military

It may come as a shock to many in the world of political punditry, who live in a world where the military always votes Republican, but many of our troops aren't lining up behind war hero John McCain. Not surprisingly, troops on their third tour of duty in just about as many years want some time home with their families, and are worried about their own economic security.

From ABC News:

ABC's Martha Raddatz asked American soldiers in Iraq what issues are most important to them when looking at the presidential candidates.

Though the military is not supposed to engage in partisan political activity, these soldiers spoke out about their personal endorsements, and their opinions are likely to matter. In 2004, 73 percent of the U.S. military voted for a presidential candidate, and officials believe it may be even higher this time around.

PFC Jeremy Slate said he supported Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., because of his stated intention to pull out of Iraq right away.

"That would be nice," Slate said, "I'd like to be home, yea."

SFC Patricia Keller also expressed support for Obama, citing his representation for change.

Spc. Patrick Nicholls from Eggawam, Mass., pointed out that many soldiers on the frontlines frequently think about their families back home.

"We think about how our families are doing back home. That's a major concern, like how the economy is doing, also as well as where we're going to be in the future. Because really, truly, what we consider we're doing, we're doing a valuable job, we want to make sure that the efforts we make are appreciated."

He suggested he was too engaged in Iraq to keep up with politics back home. "I haven't really been following it too much since we've been over here, ma'am," he told Raddatz. "So, don't really know which issues are too important to me right now. ... I don't know who's running, ma'am."

Lt. Leah Wicks said that, tied into concerns about her family's welfare, were concerns about the economy, "where we're going to be in the future."

Only moments before speaking with ABC News, the troops had been listening to Vice President Dick Cheney give a rousing speech, but it didn't change their political preference.

Spc. Imus Loto said he supported Obama. "It will be something different. But he's out there and he'll probably support us a lot more."

By support, Loto meant pulling out troops. "Pull me out, too." he said.

Also interesting was the fact that military members vote at such a high rate. If the military rank and file turnout in high numbers for the Democratic candidate, that's good news on two fronts. It will be a significant boost in support, and it will also help loosen the stranglehold that Republicans have on "national security" in our public debate.

• I’m quoted at length in this Concord Monitor piece about technology and the 2008 election. I’ve become an “expert.” Cool.
• Justin Olberman reports that Hillary Clinton is launching a Text Message program. Like Justin, I cringe at the thought. I’m so not sold on text messaging as a campaign tool yet … I hate spam and cold-calls on my phone, and I really don’t see us figuring out best practices or even getting a critical mass of participants in mobile activism until today’s tweens are in their early twenties.
• Both Rock the Vote and YDA point to this piece on the power of the youth vote in today’s Boston Globe. It’s based on old(ish) data - the Harvard IOP Poll we covered here and here. I think they over-play the Darfur card (again), but its a well done piece none the less and worth a read. I echo Lindsay’s sentiments that it’s nice to see the narrative continue to swing in our favor.
• Finally, looks like the military is cutting off soldier’s access to Web 2.0. Combined with the crackdown on mil-bloggers, what will that mean for the transparency of this war?

Sorry for the light posting today. The site swallowed a half written post early this morning and my schedule hasn't allowed me the time to rewrite it yet. I'll probably get to it after dinner. In the meantime, here's a few interesting articles I came across today covering some things we've touched on before, and all of which could be full blogs in their own right:

• I was checking out the New Era Colorado website to prepare for an interview and came across this stat (emphasis mine):

  The 2004 elections marked a year of unprecedented attention focused on young voters. However, immediately after the loss of Presidential candidate John Kerry, newspapers and political pundits overwhelmingly accused young people of not being worth the investment. Today, only 8% of political party chairs identify young people as the most important demographic for the “long-term success of their party,” compared to 21% who name senior citizens.

  That, to put it mildly, is what we call a problem.

• In what is either a devious strategy to exclude young people from the debate, a sign of financial jeopardy, or DC insider-dom gone mad (or some combination thereof), The Politico has decided to lay off all of its young staffers. Combined with their incredible knack for getting shit wrong, this move puts The Politico slightly above NewsMax on my reading list. But it still does have that shiny Web two-point-oh look.
• Anya Kamenetz continues her reporting on the student loan scandals, this time uncovering some connections between corporate lenders and congressional PACS, and wondering about the practices of bigger corporate lenders like Nelnet and Sallie Mae.

  Is this something y'all would like to hear more about? It's a little outside our normal realm of conversation, which tends toward the strategic rather than nitty gritty policy. If so, what angle would you be most interested in talking about? The blow-by-blow details? Why its' important in the grand scheme? How the candidates should be playing this in their messaging to young voters? Candidates responses? What's most interesting to you and what's the best way to leverage this to increase young voter visibility in this election cycle?

  More after the jump.

In our politics, we all have a penchant for making neat divisions - youth vote, soccer moms, military. But most of the time those are gross generalizations. Categories overlap, and when we talk here at Future Majority about millennials and young voters, we should remember that this category overlaps with - really envelopes - the active duty military. Candidates say youth vote, we think “campus outreach” and “education costs,” but, as this disturbing article in the Washington Post makes clear, we should also be thinking “Veterans Benefits” or “A New GI Bill.”

Our soldiers are coming home and not receiving the support they deserve to pick up their lives. If that’s not a young voter issue, I don’t know what is. For more, check out Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America. I added them to the sidebar under non-partisan.