(Reuters) - Meet the undecided voter.
Sometimes seen as the great prize of U.S. electoral politics, this elusive citizen is more likely to be female, white, lacking a college education and earning less than $25,000, according Reuters/Ipsos polling data accumulated over the course of 2012.
The "undecideds" make up roughly 6 percent of the electorate, with a slightly higher concentration in an Upper Midwest region including Ohio and Wisconsin, swing states that could determine the outcome of a close election.
Even though such voters are expensive to win over and perhaps less likely to make it to the polls, they continue to capture the attention of campaigns and political analysts for their potential to tilt the result in a tight race.
After a long campaign season, the undecideds have also earned scorn from some pundits and humorists, incredulous that anyone could remain uncertain after months of campaign advertising and media coverage. "Low-information voter" is one of the more polite names attached to this group.
"This year at the debates we should skip that thing where the undecideds dial in their reaction to every little moment," remarked television host Bill Maher, "and instead hook up the dial to their foreheads to see if there is any measurable brain activity."
3 comments:
I have decided they are all worthless and only care about themselves, their money and power, and how to keep it.
And I would bet that goes back at least 100 years.
I am part of the 52% that neither candidate cares about...I'm not in the 47% that Romney railed against, and I'm not a part of the 1% either. My husband and I are white middle class people that have 4 jobs between us, just to keep up with the cost of living. We pay our own way in this world, and neither candidate is interested in our vote.
We aren't rich enough to buy any kind of influence, and from all of the research I have done, neither candidate is going to help us. We have reached the point of now trying to decide who will hurt us the least, and even looking at those facts its a crap shoot.
We're undecided because the candidates we have to choose from really won't help us...The middle class families that were once the backbone of this country. If you put the social issues aside, neither candidate is a viable choice for working class families.
Suggesting people like us should be hooked up to an EEG to check for brain activity by a man that made a 1 million dollar donation to Obama's super pac is rich.
Politicians pay lip service to families like ours, hoping that we are too busy with keeping our heads above water to hear anything more than their well coordinated and targeted sound bytes.
This country needs a real candidate that understands the plight of the working middle class. Unfortunately, given the way our political parties are set up, only the rich and or well connected are now able to enter the national political arena.
We're not undecided and uninformed, we're just frustrated.
3:29, that is a comment worthy of a post.
Awesomely said!
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