What Do We Know
New Poll Finds Nothing New About Young People
Multi-racial, opinionated and probably not going to bother voting
The New York Times is reporting that a new poll they conducted with CBS and MTV has found that young people, those between the ages of 17-29, are leaning heavily towards the left on almost all the issues. This may not come as a surprise to you since you’re probably between these ages yourself and not an idiot. Just to note though, four years ago the numbers weren’t quite like this. Young people were pretty much split between red and blue because apparently we’re just as easily bamboozled by President Numbnuts as anyone else is. But in any case, there is actually something sort of interesting about this new poll: The rest of the country feels almost exactly the same way as we do. Each answer is shown next to the answers given by the respondents from the “all ages” group, conducted last month. The 17-29 year-old group is indeed more liberal on practically every single question, but just barely. Five points, at the most, depending on the question.
Here are some examples: Of people between the ages of 17-29, 72% dissapprove of George W. Bush, which is the same number of people of all ages who dissapprove of him. 54% of young people think Congress is doing a shitty job while a mere 52% of all people think the same thing. 58% of young people have a favorable view of the Democratic Party while only 53% of everyone else has the same view, etc.
So, really the news here is that basically the entire country is pretty much fed up with the ass-backwards way the world is being run, but that’s hardly news at all. Top reporting, New York Times!
Full poll results [NYT]
Featured Song: “My Generation” by Patti Smith
