HOW WE VOTED….We’re going to be seeing a ton of electoral slicing and dicing over the next few day, but Andrew Gelman leads off today which a chart showing the tremendous difference in the youth vote this year compared to 2000 and 2004. In the previous two elections George Bush got nearly half of the 20-something vote. This year, John McCain barely broke 30% of the youth vote.
Gelman also notes that the election came out about the way political scientists expected. “Obama won by about 5% of the vote, consistent with the latest polls and consistent with his forecast vote based on forecasts based on the economy.” He calls that “close,” but I’m not sure that’s right. It’s true that historically it’s no blowout, but presidential elections have trended pretty close in recent years, and by the standards of the last decade this is a pretty solid win — especially given the big Democratic majorities now in place in Congress. Given the state of the country, it’s hard to see how it could have been much bigger.
