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  • Joe Biden Wants To Offer You A $2,000 Credit Limit

    It's dangerous to read too much into a VP pick, but for young voters Joe Biden's got one red flag worth thinking about. His main special interest vice is the credit card industry, on whose behalf he's pushed legislation through Congress. Consdiering how many kids these days get drowned in a sea of Visa bills, Biden's ties don't exactly reinforce Obama's pro-youth message.

  • Barack, It's Late, and I Don't Want To Hook Up

    Barack Obama was supposed to show off his youth and technology credentials by announcing his Vice-President pick over text message. But then many young voters were woken up at 3 a.m. East Coast time last Friday by the buzzing of their cells. Does the Obama campaign really want to start drunk dialing their supporters?

  • College Dems Scheming In Denver

    During the contentious primary season youth turnout was triple the 2004 levels, and college Democrats across the country are hoping to translate that enthusiasm into Barack Obama votes. Campus representatives congregating in Denver are attending training sessions in expectation of a big fall for Democrats. Here's some of their perspective on the election.

  • Awkwardly Partying With MoveOn.org

    Signing up for email lists is a harrowing risk in the digital age, especially when you end getting invited to a creepy party. Would you go hang out with a bunch of strangers just because MoveOn.org told you too? One man has decided that he doesn't want to be part of any political organization that blasts around personal information to other people in his hometown.

  • Noose Is Outlawed, Stars And Bars Next?

    In response to the racially charged Jena 6 incident last year the state of Lousiana has outlawed the noose. Nooses, the law says, are invariably associated with racial intimidation and, as such, are not allowed to be displayed in public. By that rationale, one writer points out, the Confederate flag should be banned as well.

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  • The Youngest Delegate

    Ben Taber just graduated from high school, but this week he'll get to cast an official nomination ballot for Barack Obama. He's the youngest delegate at the entire convetion, representing Colorado, another anecdote supporting the overhyped Youth Vote. Still, if every 18 year old was half as excited as this kid is the country's politics would be a lot different.

  • The Three Dumbest Post-Invasion Neocon Predictions

    Neoconservative policy makers brought the Bush administration towards the invasion of Iraq with outlandish predictions that were based far more in ideological frivolity than actual fact. Their mistakes lead to demonstrably false expectations, such as a short period of conflict in Iraq and immediately successful democratic elections. But their failures in Iraq haven't stopped Neocons from making other silly foreign policy predictions. Here are the three worst to think about.

  • Trolling Alone

    In his famous book on social capital, political scientist Robert Putnam found that newspaper readership was the best indicator of community involvement. Now that many newspapers are going through rebranding paroxysms as they hemorrhage revenue and cut staff, the role of newspapers as social unifier is threatened. There's some hope that online communities can fill the void. Here an author argues that with the help of good journalism online communities can move beyond the meaningless rants and hyperbolic echo chambers they so often devolve into, potentially replacing newspapers as an active builder of community.

  • McCain's Failed Facebook Satire

    In July the McCain campaign set up a Facebook parody website that was meant to draw attention to Barack Obama's shady political connections. Unfortunately the site drew more attention to an obvious lack of understanding when it comes to Facebook and social networking. Now the Republican National Committee has to issue a press release whenever BarackBook.com has an update, because the social networking tool itself isn't generating enough buzz.

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  • The Real VP Debate

    Waiting to hear Barry's choice for Veep is getting really boring, so even though we should finally get an answer this weekend it'd be a lot more fun to pick out a fictional running mate. After a competative vetting process, it turns out the experience and wisdom of Gandalf would make the ideal partner for the young, fresh-faced Obama.

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  • McCain's Youth Vote Dissonance

    The McCain campaign thinks they've got a winner with their Obama-as-celebrity message, but it's only going to alienate younger voters who actually get excited that a politician is competing with Britney for attention. Once again, McCain has shown that he can't really keep up with Obama's appeal among the up and coming political generation. If he wants to do bettter, maybe he should start with learning how to use email.

  • States Ditching Touch-Screen Voting

    After the immense controversy over ballots  in the 2000 election (remember how stupid hanging chads were?), many states ditched paper voting in favor of trendy new electronic machines. But now many of them are giving up on the touch-screen technology, after concerns about security and reliability proved too risky for the upcoming elections. Basically banks can figure out a way to make ATMs secure, but the government can't figure out how to do the same thing with voting.

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  • Media Zeroing In On Young Voters

    Cable news outlets are reaching out to politically aware youth, yet that demographic is far less likely to actually watch cable news. Their efforts to connect with Generation Y mirror what the campaigns themselves are doing to break a "vicious cycle" of political disillusionment and disconnect among the young.

  • "Voluntary Deportation" A Smokescreen For Harsher Tactics

    Earlier this month U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, also known as ICE so that they pretend they're in an action moive, started a voluntary deportation program. The idea is that undocumented residents will take a cushy flight home instead of waiting to get caught by tough law enforcement. It seems like no immigrant would be dumb enough to actually do this, but that's beside the point. By offering this voluntary program, ICE gains thin justification for home raids that tear apart families and take away workers.

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