Laurie's (first) Most Excellent Exit Poll~

I awoke this morning feeling supercharged for the events of the day. After doing my usual do-de-do’s like checking emails, updating twitter and Facebook, Mike and I piled in the car and headed off to vote at a fire station not far from the house.

I was immediately energized by the dealings. Being an “introvert” I only knew 50 percent of the people at the polls. Right after making our penciled little circles on paper ballots we decided to find some breakfast and write down our predictions about the candidates on our ballots, which I’ll share in the next post. Then I got the bright idea to do my own unscientific exit poll! Why not? I wanted to be out amongst the action and the people. I wanted to share in the spirit of the process after waiting for so many months.

I got home and quickly formulated the questions for my poll~ The fundamental idea was to see how many people I might find who wanted to become more informed and engaged. And I was really surprised by what I found.

I visited 5 voting locations within a 25 mile radius over 3.5 hours, wanting to get the largest random pool of people for Laurie’s first Most Excellent Exit Poll. The individual questions and results are posted below. But here’s what I found. Forty percent were at least 51 years old. The next largest age group at 25 percent was between 30 and 40. Over 45 percent of those I surveyed said they spent “several hours” gathering and researching information before voting while 30 percent said they spent just over an hour. Then 68 percent said they shared the information they had gathered with others (primarily a spouse or relative).

And here was a bit of a shocker, One hundred percent of the people who voted ( I believe that means EVERY single one of them) answered “No” to the question: “Are you happy with the current state of politics in America?” (Perhaps not much of a shocking surprise there). BUT, asked if they would want to become more involved to help change things 60 percent said NO! That was discouraging.

As a matter of fact, at the first two places I stopped to question folks, that number was also 100 percent. I was, ummmm, I have no words. Friends, it strikes me that our biggest problem is one of apathy. For those of us who understand how crucial it is that we all become engaged in the process of electing our leaders, it falls incumbent on us to make sure we are attracting others, and sharing with them, the absolute urgency in 2010 of becoming an engaged citizen, rather than an endangered servant~

Age	Percentage
18-29	18.00%
30-40	25.00%
41-50	18.00%
51>	40.00%
Time Spent Vetting
<>	25.00%
> 1 hr	30.00%
Several hrs	45.00%
Source of Info
Friends/Family	3.00%
Web	15.00%
ADS	5.00%
Organizations	0.00%
All Above	77.00%
Discuss Info with others
Yes	68.00%
No	32.00%
Happy with current state of politics in America
Yes	0.00%
No	100.00%
Voting Record
Always	80.00%
Sometimes	18.00%
1st time	2.00%
Want to be more involved
Yes	40.00%
No	60.00%