A War Between Generations?

This comes as no surprise, given the fact that over-65 voters were the only ones who tilted toward McCain in 2008.  (Interestingly enough, boomer voters split down the middle between the two tickets; one wonders to what extent the relative evenness of support for Democrats and Republicans in the past decade is something of a boomer thing, like so many other things both good and bad.)

But it also offers yet more evidence of why this month's election does not signify a hard tilt to the right.

Aside from the fact that the incumbent party almost always loses seats in midterm elections (2002 was, as has been said elsewhere, a 9/11-derived fluke, inspired by an electorate determined to give an unelected President a vote of confidence), the voter base in midterms is almost always smaller, and skewed demographically toward the elderly, who have ample time for voting and who are highly dependent on government spending.  And a lot of them voted their fears, based on right-wing propaganda on health care reform.

In time, both of these factors will disappear.  First of all, as health care reform makes health care more available to the general public, the cost of providing it will go down--protecting seniors' access to it.  And second, if this is the Republican base of the future, then (without being undiplomatic about it) the future is relatively short-lived.

We lost a battle, folks.  Not the war.  Time, and the truth, are on our side.