conservatives

Yesterday, Kevin wrote a post that carefully and thoroughly proved that Generation Opportunity--at first glance, a non-partisan, non-threatening organization targeting youth to engage in positive change--is a sham.

To summarize, Generation Opportunity created a Facebook page titled "Being American" complete with random, non-descript photographs, encouraging young people to like the page just like they'd like apple pie, and then once it reached about 600,000 likes, they began to introduce their "non-partisan" organization.

I think the thing that strikes me the most about Kevin's post after some reflection is that Generation Opportunity--and by association, conservatives/Republicans--is admitting that it can't attract young people to its movement on its own merits. Basically, this means that The Right acknowledges that it needs to hide in the American flag like a Trojan horse in order to build any momentum among young people.

All the research that supposedly signals a conservative swing within the Millennial generation? It's misleading. And the very act of hiding behind "being American" and the "non-partisan" label to keep young people from knowing what your organization actually advocates points to an admission that youth aren't buying what you're actually selling.

As a reminder, Kevin, in beating back some of Generation Opportunity's claims (that Millennials are big on tax cuts, hate government spending, are American exceptionalists, believe the national debt is the most severe national security concern, and support expanding domestic coal and oil), puts forth the more credible research from Millennial Makeover and Pew; it happens to show a different picture.

Millennials, also to a greater degree than members of older generations, have confidence in the federal government and are more likely to favor a clear, rather than ancillary role for it in American life. A decisive majority (64%) of Millennials disagrees with the statement, 'When the federal government runs something it is usually inefficient and wasteful,' while 58 percent of older generations agree with that harsh appraisal. Millennials are also substantially less likely to believe that the federal government should run only those things that can't be run at the local level (63% vs. 71%).

These more favorable Millennial Generation attitudes toward the federal government are not simply a matter of 'normal' youthful liberalism. Millennials today are far less likely than Gen-Xers were in the late 1980s to believe that the federal government is usually wasteful and inefficient (32% for Millennials, 47% for young Gen-Xers) and that it should do only what can't be done at the local level (63% vs. 76%) (Pew Research Center 2007a).

And when these patriotic Millennials, who like "being American" but predictably don't enjoy having conservative talking points shoved down their throats, begin to resist on that Facebook page, what happens? They are silenced, of course. How American is that?

Before 2004/8, Republicans believed--with some Democrats--that the youth vote didn't exist and wasn't worth worrying about. However, as the first Millennials began to vote for Kerry in 2004, overwhelmingly supported Democrats in their 2006 midterm takeover of Congress, and showed up to the polls en masse in 2008 to vote for Obama, the Right took note and understood the youth vote is indeed a force to be reckoned with.

Instead of pursuing honest, genuine efforts to engage young people in the process and persuade them to think about moving to the right, however, they are apparently embracing cynicism, holding to stances and values that Millennials view as toxic according to the credible research. They hope that if they dress up these views a little bit, throw the American flag, apple pie--hell, maybe even some BBQ, fireworks, and a Main Street parade--at them, Millennials will bite.

What's that saying about pigs and lipstick again?

Well, another day, and another unknown guy lamenting the horrible things happening to our generation and our supposed complicit behavior.

This rando, some Gen Xer named Rob Long, writes that young people are being ripped off thanks to a "a vast, Madoff-like Ponzi scheme," in which payroll taxes are immediately shuffled off to help seniors pay their medical bills. He can't believe that young people are letting this go and are not more alarmed, Glenn Beck style.

And yet: no protests in the streets. No marches. No student sit-ins. No youth agitation at all, really, except for a couple of College Republicans in blue blazers. What? Are they stupid? After all of that college tuition? Are young people in their 20's just dumb?

I appreciate your phony concern, Rob. But if you're truly advocating for a strong quality of life for Millennials, you'd come to terms with what must be a painful truth for you. Your party, while railing against imaginary deficits in the future, blatantly ignores the fact that many of us are struggling to make end's meet today. One of your party's governors, in the name of fiscal responsibility, cut $30 million from childcare centers. And "after all that college tuition," the Republican House proposes to balance the budget by taking Pell Grants, and therefore the prospects of higher education, away from us at the worst possible time. This is at the same time that we're being crushed by trillions of dollars worth of student loans. Fellow FM writer Karlo Marcelo used a great analogy to frame this reality back when we were debating the stimulus.

Millennials will face new challenges when caring for the Baby Boomer generation as they near towards retirement. What they don't need are unnecessary financial burdens that make it difficult for them to succeed early on in their adult lives. Young people are already saddled with a "burden", and the GOP needs to recognize and respect that reality.

Imagine for a moment that you are trying to traverse a hill. The hill represents how much taxes you expect to pay over your lifetime. One end of the hill is the start (the beginning of your life), the top of the hill is middle-age, and the other end of the hill is, well, six-feet-under. At both ends of the hill, you pay relatively little in taxes, and the top of the hill is when you pay the most in taxes. This is what tax-paying looks like throughout the course of one's life. For some generations, traversing this hill was made easier (but not faster), because the government helped invest in the well-being of the tax-payer very early on in life.

This is not the case with Millennials. The rising cost (PDF) of college and beyond has not resulted in a proportionate increase in services or resources. When you place this fact of rising costs into the context of rising college attendance, the effect is magnified. The share of young people that have attended college has increased 21 percentage points from the 1970s to the present (PDF, pg. 5). What's more is the fact young people with post-graduate degrees on are on the rise, too. What all this amounts to is a more difficult (but not slower) journey over the hill. It's almost as if Millennials have to carry a heavy backpack (read: student debt) and still keep pace with everyone else. Now add to that the fact that the end of the hill for Millennials is much farther away than it is for previous generations due to longer life expectancy.

So, if you're seriously concerned about our collective future, do us a favor: get off your high horse and hop on a time machine back to now and start working on these problems.

Mr. Long, you're not done. Please sit back down. Let me explain another thing. And I'll go slowly, because this might be hard for you to understand:

Millennials. Like. Government.

Seriously, we do. You can see that here, here, here, or even here. According to NDN, a Washington think tank, 58% of Millennials actually favor larger government, as opposed to one that “stays out of society and the economy.” It might be surprising since we've been let down by government so often (especially from 2001-2006 when the GOP ruled Washington), but it's the truth.

And we do protest. Your fellow unknown Ted Nugent also made the mistake of assuming young people don't get mad and act on it, and we provided these examples (these just being a few that one simple Google search turned up):

Students across USA protest over college funding, tuition
March 4, 2010

Dickinson College students protest school's handling of sex assaults
March 3, 2011

Cerritos College students protest proposed summer cuts
May 18, 2011

Half-naked college students protest coal
April 15, 2011

‘Students are not ATMs'; college students protest budget cuts
March 15, 2011

College students, staff protest budget cuts
April 13, 2011

College students protest higher fees
January 12, 2010

Three Arrested at Hunter College Protest
March 4, 2010

College students protest death penalty
March 27, 2010

College students protest PA budget cuts
March 30, 2011

'Ramen' protest highlights community college fee increases
March 2, 2011

California college students protest higher ed budget cuts
April 13, 2011

High school, college students to protest state education cuts
March 19, 2011

PSU students, State College mayor protest funding cuts
April 5, 2011

College students protest HOPE cuts outside State Capitol
March 2, 2011

Vt. college students protest planned cuts
March 16, 2011

Phoenix high school, college students organize Capitol protest
March 4, 2011

Michigan College Students Protest Higher Ed Cuts
March 24, 2011

College Students Protest Voter ID Bill
April 4, 2011

Allegheny College students protest education cuts
March 18, 2011

College students protest strip mine plans
September 14, 2010

Carthage College students protest anti-gay speaker
February 24, 2010

College students protest HB 176
February 24, 2011

Emory protesters arrested during student protest
April 26, 2011

TUSD on image control after student protest cancels meeting
April 27, 2011

Supporters rally for students arrested at SB 1070 protest
November 16, 2010

Thousands of students flock to Capitol to protest SB1070
April 22, 2010

Wisconsin Students Protest Governor's Attack on Unions
February 15, 2011

Zombie protesters lurch for voter, student rights
June 8, 2011

Based on the list above and the little we do know of you, it would appear you're merely grumpy because we don't protest the same things that your Tea Party friends do.

Do us a favor and can the fake outrage. If you're genuine, you'd be doing what you could to keep conservatives from defunding our collective future so that fat cats can keep flying their corporate jets.

Some reading for your Friday. Enjoy!

• Salon explores why conservatives hate Common. A sneak peek:
  

  The president said Wednesday night, "A great poem is one that resonates with us, that challenges us, and that teaches us something about ourselves and the world that we live in." And maybe an African-American male from the South Side of Chicago has his own perspective on the world we live in, one that merits consideration even if it makes Sarah Palin uncomfortable. Common may or may not be a great poet. But he sure knows how to be challenging. And simply by his presence Wednesday night -- and the ire he provoked -- he proved the power of words before he even opened his mouth.

• Sen. Richard Lugar (D-IN), unhappy with President Obama's recent framing of the immigration issue, refuses to support the DREAM Act as he did last December.
• The Corporation for National and Community Service (CNCS) awarded six colleges and universities with the Presidential Award, the highest level of recognition a college or university can receive for its commitment to civic engagement and community work.
• Somehow, Newt Gingrich, fresh off yet another announcement that he's running for President, claims that Barack Obama has unfair advantages. You know, other than being an oppressed minority.
• Not a huge surprise, but a Hamilton College study shows that younger Americans (aged 18-29) are more positive toward immigrants and minorities.
• Youth, women, and minorities are resisting the Egyptian old guard's efforts to co-opt their revolution.

One of the more confounding things I have seen over the last few years is CATO's (the libertarian think-tank) and other conservatives' obsessions with ascribing libertarianism to Millennials. It's not confusing merely based on my personal disbelief; rather, it is illogical given study after study that shows the Millennial generation adopting populism, the opposite philosophy.

The most recent study, conducted by Pew Research and titled, "A Pro-Government and Socially Liberal Generation," shows just how pro-government Millennials are:

Many will chalk this up to Millennials being naive, too young to feel the ramifications of a regulatory economic system. Most of these critics, though, completely miss the generational cycle operating underneath our day-to-day and year-to-year political events. The nation is due for a generation like the Millennials who build institutions and society by nature, believing in the common good. The right's expectation is that Millennials will drift rightward following their coming of age and the onset of their "adult" responsibilities. Yet, research proves this notion to be a myth - ideologies generally tend to stay locked as one continues living life. It's clear why libertarians and conservatives would want to see some form of libertarianism in the Millennial generation, but there's little libertarianism to behold.

Jonathan Chait posits a reason for why commentators and think tanks continue to see libertarianism that's simply not there.

...To be sure, most Americans will express opposition to government in the abstract, and don't want to pay higher taxes. They can be skeptical of government programs that they think will benefit other people at their own expense. But these sentiments shouldn't be confused with any principled opposition to government, at least not a principle that can survive contact with real-world questions. Raising taxes on the rich is overwhelmingly popular. In 2000, about 90% of the public favored adding a prescription drug benefit to Medicare. The remaining 10% corresponds to what Pew calls "Enterprisers," which is the hard-core group of Republican partisans who are anti-government on economics, very hawkish and socially conservative. Which is to say, people with principled opposition to economic activism and left-of-center social views or dovish foreign policy views aren't numerous enough to register.

Practically speaking, the libertarian vote is non-existent, while the opposite viewpoint -- economically liberal and socially conservative, which some call populist -- is quite large. This fact tends to get lost in the political discussion because the political discussion is run by elites who are far closer to libertarianism than the public as a whole. (Case in point: Press critic Jay Rosen recently suggested CNN divvy its evening lineup into left/right/libertarian blocs, ignoring the vastly larger populist segment of the electorate.) Populist voters simple lack any intellectual infrastructure whatsoever.

So, in essence, that the media and elite policy wonks and commentators cannot accurately portray the attitudes and dispositions of Millennials and other groups is not surprising. Their own lenses get in the way of accurately assessing the political climate. Furthermore, and what Chait fails to point out, we would benefit from consultants and media personalities who choose to foster a better understanding of political events as opposed to explaining them. Aiming toward creating a better understanding, while admittedly not providing the yellow journalism today's media thinks they need to survive, would allow for more reflexivity among individual journalists and consultants. If we really want citizens and young people to think for themselves, we should stop spoonfeeding them the information we think they need to know and present information that forces them to make their own decisions. (See Jon Stewart's devastating performance on Crossfire a few years ago.)

Should we get our media back on track (a large mission which other, whole blogs have dedicated themselves to achieving), perhaps, among other things, we can better understand the electoral coalitions of our time -- including Millennials -- and how that might actually affect policy output in America.

Perhaps this is just one conservative know-little's analysis, or maybe it's a sign of a recycled talking point to come.

John Feehery, a political pundit who has experience under former Speaker J. Dennis Hastert, writes in The Hill that Republicans might be the best fit for Millennials based on the youth's love of free markets. Feehery tries to make his argument based on the Pew Research Center's recent report on Millennials.

While Republicans may seem out of step with Millennials, especially because their social conservatives have such hostility to gay rights and insist so ardently for traditional values, the free-market principles of the party, which stress a light touch on regulation and more freedom to allow a rapidly changing marketplace to evolve on its own, should work well with younger voters who see all of the opportunities that come from the Creative Revolution.

Perhaps Feehery skipped over broad swaths of the data. The release I read discussed Millennials pro-government tendencies. More than half (the only generation that can claim this) of youth favor government intervention and an activist government.

In case pictures aren't your thing:

Millennials are significantly less critical of government on a number of dimensions than are other age cohorts. This tendency has been seen on a variety of individual survey questions as well as on a three-question index of items from the political values survey; this index covers opinions about government’s effectiveness, government regulation of business and whether the government has too much control over people’s lives.

I applaud Feehery's argument that Millennials should be courted, but his analysis that Republicans have a shot at this generation based on non-existent anti-government views is just plain out of whack with reality. The "creativity" argument is creative, but it's wrong. It'll be interesting to see if the GOP tries to use it in a ploy to attract Millennials. Stay tuned.

Update: Andrew Romano of Newsweek makes the same faulty argument. Notice the lack of data simply discussing Millennials' views on government that I provided above.

The basic idea is less government, more liberty, which is far more consistent than the GOP's current platform—and has the added bonus of being far more appealing to the (largely anti-Bush) Millennial Generation as well. As compared to the average American voter, Millennials are less willing to agree that military strength is the best way to ensure peace (52–42 overall vs. 38–58 for Millennials). They are more liberal in their views on family, homosexuality, and civil liberties (especially as compared to the Silent Generation). And they are identical on questions about whether "it is the responsibility of the government to take care of people who can't take care of themselves," which suggests that with old age still half a century away—and with the Boomers threatening to bankrupt the country—they'd see entitlement reform less as a threat than as a precaution. What's more, "while the Democratic Party has a larger advantage among Millennials than it does among the two oldest cohorts, a greater proportion of the party’s support comes from people who do not explicitly identify as Democrats but only lean toward the party." They're Independents, in other words. They could be convinced.

One of the big conservative talking points attempting to lure the youth vote is that the current health care bill would include a mandate to purchase health insurance without increasing affordability.

What they fail to mention is that it has been the GOP and a few conservative Democrats that have stripped away those things that would have made insurance more affordable.

It's like someone sold you a bicycle and John Boehner jumps out and smashes it with a hammer, only to say "can you believe that guy sold you a broken bicycle?"

And what are these conservatives who are apparently so concerned about the plight of young Americans doing for us? Shutting down the Senate for 12 hours.

Liberty University's recent eviction of the Young Democrats organization from their campus facilities has me thinking about a paradox in the conservative movement. On one hand, conservatives like to portray themselves as tough and devoted to what they happen to believe. On the other hand, in various situations in which their views might be challenged, conservatives tend to want to eradicate any opposition to their views, suggesting that their views might not be able to withstand the opposition's.

When then-candidate Barack Obama had a back-and-forth with John McCain and conservatives regarding whether or not to create dialogue with our enemies, conservatives attacked Obama for his willingness to talk to the other side, as if talking in and of itself was equivalent to surrender.

SEN. JOHN MCCAIN (R-AZ), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Senator Obama has declared and repeatedly affirmed his intention to meet the president of Iran without any preconditions, likening it to meetings between former American presidents and the leaders of the Soviet Union. Such a statement betrays the depth of Senator Obama's inexperience and reckless judgment.

McCain and his conservative brethren apparently only want to fire up Reagan's "beacon of freedom" when the coast is clear, when there's nothing that tests it. McCain and Co.'s suggestion that Obama is the one with the "reckless judgment" is asinine when they were the ones both ignoring reality (Iran is a sovereign nation) and lacking trust that America's values would prevail in such a discussion.

The most recent example -- Liberty University's escapades -- provides us with yet another scenario in which conservatives can't bear to have their views challenged by others. Former Arkansas senator J. William Fulbright once noted that dissent is an act of faith in a democracy. It makes sense. A nation can tolerate the inevitable questions and feedback if it is confident in the values guiding it. In the end, dissent strengthens the country, rousing it out of complacency and forcing it to come to terms with potential problems on the horizon.

For a Republican Party that increasingly belongs to those sharing the same worldview of these Liberty officials, this isn't a great development (whether they realize it or not). This is one more example of the false confidence that is on the rise in today's increasingly homogeneous GOP. Conservatives claim to believe in rock-solid principles, but when it comes time to put them to use in a constructive dialogue, many run away from these values and opt for hasty actions that serve to distract. Iraq, anyone?

As far as Liberty is concerned, the notion that the administration was forced to eliminate the Young Democrats from campus because of its parent organization's un-Christian views on abortion and LGBT issues will never be logically sound unless the Liberty Republican counterpart is also asked to leave because of its pro-war, pro-death penalty views (many consider these to be un-Christian). Of course, if Liberty is as patriotic as its name implies, a healthy pluralism would be encouraged.

All of this boils down to a couple views that Liberty apparently has and is communicating to all of us:

1.) Young people who significantly disagree with us on a few issues aren't allowed to agree with us on others.

2.) We don't have enough confidence in what we believe in to subject those beliefs to criticism.

One gets the feeling that the GOP is now a fledgling kids' club, run by a few obnoxious brats, who will soon realize that after booting everyone they didn't like for one reason or another, they're the only ones left. Jim Jeffords. Colin Powell. Richard Clarke. David Frum. Scott McClellan. Meghan McCain. Harriet Miers. Arlen Specter. And millions of Republicans-turned-independents. How much longer until its Dick, Rush, Sean, and the Liberty administration?

Lots of stuff today hitting on the relationship between technology and democracy. Enjoy!

• Sam Stein details the rise of thirteen year old Jonathan Krohn, the latest excuse for the GOP to not have to do anything to court the youth vote. Check him out here.
• Micah Sifry's post on the complexity of user rights on Facebook.
• At tech President, Nancy Scola examines the governing tension inherent in Facebook's relationship with its users and vice versa.
• Adam Green argues that Facebook, in order to become the ultimate organizing tool, needs to eliminate a few self-imposed barriers first. One of those involves the group mass-email policy.
• More Micah: Sifry examines the larger, philosophical questions regarding the 'net's impact on democracy.
• "Youthanized" is a documentary short from Project Youthanize that examines something which we discuss on this blog quite frequently -- the transition from youth-led, street protest-based activism in the 1960s to youth-led, digitally-inspired activism today.
• Glenn Hurowitz's discussion of the Powershift Conference, focusing on one member of a group of young climate activists that Glenn Beck describes as "Hitler youth," Meg Imholt.
• Rock the Vote announces the premiere of Rock the Vote Radio -- a weekly 30 minute, roundtable discussion centered on politics and current affairs, with a rotating panel of young adults. Check it out!
• More testimony to the "parasitic nature" of student loans.
• Rev. Lennox Yearwood sounds a call for action among America's youth, given the increased importance in governance over elections. I wish Tom Friedman sounded more like this.
• Where is Obama's CTO? A Politico article asks the question and searches for the answer.
• Mayor Daley of Chicago has a YouTube channel.

In The Washington Post, Ian Shapira notes that it's hard out here for a young GOP gun:

Recession-related reasons aside, right-of-center young people looking for steady work with an ideological bent are having an unusually difficult time. For much of the past decade, young conservatives enjoyed an array of job opportunities in the Republican-controlled Congress and at insulated, well-funded nonprofit organizations. But since Democrats gained control in 2006, many prized slots on Senate and House committees started going to the new majority. And now, there's no Republican administration in power to offer jobs to its own.

Young conservatives could apply for regular jobs, they acknowledge, but they also believe that their 20s are a safe age -- likely no children, often unmarried -- to start low- to moderate-paying jobs that potentially could launch prestigious careers in politics or public policy. The tough job market only reinforces their sense of being marooned.

At Heritage, one of Washington's premier conservative think tanks, the organization's Young Leaders Program job bank is receiving résumés from 20-somethings nationwide. But employers are not tapping the source as much as in past years, a sign that the potent conservative think tanks and other machinelike organizations of the Bush years might be waning. "It's gone from maybe three or four calls a day to one or two," said David Barnes, the program's assistant director. "It's bad."

Out of power and lacking an outlet for new talent, it looks like the fabled conservative youth factory is grinding to a halt. Not only that, but young conservatives are feeling more and more alienated from their own generation:

There's hope among today's young conservatives -- new Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Steele just announced an "off the hook" public relations blitz to woo young people -- but there's also a lot of alienation. Those 18 to 29, part of the "millennial generation," voted overwhelmingly for Obama in the presidential election, according to polling data. Some at this happy hour won't name their employers in social settings with contemporaries because they fear it will create awkwardness.
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"I just say that I work at a nonprofit," says Margaret Taylor, 24, who won't say for publication which organization she works for, other than that it's economically oriented.

[...]

At the Union Pub, Dustin Siggins, 24, says he sometimes uses humor to deflect the awkwardness of being on the margins of his generation. "I met a girl today at the gym from Boston College. She was getting a law degree from George Washington. She was cute," he says. "But she wants to work for the ACLU, and I said, 'Oh, you're one of those.' "

Later, in a phone interview, Siggins says he struggles with some of his party's more culturally orthodox ideals. "Because I am in this generation and was raised in a pro-gay-marriage era, I am only a little bit against gay marriage, but only a little, like 53 percent to 47," he says. "I have about a dozen gay friends, 30 or 20, and they would all back me up. In college, I used to have lunch with them. . . . We went ice skating once."

Scott Keeter from PEW notes that, if not necessarily a death knell, this alienation is a symptom indicative of a potential collapse of the GOP's status as a strong national party:

Scott Keeter, survey research director at the Pew Research Center for the People and the Press, suggests there may be broad reasons why Republicans are not in sync with millennials. "I don't want to go too far and say this is a lost generation for the Republican Party," Keeter says. "But it's a serious portent that [young people's affection for the Democratic Party] is not dependent on Obama -- it's a function of demographic shifts, and that this generation came of age when the Republican brand has been damaged."

Here's what the GOP is up against: Analysis of network exit polls by The Washington Post and Pew show that in terms of both party identification and vote margin, the Democrats' advantage over Republicans among voters younger than 30 is as large as it has been in more than three decades. Looking at party affiliation, for instance, in 2008, 46 percent of 18-to-29-year-olds identified as Democrats, 27 percent as independents and 27 percent as Republicans, about the same as the breakdown in 1972. But as recently as 2000, there was much more parity: 36 percent were Democrats, 29 percent independents and 35 percent Republicans.

I’ve landed in Nashville. I’m sure I’ll be seeing some of you at the YDA conference tomorrow. For the rest of you, I’ll be live-blogging as I can depending on the WiFi access, which wasn’t all that great at the last YDA conference.

Over at The Next Right (sort of an “Open Left” for conservatives), Ethan Eilon, the Executive Director of the College Republicans is saying some smart things about young people and their relation ship to the GOP. Specifically, he’s calling on the Republican Party to wake up and start reaching out to young voters. The whole thing reads very much like stuff you heard out of Democratic youth circles 4 years ago (and still do today though people seem to be getting the message).

His advice to the party is good and will be familiar to many here: go where young people congregate (online), make an effort to promote effective youth leaders in the party. Address youth issues on the stump, etc. The piece is valuable reading for anyone in either party looking to court young voters. But he’s got two huge problems.

First is the straight up math of what we’re seeing now:

Now, I'm not naive enough to suggest that we make these changes and all of a sudden we are going to win the 18-19 vote 80/20, but we don't need to. We just need to not lose it by that margin, which is exactly what current trends, if left unchecked, will yield.

That’s really the crux of it. There’s very little chance that the Republicans will eat into Democratic gains among Millennials unless the Democrats drop youth outreach altogether and/or severely mess something up policy wise. McCain was probably the best candidate choice for Republicans to make an attempt at courting youth, but eve he won’t be enough and he’ll likely have little influence down-ticket in an environment so toxic to traditional Republicans. The GOP is now in the unenviable position of doing electoral triage for a generation. It’s not about winning anymore; it’s about losing as little (young) blood as possible.

The problem is that the Republican brand is not just tarnished – that in itself is a tough hurdle to overcome (see Democrats: National Security) – but the governing philosophies of conservatism itself are rejected by Millennials. That’s why this is more than a little wishful thinking:

We need to get very serious about making our brand more appealing to young voters, and to get young people bought into the overall concept of what this party is about: limited government and individual liberty. This is not a hard sell, but when the Democrats and their affiliates are outspending us in the demographic by 25 to 1 we are going to have an uphill battle.

Culture war issues promoted by the Republican Party restrict individual liberty (gay rights, right to choose, etc.) in ways that the multicultural, tolerant Millennials find repellent, and limited government is a failed proposition. For a generation that lived through Katrina (and exhortations from Grover Norquist to “drown the government in a bathtub), limited government fails to recognize the responsibility that a government has to its citizens to provide opportunity and security. These will not be winning talking points for reaching out to today’s youngest voters.

Finally, I would just like to point out that the 25 – 1 number cited by Eilon is highly disputable. The College Republicans had well over $20 million in expenditures over the last 4 years: dwarfing spending by the College and Young Democrats (from Open Secrets):

And while it is true that Democrats have focused far more than Republicans on GOTV in recent years, the amount of money going through the conservative leadership pipeline is about 5 – 10 times more than what equivalent progressive organizations have to work with. Campus Progress thoroughly debunked similar claims made by Young America Foundation Alum Jason Mattera earlier this year (below). There are rumors that the CRNC is nothing more than a money funnel conservatives use to direct money to other “grown up” projects, and that the College Republicans actually see little to no of their tens of millions raised/spent. So perhaps there is a grain of truth here, but if so doesn’t that just speak to the moral bankruptcy of the Republican Party?