The streets were overflowing as a brisk November air rushed through New York City. Car horns blared, music boomed and all around eager 20-somethings, many sitting on each other’s shoulders, cheered wildly: a veritably frenzy perhaps only matched in intensity by the sheer chaos that is New Year’s Eve. But the thousands huddled in Times Square that night, basking in the glow of neon lights and flash bulbs, were not there to ring in the New Year. Rather, it was election night.

In 2008, then Senator Barack Obama was propelled into the White House largely on the backs of young voters. Sold on the idea of change they could believe in, Generation Y voted in record numbers and dispelled the notion that it was apathetic when it came to politics.

But now just four short years later, with the unemployment rate dauntingly high, this generation’s youthful enthusiasm has come  face to face with a bleak reality. While in 2008, it seemed that Obama held a monopoly over this generation’s votes, that may no longer be the case. Millennials are still a highly sought commodity but now considered a more available one, with candidates on both sides of the political spectrum vying for their attention. So the question becomes: What role will Generation Y will play in this election cycle? Read the rest of this entry »