Following the presidential primary election at the beginning of the month, I’ve been thinking about politics. I work at the polls on Election Day. I have done so for a couple of years now and at several different polling places. I have had a chance to see and talk to voters for thirteen hours of voting. In this primary there were many young women who turned out with such a specific mission in mind that they couldn’t contain it. They came to vote for a woman president.
Older adults are the most noticeable age group at the polls that I once tried to get a survey on senior services passed out to them at election time because the volume of seniors is so high. But seniors don’t vote as a block. There isn’t coordination, even by special interest lobby groups like AARP. I see how advocates for children and youth turn out and speak up in implementation of prop 63 meetings while older adult advocates have trouble figuring out whom each other are. Children’s advocates get their tactics and strategy in place. Since the squeaky wheel gets the grease, you know where the money goes!
I know there is concern for the process. I was recently reminded of Granny D, the 90 year-old woman from New Hampshire that walked from Pasadena to Washington DC in 1999 to protest for campaign finance reform. She was so peeved about the near outright purchase of elected officials that she spent a year on the road to make her point heard. I have a hope that the talent, experience and skills that retired workers possess will be applied to shifting the platforms of the major parties to older adult issues. I hope that the budget crisis doesn’t decimate programs like adult protective services because no one worries about the older adult vote.