Voting Strategy/ With Traditional Efforts To Get Young People To Vote A Dismal Failure, Organizers Say It's Time For A New Approach

The decade-long effort to get so-called Generation X to vote failed... Third Millennium blames the lack of youth outreach on the rise of niche marketing. "Candidates have become so expert at marketing their message to certain constituencies," said director Richard Thau, "that they automatically write off groups that they don't think they can get to the polls." And young people seem to be getting the message that this election isn't about them. In a Zogby/ Hamilton College poll released last week, 33.6 percent of 18-24 year-olds asked about various reasons for young people' lack of political participation strongly agreed that politicians did not pay enough attention to young peoples/ concerns, while only 125.2 percent strongly agreed that young people were too apathetic.