By Rebecca DiFede — A mere four years ago, a young senator from Illinois rose from relative obscurity into the forefront of the young American imagination. He pledged to the youthful voters hope, change, and a world that would be full of wonder and promise. They rallied around him with wide-eyes and even bigger picket signs, and like lovesick puppies they followed him right down the ballot aisle.
Following his election to the presidency, Barack Obama had an overwhelming 84 percent of young voters (age 18-29) supporting him. His campaign was based around, founded on, and partially funded by that demographic, and they trusted him to make good on what he had promised them. They stood by his side, hopeful and waiting for their jobs and money to be rescued by their new president.
But alas, the courtship has ended.
Now, in the wake of the impending election, Obama’s former teammates have turned against him. The most recent poll by the Democracy Corps has young voter approval ratings at below 40 percent — with disapproval now at 54 percent.
Obama’s droves of nubile lovers have waited in the cold, uncertain darkness of the recession for the kiss of salvation, only to find that it would never come. Their love was in vain, and they have become enraged. For hell hath no fury like a voter scorned.
From the ashes of the sordid love affair came the hordes of spurned inamorati, occupying cities all over the country in search of answers. They harbor no feelings towards progress because they feel their government has betrayed them. And so they sit, in tent cities from New York to Nashville and Dallas to San Diego, crying out for jobs and rebelling against the society they feel has failed them.
What many may not realize about the Occupy protestors is that they are disaffected youths who feel they have no other way to express their distrust and dismay with their society than to hole up in the town square or local park and defy the conventional norms.
These poll results are hardly surprising, as the Obama stimulus has failed to turn the economy around. Youth unemployment (ages 16 to 25) is north of 19 percent according to data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, approaching European levels. Our society’s most productive members simply cannot find jobs in the Obama economy.
As NetRightDaily has previously reported, these protesters have a pretty good idea of what they want, and an even better idea of whose shoulders they place the blame for our nation’s dismal economic situation: Obama.
They feel they want to belong to something, and when our illustrious president left them empty handed, they felt had no choice but to take to the streets.
So, it would seem that the backs on which Obama rested his election hopes have now turned against him, and if he wants any hope of succeeding in 2012 he must try and get them back—by turning around the economy he helped to wreck.
Rebecca DiFede is a contributing editor to Americans for Limited Government.
