As many Wisconsin residents and UW-Madison students are aware of by now, U.S. representative and presidential hopeful Ron Paul will visit the Madison community this Thursday for a town hall-style event at the UW-Madison Stock Pavilion.
Given the congressman’s libertarian-leaning viewpoints, it is no surprise that he is the first Republican presidential candidate to visit before Wisconsin’s April 3 primary. Apart from his particular policies and ideologies, Paul’s Thursday visit to UW-Madison stresses the need for politicians, especially presidential candidates, to consider the values of the younger generation of voters.
Whether one agrees with his ideologies or not, Paul’s visit to UW-Madison is notable on its own merits. The visit should remind candidates of the importance of connecting with the country’s younger voters. While he has the least number of delegates of the four Republican candidates, Paul has unquestionably been able to capture the mindset of the younger, collegiate generation of voters. Considering his stances on foreign policy, economics and marijuana, Paul’s ideals clearly resonate with the independently minded young voters who reject the “mainstream” ideologies shared by many political figures in Washington and the other three Republican candidates.
And in my opinion, a candidate who connects with the younger generation of voters is a candidate worthy of any political office.
During the 2008 election cycle, the county’s younger people had an enormous impact on the outcome of the election. In fact, over 20 million people in the 18-29 age range voted in the 2008 election, with more than two-thirds of those voters voting for President Obama.
Obviously, Obama’s campaign was revolutionary in both how Obama connected with younger voters through social media and his ability to collect many small, $20 donations rather than solely relying on campaign funds from spotty, epic fundraising events.
With the recognition that the young vote matters, there have been numerous GOP debates at different colleges over the past six or so months, including those at Dartmouth College, Oakland University, Wofford College and Drake University. Like any presidential election cycle, actual presidential debates at other colleges will occur in the fall, and I hope that these venues will stress the importance of connecting and reaching out to the younger voices in this country.
It may be nearly inevitable that the GOP race has become a Romney-Santorum showdown with Romney probably coming out on top by the time of the Republican National Convention this August. Yet, there is no excuse for candidates not to connect to and to reach out to the 18-29 age demographic of voters by speaking with younger voters, hosting town hall meetings, and becoming more aware about the collective political and financial concerns of college students.
Though their political ideologies maybe different from much of the college crowd and campaign staff members may think otherwise, I believe that the Republican candidates across the board must do a more effective job at spreading their message to the country’s younger voters. After all, college students are the individuals investing thousands of dollars into an education that should idealistically help spur economic growth, an issue that lies at the forefront of this presidential election cycle.
Ethan Safran is a freshman with an undeclared major. Please send all feedback to opinion@dailycardinal.com.
