistically expect on Tuesday, a list of common mistakes the media makes when reporting on youth, and some tips to help activists, journalists, and bloggers alike accurately assess youth participation on Election Night.

What to Expect When Expecting on Election Day:

Youth Turnout Will Likely Be Higher Than in 2004:

There are three measures of youth participation:

• Total Number of Votes: That's pretty self explanatory.
• The Turnout Rate: This is the percentage of all eligible young voters who cast a ballot.
• The Share of the Electorate: The percentage of the entire voting electorate between the ages of 18 and 29.

This year, the hard number of ballots cast by young voters and the turnout rate are both highly likely increase. Let's keep that in perspective, though. Youth turnout is not likely to climb into the 60 or 70% range. The highest youth turnout ever was 55%, recorded in 1972. I would be extremely happy to see us match that number this year. Who knows, maybe we'll be surprised and it will be higher, but we shouldn't go into Tuesday expecting that it will be higher.

Even if youth turnout rises significantly, there is no guarantee that the youth share of the electorate will show a comparable increase.

This was the big problem in 2004: youth turnout rose significantly, but, because older portions of the electorate also increased their turnout rate, the youth share of the electorate held steady at 17%. It is highly possible that increased turnout among African Americans and other groups, or even decreased participation among depressed (young) McCain supporters, could prevent young voters from increasing their share of the electorate on Tuesday.

Again, this isn't to say that youth won't increase their share of the electorate, but don't be surprised if it holds steady at 17%. More importantly, don't use that "share of the electorate" figure as an accurate measure of youth participation. More on that below.

Don't Compare Apples to Oranges:

There are two measures of youth turnout from 2004 - those taken from national exit polling, and a more accurate measure taken from the Current Population Survey. While the CPS data is more accurate (and it is what you will find on most fact sheets from CIRCLE), it also does not come out until months after the election and uses a different methodology than exit polling. To ensure that we are not comparing apples to oranges on Election Night, it is best that, when measuring youth turnout, we compare the 2008 exit polls to the 2004 exit polls. Here are the exit poll numbers from 2004. Use these as your baseline when reporting on Tuesday's youth turnout:

18 - 29 year olds:

• Vote Count = 19.4 million
• Turnout = 48%
• Share = 17%

Common Mistakes (and Basic Facts) About the Youth Vote:

Some of these might be repetitive from above, but they bare repeating. Use these as a guide when reporting on young voter turnout on Tuesday night:

1. When reporting on youth participation, do not confuse "share of the electorate" with "turnout." Share of the electorate is a measure of the proportion of young voters who cast a ballot in relation to all other voters. Turnout is the percentage of all eligible young voters who cast a ballot. Share measures the influence of young voters within the electorate as a whole. Turnout tells us whether or not more young people showed up at the polls. Please do not confuse them.
2. It is possible for turnout to rise, while share of the electorate remains steady. Indeed, this is exactly what happened in 2004. Young voter turnout (18 - 29) increased by 9 percentage points from 40 to 49% (an increase of about 4.3 million votes). However, young voter's share of the electorate remained steady at 17%.
3. Young voters can only be held accountable for their own actions, not those of the entire electorate. If the youth vote's share of the electorate holds steady from 2004 to 2008, that will mean that older voters also went to the polls in higher numbers. Young voters cannot be held accountable for that. As such, turnout and the hard number of votes are the only accurate measure to gauge the success of efforts to get out young voters.
4. Rising youth turnout is a trend, not a fad tied to the popularity of Senator Obama. Contrary to conventional wisdom, or media reports from 2004, Obama's campaign is not solely responsible for higher youth turnout, though it has played a crucial role during this election cycle. Youth turnout began to rise in 2004, when youth it jumped by 9 percentage points, from 40 to 49%, and 4.3 million more young voters cast a ballot than in 2000. This trend continued in 2006, which saw the first increase in young voter turnout during a midterm election since the 1980s. It reached a new height in early 2008 when youth turnout in the primaries was double that from 2000, the last comparable year. In some states, youth turnout in the primaries was triple or quadruple that of previous years.
5. The margin of victory among young voters may be just as important as the overall increase in youth turnout. In 2004, 20 million young voters cast a ballot, with 54% selecting John Kerry. That gave Kerry an advantage of 1.6 million votes over President Bush among young voters. This year, if 22 million young voters cast ballots and 62% choosing Obama vs. 38% for McCain (numbers roughly found in most polling), that would give Senator Obama an advantage of 5.28 million votes.
6. Youth turnout is about access, not apathy. When young people are registered to vote - they turn out. According to the US Census, 81.6% of all registered young voters actually cast a ballot in 2004. That is on par with other portions of electorate. The more campaigns and independent organizations work to register young voters, and the easier we make the registration process, the higher youth turnout will be.
7. Regardless of youth turnout on Tuesday, young voters have already played a crucial and decisive role in this contest. In the Iowa Democratic caucuses, young voter turnout tripled and their share of caucus-goers was equal to that of the "reliable" 65+ demographic. Obama won the support of 60% of Iowa's youth, catapulting him to the front of the Democratic pack. Similar levels of support from youth in the following primaries and caucuses were the foundation of Obama's primary success.

In all likelihood, we are standing on the brink of an historic election, and we may well witness youth turnout unlike any we've seen in decades. Let's make sure that, whatever the final numbers, we have an accurate reporting of that turnout and don't make the same mistakes that so many reporters and bloggers made after our disappointing loss in 2004.

Small business owner Kevin and plumber Mari give you loads of options for election day. Vote early, avoid the wait and check out declareyourself.com/whywait.

Comedian Whitney Cummings warns voters of the PERILS OF NOT VOTING EARLY! Find out how to cast your ballot early at declareyourself.com/whywait!