Tuesday, November 23, 2004

Correlation?

According to a study by The Chronicle of Higher Education reported here (because I no longer have a sub. to the chronicle), the percentage of college students voting for Kerry was higher than the percentage among non-enrolled 18-19 year-olds. The data seem not terribly conclusive to me, but this quote was a gem:
College Republicans Vice Chairman of Events Jeremy Williams said he viewed the Chronicles' findings to be "an indication of the liberal bias in today's colleges among professors."
Sure, Jerry, that's it...it's the liberal stranglehold we're witnessing in education and the media. It's so oppressive isn't it?

Another organization, Declare Yourself, also has survey results about youth voters. They report that the Internet was the first source of information for 25% of young voters, and "Among those who cited the Internet as their primary source for news, a sizeable 62% voted for Kerry, while only 36% backed Bush."

The Declare Yourself survey report ends with a comparison of how informed youth (voters and non-voters) are versus the rest of us fogeys. They use the survey to argue that youth voters are almost as informed as adult voters. So, for instance, 90% of youth voters could identify the Vice President of the United States, versus 91% of adult voters; similarly 86% of youth voters knew who Kerry's running mate was versus 88% of adult voters. The numbers on Supreme Court Chief Justice are more skewed with 32% of youth voters and 52% of adult voters being able to answer that one. Is it so wrong for me to think if you don't know who the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court is, you should have to take a class before you can vote. I mean, c'mon...9% of voters didn't know who the fucking Vice President is?

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

This supports my argument that we should all be required to take the same test as those who want to become citezens in this country in order to have the "right" to vote. Some rights just need to be taken away if you are stupid. Let's face it, that same 52% who don't know who the Supreme Court Justice is probably doesn't know what rights they have and do not have anyway. So let's just take those rights away from them and they won't know what they're missing. Stupid people should not be allowed to vote! I don't think our forefathers had people getting addicted to reality television and Big Macs in mind when they wrote that shit! (Not that all stupid people obesssssessssssively watch reality TV and eat at McD's...but hey, if the shoe fits.)

Anonymous said...

Of course by citezens, what I really mean to say are citizens. Yes, I vote.

Travis (♀) said...

There are few things I appreciate more than rich irony.