Whither the youth vote?

If John Kerry loses this thing, and it's looking a little grim right now, the left will spend weeks and months asking what went wrong. What happened to the massive turnout efforts, for example, among young voters who were going to be such a factor? Exit polls show young voters, aged 18-29, favor Kerry by 12 points, eight more than favored Al Gore over Bush four years ago. But despite P. Diddy's Vote or Die campaign, Rock the Vote, Choose or Lose, and on and on, it looks like young people didn't turn out anymore than they did four years ago. The AP reported that "fewer than one in 10 voters Tuesday were 18 to 24, about the same proportion of the electorate as in 2000, exit polls indicated." Over at Daily Kos, the mood on this topic was grim. "MSNBC exit poll indicates that the youth did not vote. The 18-29 bracket voted the same this year as in 2000, while 30-44 group was down. That's what's killing us," kos wrote.