The Kids Love Him

Dana Goldstein has highlights from the Harvard Institute of Politics poll of 18-24 year-olds:

* Young Democrats are more independent of their elders than young Republicans are. Like their older counterparts, 18-24 year old Republicans prefer Rudy Giuliani as the next president. But while older Democrats support Hillary Clinton (42% to Obama’s 24% and Edwards’ 17%), young Democrats prefer Obama (35% to Clinton’s 29% and Edwards’ 9%).

* Dovetailing nicely with Ronald Brownstein’s Obama-skeptic analysis of “beer track” and “wine track” Democratic candidates (the six-packers make more likely winners), Obama is more popular among the highly educated. Obama leads Clinton by only 3 points among 18-24 year olds not enrolled in a 4-year college, but by a whopping 17 points on campuses.

* And don’t discount gender. Obama leads Clinton by 20% among young Democratic men, but young Democratic women prefer Clinton by 6 points.

We already knew, of course, that Obama's appeal skewed young, male, and educated. It's interesting, however, that age beats education (leading Clinton by only 3 points is small, but it's sill leading) perhaps because there are fewer white people in the youth cohort, but gender trumps age. Indeed, that gender gap, though expected on some level, is pretty astoundingly large when you consider that women are more dovish than men.