Wisconsin Lt. Gov. Barbara Lawton spoke Tuesday night at the UW-Madison College Democrats meeting in Ingraham Hall, touting the importance of the youth vote at UW-Madison.
\We are the old people and we know that this is the most important election of our lifetime,"" Lawton said.
Lawton said although UW-Madison voter turnout has traditionally been high, the number of student voters for the 2004 elections needs to increase.
""You need to more than double your numbers. You need to quadruple your numbers,"" she said.
In addition, Lawton discussed points of contention Democrats have had with the current government, on both national and state levels.
""There's a tremendous cognitive dissonance between the rhetoric and the reality of the four-year record,"" she said.
Also in attendance were representatives from campaign groups at UW-Madison, including Students for Kerry, Students for Feingold and Students for Baldwin.
""The youth vote's completely invaluable because the students can determine this election one way or another,"" said Matt Berg, co-chair of UW-Madison's Students for Feingold.
He added Students for Feingold will be doing everything it can to make sure all students on campus vote in the weeks leading up to the November election.
""As Senator Feingold said at a rally on campus last week, the youth vote is the backbone of his career,"" said John Kraus, a representative of the Russ Feingold campaign from the Milwaukee Office.
Kraus seemed hopeful that young voters will affect this election in a positive way for Democrats.
""The youth vote can decide this election. Not only the senate election, but the presidential election as well,"" Kraus said. ""I think that it's likely that the 2004 election is going to bring a large youth turnout.""
""When we think about the student role [of College Democrats] here on campus, we want everybody and their best friend and their best friend's friend to go out and vote,"" College Democrats Chair Liz Sanger said.
College Democrats consists primarily of student volunteers who canvass, perform literature drops, sidewalk chalkings and ""get students on campus excited about the elections and energized about the campaign,"" according to Sanger.
""We have a lot of energy, a lot of members, and we want to win this election. And we're ready to win it, and we're going to win it,"" Sanger said.
