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06 Jun 07

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29 Mar 07

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28 Mar 07

Diana Carlisle

Millennials take diversity as a given and tolerance as the only acceptable behavior.
Clinton's attempt to make her gender define the nature of the historic change in this election missed another important trait of Millennials. This generation is the most gender neutral, race-and ethnicity-blind group of young people in American history.
ever since 9/11 today's youth have voted in increasing numbers, at a growth rate that surpasses that of all other generations
But that attitude, common among Baby Boomers who believe the entire world should think and act the way they do, represents a significant misreading of history.
Not only did Clinton lose to Barack Obama by an almost six to one margin among Millennial Generation (those under 25) caucus attendees, but also her weakness in this age group was the key to her overall loss among women. While Hillary carried the over 45 female vote 36%-24%, Obama won women under 45 by a 50%-21% margin and the surprisingly strong turnout among young caucus goers turned that margin into an overall defeat among the female constituency Hillary was counting on the most. Had she and her team only read their history, they wouldn't have been surprised by this outcome.

Every eighty years a "Civic" generation, like the GI Generation and now the Millennials, comes along with a determination to use their size and their facility with communication technology to change the political culture of America. 2008 will be the first election when Millennials, the largest generation in American history, born between 1982 and 2003, will be eligible to vote in sufficient numbers to tip the political scales to candidates who they favor, but they have already made their presence known to those analyzing election data, not just the latest poll results. They, along with the last remaining members of the GI Generation, were the only age groups to cast majority votes for John Kerry in 2004. The YouTube inspired involvement of Millennials in the Senate races in Virginia and Montana was the difference in those two close elections, returning Democrats to majority status in 2006. But those initial tremors are minor compared to the tsunami of change that Millennials will set in motion in the 2008 elections.
Every leading contender for the 2008 Republican nomination intends to make supporting a continuing war in Iraq the centerpiece of their campaign. Strange that they somehow forgot running in favor of the war resulted in Republicans being crushed in 2006. I can only imagine how popular that position will be eighteen months from now. I'd say that this made me extremely confident about the 2008 elections, but we are dealing with a Democratic establishment that, in many cases, either does not believe Iraq will still be a central political issue in 2008, or that wants to continue the military mission in Iraq themselves. This means that while the 2008 presidential election should be an easy slam dunk for Democrats, we could yet blow it.