Washington Post political reporter Ben Terris is a fresh-faced writer who just graduated from Brandeis in 2008. So surely he enjoyed writing a story for the front of the Style section on Thanksgiving with the snarky theme "Marco Rubio is just the guy to win the youth vote. Or so the old folks think. "
This is an interesting wisecrack, considering the same thing could be said about the old folks at newspapers trying to capture readership among millennials. Check out those fossils trying to appeal to the youth who speak in Tweets! It began:
Marco Rubio — he of the unlined cheeks and recently paid-off student loans and strongly felt preference [in rappers] for Tupac over Biggie Smalls — might be just the thing to get young people to come out and vote Republican in 2016.
So say old people.
“I hope that the young people won’t keep being bumfuzzled by Democrats,” said Larry Trickle, a 77-year-old who came to see the senator speak at a Holiday Inn in Council Bluffs this week. “Here’s a guy that can speak their language, and maybe teach them a thing about work ethic.”
Terris retweeted this anti-Rubio joke turning the Florida senator into Steve Buscemi pretending to be hip:
Marco Rubio is exactly what the young people want, say old people https://t.co/fz9jSzopom @bterris pic.twitter.com/MvXIjNrYpO
— Drew Harwell (@drewharwell) November 25, 2015
There are polling numbers for this Terris thesis:
In a new Washington Post-ABC News poll, Rubio received 16 percent support from Republicans 65 and older, compared with 12 percent among those ages 50 to 64 and 7 percent among those younger than 50. He might be, as Michael Kinsley famously said about then-Sen. Al Gore, “an old person’s idea of a young person."
But this neglects the question of a general election next November featuring 45-year-old Rubio vs. 69-year-old Hillary Clinton. Of course, liberals always think the millennials would never vote for anything resembling traditional conservatism:
Indeed, much of what Rubio promotes is traditional conservatism wrapped in a “New American Century” slogan. He has argued for robust military spending, disagreed with the Supreme Court decision on same-sex marriage and said he does not believe there should be exceptions for rape or incest for abortions.
Terris kept quoting voters past retirement age to underscore his thesis:
“He’s a great representation of someone I would hope would appeal to the younger generation,” said Karine Mclaughlin, 63. “It would be very good for young people to see someone so knowledgeable, with such refreshing ideas.”
The youth vote might not matter so much for Rubio, at least not at first. Older voters are the ones who tend to vote in caucuses, and older voters tend to vote Republican. But his youthfulness is leaving some of these most-reliable voters smitten.
“Physically, he’s a very nice, appealing man,” said Wayne Seaman, who described himself as between 70 and 80. “And he’s very articulate, with a good vocabulary.”
“He explains things really well,” said Wayne’s wife, Saundra, also between the ages of 70 and 80. “He actually has some energy.”
