Interest in politics has changed slightly along partisan lines compared to 1992, when the GOP was the incumbent party and the Democrats were challenging. Few Familiar with Positions Lack of interest in the campaign is also reflected in limited public awareness of candidate positions. Slightly more people correctly identified Gore as the candidate who has proposed using surplus Medicare funds to protect the program's future and Bush as the candidate who has proposed allowing workers to invest some of their Social Security contributions in stocks and bonds. But the vast majority were in the dark on these questions. Unfamiliarity with specific policy positions taken by the candidates does not signify a complete lack of attention to the campaign, however.
Men typically are more familiar with candidate policy positions than women.
Moreover, older voters consistently do better than younger ones at identifying candidate positions and campaign events. Not only are many Americans turned off by the current campaign, a significant number say it doesn't much matter who is eventually elected. While there is a clear generational divide on these questions, with younger people more skeptical that the election matters, education and income are also important factors. Independents are more likely than party loyalists to express doubt about the election's significance. This perception is strongly linked to feelings about the importance of the upcoming election.