Youth vote puts some spring in Obama’s step

US: Republicans believe high unemployment will be Barack Obama's weak point this November. So why has Matt Caffrey, a 22-year-old from Ohio, just quit his job? To help the president get reelected.

Leaving a secure job in a country with an official unemployment rate of 8.3 percent, and broader estimates in the double figures, is not for the timid.

But six months into his first fulltime job, a two-year contract with an environmental advocacy group, Caffrey decided nothing could be more important than campaigning to get Obama another four years.

So on the eve of a business trip, he called his boss.

“It was something I agonized over -- for a few minutes,” Caffrey, a bearish figure in student-style sweatshirt and running shoes, said with a grin.

Back in 2008, Caffrey was one of the excited foot soldiers in a youth movement helping propel Obama from obscurity to the White House.

AFP