Interesting take on a poll...

So one of my assignments today for my journalism class was to go out on campus and ask people a simple poll question. The question: If the presidential election were held today, would you vote for Barack Obama or the republican nomination? Then I was instructed to get the names and majors of those answering, or if it was a staff member, their job at the college.

Before I started polling, I thought the answers would be pretty balanced. Morris County is of high, extremely Republican, but I figured Obama as well as the Democratic party appear more appealing to youthful voters, so I figured the answers would be pretty even. The results:

Obama-1
Republican-6
Not sure/No opinion/Apathetic/They're all the same-4

Now I have to say I was surprised by this, that the results were so heavy towards one side. I thought maybe it was just my sample, but this seemed to be the norm for the results my classmates got as well.

So I began to wonder what may have led to this, and whether it was the fact that this was party allegiance (as Morris County is extremely red) passed on by parents, or simply disillusioned youth who weren't happy about the results of the current President. It's pretty clear that most youth out of high school or in high school are likely to follow the same political affiliation as their parents, but is this the determining factor?

It seemed pretty clear that most of the people I interviewed who said they would vote Republican were voting Republican no matter who the candidate was. One quote, from P.J., a business major, "Yeah, I would never vote for Obama in a million years. In fact, I'd take a juice box over Obama." That may be so, P.J., but I'm not sure a juice box can run for office.

Owen, the one staff member I interviewed, seemed to be a bit more thoughtful with his answer. Owen's job at the college, self-described, is he "takes care of the air conditioning." Owen relayed that he would probably vote Republican, but "both sides of the aisle have really disappointed me, and I'm still not certain."

The unsure answers seemed to be the most organic answers out of all of them. Max, a music major, had the best quote out of my polling. When I approached Max, he seemed rather hesitant to delve into politics. But when he saw that I personally wasn't going to cast any judgment on his response, Max went off on his disappointment with the system and both parties, as well as Obama. He concluded his thoughts with, "Voting for politicians man...it's kinda like putting both hands on a burning hot stove and then trying to determine which hand feels better."

With the election still more than a year away, I'm surprised more answers weren't the unsure kind. But from my and my class's sample, the results were very heavily skewed toward the GOP. But, maybe Max is onto something. Maybe we're all just burning our hands, and trying to figure out what feels better. But burning your hands is better than cutting them off, which could be the end result of an apathetic generation of youth.