Harvard: Younger Millennials would "Throw Obama Out"

"The most startling finding of Harvard University's Institute of Politics [study]: A majority of Americans under age 25—the youngest millennials—would favor throwing Obama out of office," writes Ron Fournier @ National Journal.

Obama's support among Millennials has dropped to 41 percent, down 11 points in a year, according to Harvard's study of 2,089 Americans ages 18 to 29 conducted Oct. 30 through Nov. 11.  Younger MILs ages 18-24 are more critical than older MILs.

When asked if they would want to recall various elected officials, 45 percent of millennials said they would oust their member of Congress; 52 percent replied "all members of Congress" should go; and 47 percent said they would recall Obama. The recall-Obama figure was even higher among the youngest millennials, ages 18 to 24, at 52 percent.

This age group offers little support to Obamacare, the health care law that depends on youthful exuberance and financial support to succeed.

According to the poll, 57 percent of millennials disapprove of Obamacare, with 40 percent saying it will worsen their quality of care and a majority believing it will drive up costs. Only 18 percent say Obamacare will improve their care. Among 18-to-29-year-olds currently without health insurance, less than one-third say they're likely to enroll in the Obamacare exchanges.  [snip]

In addition to health care, domestic spying is an issue that puts Obama on the wrong side of the rising generation. While split on whether Edward Snowden is a "patriot" or a "traitor" for revealing Obama's surveillance programs, strong majorities of 18-to-29-year-olds oppose the government collecting information from social networks, Web-browsing histories, email, GPS locations, telephone calls, and text messages.

Fournier adds that the "results conform with a story I did this summer with the help of the Institute of Politics (The Outsiders: How Can Millennials Change Washington If They Hate It?), arguing that while Millennials are deeply committed to public service they don't see government as an efficient way to improve their lives or their communities."

The full Harvard study is here.

Harvard Study: Gun Bans Don't Reduce Murder Rates

In a Harvard study, researchers asked, "Would Banning Firearms Reduce Murder and Suicide?" To find an answer, they reviewed the crime data of several European countries. They discovered "that countries with HIGHER gun ownership often had LOWER murder rates." Key findings:

• Russia, which enforces very strict gun control on its people, has a murder rate 4 times higher than the US. [So much for the Left's false assertion that the US has the highest murder rate in the world.]
• Luxembourg, "where handguns are totally banned and ownership of any kind of gun is minimal, had a murder rate nine times higher than Germany in 2002."
• Norway, Finland, Germany and France—all nations whose citizens enjoy significant gun ownership—had remarkably low murder rates.

Harvard researchers concluded the study with this:

Over a decade ago, Professor Brandon Centerwall of the University of Washington undertook an extensive, statistically sophisticated study comparing areas in the United States and Canada to determine whether Canada's more restrictive policies had better contained criminal violence. When he published his results it was with the admonition:

If you are surprised by [our] finding[s], so [are we]. [We] did not begin this research with any intent to "exonerate" handguns, but there it is—a negative finding, to be sure, but a negative finding is nevertheless a positive contribution. It directs us where not to aim public health resources. [Brandon S. Centerwall, Author's Response to "Invited Commentary: common Wisdom and Plain Truth," 134 AM. J. EPIDEMIOLOGY 1264, 1264 (1991)]

Summarizing the Harvard study, Steve Adcock noted:

Further, the report cited, "the determinants of murder and suicide are basic social, economic, and cultural factors, not the prevalence of some form of deadly mechanism." Meaning, it's not guns that kill people. People kill people.