Obama in his "comfort zone" rally at University of WI - image Fox
It’s Campaign Mode for the DNC and the Head of the Party, Barack Obama, while Democrats worry over dismal poll results in the final weeks prior to the Mid-Terms. The strategy appears, on the surface, to be two-pronged – first the blame game. After blaming former President George Bush, the Democrats go-to “villain”, wore thin with independents, the President has now taken to blaming members of his own party. In a recent Rolling Stone interview(AP news source), the president called Democrats out for being “inexcusable” and “irresponsible” should they not get out and vote for Democrat ticket (or at all) this November.
Not taking any chances, the President headed to Madison, WI for a stop at the University of Wisconsin. The crowd estimates were high, for a change – attendance has been estimated at approximately 26,000 (both inside and outside the campus event). However, the question remains, will one or twenty large university events, translate into a renewed energy at the polls? It remains to be seen if those students taking part in a political rally complete with music and a break from class, will get to the polls in numbers large enough to make a difference to embattled Democrats trying to hold onto a majority in both the Congress and the Senate.
Interviews conducted by the local daily, The State Journal, indicate otherwise. Asking students if the rally would translate into votes, garnered the following response from one student:
“Even Lawless admitted she would likely not vote. “It’s too much work with the absentee ballot,” she said.”
Although the same student stood in line for hours in order to see the President, it was the opportunity to be at a big event, one which included a sitting President. Therefore, it is difficult to assess how many of the 26,000 in attendance at a University will actually vote. The rally at Madison was broadcast to other Universities: Over at NYU a crowd of 40, “members of the NYU College Democrats and Organizing for America...watched” Obama. Forty gathered at NYU, including members of the President’s campaign organization seems hardly sufficient to save the day for the Democrats.
The “rock star” persona of Barack Obama may have drawn crowds that appeared to be “Woodstock revisited” in 2008, (including left-over 1960’s radicals), however, that was then, two years have passed and there other things on the minds of America’s youth, such as student loan debt and employment. Although it looks good on paper, and the evening news, the rally at Madison is hardly indicative of the national outlook and one considers the anti-incumbency mood of the general electorate – it’s palpable and it transcends political party lines. Additionally, although Obama’s ability to bring out the youth vote was huge in the past, 2010 attendance may not be as genuine as it appears. For example a recent even held at a campus in Ohio required that staffers insure seats were filled for the event by “recruiting” on-campussee: Recent campus visit in Ohio here)
Therefore, it will depend on who has the best “marketing” when it comes to the mid-term elections, and at the moment it appears that the voting public could care less – the focus being on ousting the incumbent and/or apathy. One has to imagine that, regardless of whether on is a Democrat, Republican, Tea Party, Libertarian, or Green Party, the constant drumbeat of the two-party partisan “warfare” has worn thin and the general populace is just “tired” of the rhetoric and the slogans. Therefore, what will determine the outcome of the mid-terms is not about political party per se, it is a referendum on what affects the individual – employment, inflation, fear and apathy. Youth is ever hopeful, but hope does not necessarily translate into votes. Anger and fear, however, are motivators that will move mountains. It will, even with a “youth vote” and perceived enthusiasm broadcast to living rooms across the nation, it will be those who are feeling the impact personally, (regardless of age) that determine the shape of the Congress and Senate for the next two years – as well as Obama’s future prospects for 2012.
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