why do so many boomers now vote Repub?

[pstokely]

a lot of baby boomers who said they would never vote Repub over 30 years ago and voted for McGovern now vote Repub? did they get more conservative with age or wealth?

[Cha]

1. Cause they don't want their Social Security?

[jiacinto]

2. They grew up

In a nutshell--eventually they graduated from college. At some point they had to do something else besides protest and demonstrate. Eventually they tired of the "class struggle", lost interest in it, and moved on.

Then they had to get jobs and establish themselves. They had to start supporting themselves. Then they moved to the suburbs, suddenly had to pay taxes and bills, and the rest is history. They had children and suddenly issues like crime and taxes mattered more to them.

[pstokely]

7. so people just get more Conservative as they age

?

[jiacinto]

9. It's not that

It's just that when people have to raise a family and they have to pay taxes and make ends meets, issues become much different than they were when they were younger. When suddenly a man has to support himself and his family issues change and become more complicated.

[pstokely]

12. so raising families makes people more conservative?

doesn't look like that on the other threads

[jiacinto]

13. I think of it this way

They have children and a limited income. Then they have to deal with taxes.

[noiretextatique]

22. don't democrats have children?

it's simple: they vote republican because they think it's in their best interest to do so. as to how these folks were convinced, i believe you have mentioned the rw's cultural wars strategy. we continue to see how successful it's been.

[Classical_Liberal]

24. Do you intend on voting republican when you grow up?

?

[pstokely]

25. no

unless aging, marriage, family, kids just make people go right

[jiacinto]

28. No--And I'm 25 now so I am grown

But I will say that, as I have had to support myself, my views have changed somewhat. But I NEVER become a Republican.

[Classical_Liberal]

32. You are still or recently in college

Why don't you intend on voting republican since they don't tax families as much. I dispute this, but you seem to find the actions of these people to be based on sound reasoning.

[DieboldMustDie]

19. I should think that people with children...

would also be interested in issues like education, health care & world peace.

[depakid]

21. They graduated college and eventually stopped thinking crtitically

As you say, other things mattered more to them. Crititical thinking involves a certain amount of angst; continuing education involves a certain investment in time.

Many baby boomers lost the inclination and couldn't find the time to analyze the issues as they once might have. Hence, they became willing to embrace irrational and visceral candidates and policies that they would previously have thought about and rejected.

Tax cuts to the wealthy being one of them-

Mandatory minimum sentences being another.

Now, of course, the proverbial chickens are coming home to roost.

Could be that more than a few are ready for refresher courses in Economics and criminal justice.

[SuffragetteSal]

31. interesting you see it that way...

but I think your opinion may be a little off base. These babyboomers who now are conservative did not all of a sudden get that way and start voting republican - they were that way all along (rather they knew it or not)

Most people. as they become adults turn exactly into who their parents were. Think about it.

[JCMach1]

34. I think it is a little more complex than that... not all boomers

were campus radicals. In fact, the boomer generation tended to reflect the deep divisions in America over the war. You can see that dichotomy in our two boomer Presidents Bush and Clinton...

Although I doubt Bush ever thought about it much until he was threatened by the draft.

[tomp]

39. so now that you've graduated...

...is that your route? will you grow up now?

i'd like to...oh, never mind.

[Jamesm9164]

3. Because they have their's and

do not want to share with anyone else. This despite the fact that most of what they have is a result of the previous generation.

[Prisoner_Number_Six]

4. Because we've raised a generation of

self-absorbed sociopathic narcissists who should to the last man, woman, and child, be locked away in straitjackets and never EVER be let out or allowed to interact with the public on any level.

And that's my GOOD MOOD answer!

[PretzelWarrior]

5. ignore this post

EDIT:

::poorly worded. ignore this one.

[sandnsea]

8. What???

Explain please.

[sandnsea]

6. Not everybody was marching in the streets

I guess that's something people forget. Just because you're a boomer doesn't mean you were necessarily a war protester. I suspect those that sort of maneuvered through the sixties and just avoided the politics, went to college and/or got a job and became successful, moved further right. That tends to be what I see anyway. Those that actually protested and some Vietnam vets are generally still more liberal.

[jiacinto]

11. But even those who marched in the streets changed

When one is married and has children the issues become much more complicated.

[Classical_Liberal]

26. Why don't you vote republican than?

Since you think they are good for families?

[noiretextatique]

37. principles don't get complicated

you keep saying that increasing responsibilites makes one vote republican, but what about the people who are married and have children who never vote republican? it all depends on what one values.

[Eloriel]

10. I'm not convinced that that many of us sold out

Please remember that not every "child of the 60s" was a hippie or flower child, protested against the war, or did drugs. There were MANY, many, many conservative boomers back then. Goldwater supporters. Nixon supporters. Are there more Repugs among us now? I have no idea and frankly haven't seen any evidence of it.

I've only grown more liberal in my old age. And I know others my age who feel the same way.

Eloriel

[Pobeka]

14. And what with the possibility of voting fraud

Who really knows -- there may be a heck of a lot more Dem's than either the polls or voting "results" show.

[Q]

15. I see no evidence to support your conclusion that...

...boomers vote Republican.

- Almost every post on this thread wrongly stereotypes people in an era they don't seem to understand. Most of the labels and stereotypes come from those who were either too young to have experienced it...or got their 'information' of the times from the neocon sources.

- Why the assumption that everyone was alike? I was a liberal in the 60s, 70s, 80s, 90s and I'm a liberal today. I didn't laze around in college...I worked to pay for my tuition and books. It's silly to suggest that 'liberals' suddenly become conservatives when they 'grow up' and have to finally get a job and raise a family.

- True liberals believe in a certain ideology that doesn't change with time or circumstances. There's no such thing as 'used to be a liberal'. If you've adopted the conservative ideology...chances are you were just fooling yourself about ever being a liberal.

[pstokely]

16. there's still a lot of Dem baby boomers like my parents

but there a lot of ex-liberal McGovern voting now repub voting boomers

[Eloriel]

20. Where's your evidence for that?

I'm not convinced.

How many is "a lot"?

We boomers were out protesting this war in force.

I have no idea what percentage of my generation were liberal to start with, as teens and young adults. I do know that there were many, many, many of us who just weren't into the 60s scene at all. There were young men who were eager to enlist, and did. Hell, some of them STILL believe Vietnam was the right thing to do.

Like I said, I'm just not convinced.

Eloriel

[Eloriel]

18. I'm a little confused

Your response is to my post #10 -- but I don't think I mischaracterized or don't understand my own era.

????

Eloriel

[BGAL1965]

17. Let`s see

we have Kid Rock supporting Bush so that must mean that all rappers are republicans!!!!!!!!

[Lydia Leftcoast]

23. The boomers who vote Republican

were never activists to begin with. Not really. It was fashionable to be a radical, so they followed along, but when other things beame fashionable, they followed along then, too.

At my undergraduate college (1968-1972), populated by middle and working class students from the Midwest, maybe about 10% were involved in politics.

[SuffragetteSal]

33. thank you lydia

you said it perfectly...

[Classical_Liberal]

27. I think alot of them were republicans that didn't want to get drafted

. Ayn Rand was very big in the 60s. Even the present antiwar movement has a notable conservative contingent. Once you are too old to get drafted, becoming a republican is easier.

[okieinpain]

29. the rising number of low income folks into major suburban areas.

I would say blacks with their underware showing, and the dumb ass sub woofers, but the white kids are just as bad as the black kids (it really trips me out to see a car load of white kids, bumping where my niggers at).

the rising number of socially challenged children entering the suburban schools, rising crime rate, really dumb politicians like bill clinton and his, well you know what ( please don't get me wrong, I love the man and would vote for him in a heart beat, but you have to admit the monica deal was really stupid).

and then you throw on top of that the corporatzation of the media, and well you can blame them if they tend to think that the dems are the reason for what's wrong with this country. you would only know the real reason if you go looking for that information.

[pretzel4gore]

30. ever heard of KAL 007?

or of OJ Simpson? What no one should ever forget is the vast (staggering$$$) sums spent constantly since the 'counterculture' era to demonize public interest, to create racial awareness, to foster fear of crime, enemies, boogeymen, religion, government, media, the police, the old people, the young the rich the poor, environment, environmentalists ...all to help the special interests steal control...which they reinvest in their selfish bullshit...
ie power in this world is represented by the owners/operators of the 'mediawhore'
The boomers do not exists, not really... like Lardy Thatcher said 'there be no suchum thang as dat society!)

[leftofthedial]

35. do you have statistics for this?

brain damage from the 60's?

experience of the last 30 years created ultra-cynics?

Spoiled fucking rotten?

[fabius]

36. The first TV generation.

Brainwashed.

Actually it started with Carter and his various fiascos, and voting declined, the Raygun got elected and the rest is history.

Bill Clinton is a better measure of where Boomers are, i.e. centrist, hedonistic, selfish. I know, I'm one of 'em. The sellout to the machine is part of it, look at Bob Woodward. Disgusting.

The ones with kids don't want them doing all the drugs they did when they were kids.

Also the Repug Wurlitzer has been very effective, and the Democratic leadership has sold out. The Democratic candidates this year are the first politicians I've heard since Jesse Jackson saying anything really new. That's a good start.

When Boomers start getting SS payments and Medicare, and when the Repugs keep trying to bankrupt the government there will be REVOLUTION. Like I said, one thing we are is selfish, in spades!!!

[CBHagman]

38. For starters, we need statistics

I can only speak of what I've observed, and that's a mixed bag. Does anyone have a link to a study on voting patterns and/or political activism among baby boomers?

And as one poster observed above, not everybody was demonstrating in the streets. Am I the only one who remembers those clean-cut Nixon supporters?


Some of us become liberal with added life experiences and some of us opt for what's popularly termed "conservative." Gloria Steinem once did an essay on examples of women who grew more progressive as they aged. That's certainly true of one woman I know, a 50-something single mother who calls herself an ex-Republican.

As for my own family, my parents were Republicans, and my siblings turned out similar. They tend more to the conservative Republican side, though two of them have more nuanced views than the other two.


Then there's yours truly, who voted for Jerry Ford in '76 and has moved leftward ever since. I like to say that if nothing had happened to me after age 15, I would be a conservative Republican. It was easy for me to talk of absolutes when I was 15, but things looked different after I'd traveled overseas and held down a number of jobs. It was a shock to have to try to discuss politics with Europeans who knew far more about my country than I knew about theirs. I landed right in the middle of the anti-Reagan sentiment and have never been the same.

Then there's that business of arguing about abortion in college, an experience I don't care to repeat.