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Palin and Florida
As everyone knows, Florida has a large elderly population, and the tendency to identify with McCain, an elderly man, is strong.
Health (not just health care) and mortality are very, very big issues for the elderly: if you're 65, chances are you personally know someone who has died of a disease, and you know it can claim you in short order. Death and heirs are not the relatively abstract things they are for much younger people, but are rather imminent.
If Palin comes off looking plausible, elderly McCain supporters and undecideds may continue to feel comfortable supporting him. But if Palin ends up looking like someone who one couldn't imagine being president, then, especially given McCain well-known bouts with cancer, one should look for a greater-than-national-average shift away from McCain toward Obama as the elderly contemplate much more seriously than most others the meaning of a Palin presidency.
Health (not just health care) and mortality are very, very big issues for the elderly: if you're 65, chances are you personally know someone who has died of a disease, and you know it can claim you in short order. Death and heirs are not the relatively abstract things they are for much younger people, but are rather imminent.
If Palin comes off looking plausible, elderly McCain supporters and undecideds may continue to feel comfortable supporting him. But if Palin ends up looking like someone who one couldn't imagine being president, then, especially given McCain well-known bouts with cancer, one should look for a greater-than-national-average shift away from McCain toward Obama as the elderly contemplate much more seriously than most others the meaning of a Palin presidency.
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This assumes they are as rational as you say. I would suspect a lot of oldsters will simply vote for McCain because he is old/generational connection.
Just as fishermen would vote for a fisherman.
September 30, 2008 8:09 AM | Reply | Permalink
Perhaps it would be an internal battle between their identification with him and dis-identification with her, all mixed into a gut speculation about his age/health. Generally people don't vote for/against VPs, but the (Floridian) elderly may be a significant exception.
September 30, 2008 8:17 AM | Reply | Permalink