Why are senior citizens turning against the GOP?

This poll suggests that they are –

– but it’s not clear why. The only theories offered are:

Most significantly, even on social issues, where seniors are generally believed to be reliably conservative:

Nobody analyzing this figures thinks it means the Pubs will lose the House in 2014, the shift isn’t that big, and more seniors still plan to vote Dem than Pub – but the margin is closer than ever before. What could explain such a turnabout among a hitherto reliable core constituency? Is fear for the future of Medicaid enough to explain it?

This is especially significant because voter turnout is always very high among senior citizens.

Maybe they’re leaving the GOP for pretty much the same reasons as everyone else?

It’s a real conceptual barrier to try to understand anyone’s, or any artificially-defined bloc’s, attitudes only in terms of their own assessments of their own economic self-interest, but that’s what the link does. If you allow the possibility that seniors who are otherwise set financially for themselves nevertheless still want to leave a better society behind them for their children and grandchildren, that they want them to have the same possibilities that they did, then distaste for current GOP attitudes follows pretty much automatically. That includes the reflexive “gummint is bad” shit that doesn’t sit well with those who remember a time when there wasn’t a party trying to prove it. People with a habit of responsible citizenship are then drawn to the only party that practices it.

Then too, the meanings of patriotism national security are not what it was for those who grew up with the Cold War, and that detracts from the party that has most publicly wrapped itself in that flag for decades.

I dunno. Seems like as people get older they become a bit more tolerant.
someone 25-35 is more likely, I think, to harbor specific social views that line up with GOP goals.
By the time you get to 60ish, it’s less important who wants to marry whom, and more important that medical care be available to all.

I’d like to see the actual survey and how the questions were phrased. Your cite links back to another website discussing the poll, but I didn’t see a link to the actual poll itself.

Also, from your cite:

That also makes me wonder who was being polled.

Yes, but that’s not really the relevant measure. 70-year-old Joe Smith is probably more socially liberal than 20-year-old Joe Smith was half a century ago, but he’s also probably more socially conservative than his 20-year-old grandson Bob Smith is right now.

With gay culture being more visible on network television, homosexuality isn’t nearly as alien and frightening to oldsters as it might have been 20 years ago. Republicans aren’t going to have near as much success exploiting homophobia as they were before.

Those that die off each year are whiter than the population as a whole, exploiting racism is less effective when your target isn’t as white as it used to be.

Seniors know that Republicans would dearly love to destroy Social Security and Medicare.

70 year old Joe Smith was 30ish in the 60’s and 70’s.
He may be more socially conservative than someone who is 20 today.
But compared to seniors even 20 years ago, I think older folks are more accepting of social differences.

The GOP is trying to trim back medicare and SS. Old people rely on these.

People vote what is in their best interest.

QED

These are not the same seniors who were around twenty years ago. I myself have found that the candidates chosen to represent Republicans have made it extremely difficult to support the party for the past twenty years or so.

It’s a Democratic Party poll. It was conducted to show results the Democratic Party wants it to show. Don’t read too much into it.

From the linked article, bolding mine:

I don’t think it’s a secret that people are turned off by the GOP’s messaging right now. I mean that you should take figures like “51% of old people think the GOP’s gun rights position is extreme” with a grain of salt. I’m as anti-gun as they get* and I don’t believe that for a second.

*subject to limitations unfortunately imposed by the Second Amendment.

There is also the demographic shift, where new blood is being infused into the 65 year old age group as the older cohort dies off. You’d expect a couple percentages difference in the poll based just on that.

Right, a 70-year-old today came to political awareness during the Sixties, with all of the views of government that the time shaped. Civil rights, skepticism about militarism, social safety net programs, racial equality that has sponsored gender and sexuality equality … what of that works in the Republicans’ favor?

Other than the fact that those people were past 65 during the last election and mostly went for Romney?

That’s the past- article is about the future.
Every year, it just gets worse for the GOP, for all the reasons we are discussing.

I’m not sure, but I think it’s this one from this site. At any rate, it’s all discussed here.

N.B.: It’s not a just a Dem pollster saying this. From the Atlantic article linked in the OP:

See also, from The Daily Beast:

Older people aren’t turning away from the GOP, older people are dying as older people tend to do and being replaced with people who weren’t that old a few years ago and aren’t as attached to the Republican party.

And that’s the problem, hate really isn’t a viable long-term platform.
Especially hatred of something so obviously to the benefit of everyone who isn’t wealthy.

How many out of the fifty states have Republican Governors?

How many have one or both houses of legislature controlled by Republicans?

Why is the Speaker of the House of Representatives a Republican?