Future Majority, a top-notch progressive blog that I highly recommend you add to your daily reading list, has two very insightful blog posts today related to getting out the youth vote.

First, Michael Connery looks at a report by Curtis Gans on young voter turnout. Michael offers an interesting conclusion that echoes many of the sentiments that I have shared since the election:

The real lessons of 2004 and 2008 are that young voters will participate if you ask them to. And unlike older voters, their partisanship and voting habits are malleable. They don’t need to be persuaded, they just need to be engaged and contacted.

The problem is that it was almost entirely Obama and the Democrats that made such an appeal. On the other hand, young voters aren’t stupid. You can’t just ask for their vote and expect to get it – you also have to show them that you are willing to fight to earn it. The fact is that the McCain campaign and the Republican Party didn’t do either while the other side did both impeccably, which is exactly why the Republican ticket performed so abysmally among the youngest voters.

Second, Michael links to a Pew research piece showing that polls which only included landlines had an average 2.3% bias in favor of John McCain.  This will prove to be an interesting factor in future elections as an increasing number of more people dump their landlines in favor of cell phones.

For your reading pleasure: Part 1 and Part 2 of my “Winning Back the Youth Vote” pieces.

Last 5 posts by Aaron Marks

• Onward and Upward: Building a Sustainable Majority - January 22nd, 2010
• Dear Young Voters: This Is What You Get When You Don't Vote - December 1st, 2009
• The Youth Vote and the 2009 Elections - November 6th, 2009
• The Best of the Post-2009 Election Spin - November 5th, 2009
• Introducing NextGenGOP Executive Director James Kane - October 20th, 2009