The ascendency of Barack Obama as a legitimate contender for the Democratic Presidential nomination has focused a lot of attention on the generation gap, even though some would argue that Obama (b. 1961) is technically still a Baby Boomer, albeit at the opposite end of the curve from Hillary Clinton (b.1946). From the perspective of life experience, Obama is practically a member of GenX, having missed both the optimism and the upheavals of the 1960s and come of age amid the confusion and dissolution of the 1970s. This is in marked contrast to older Boomers of both the left and right who experienced the cultural and political events of the 1960s at an age where they were old enough to make choices, form opinions, and face consequences.

It is likely that the formative political event of Obama’s teenage years was the 1980 presidential election that ushered in the current era of conservative political ascendency. His political identity as an American liberal was shaped in response to Reagan, the militancy of the GOP-dominated Congress in the 1990s, and of course the recent policies of George W. Bush. Except for a brief, fleeting moment in the early days of the Clinton administration, it is unlikely that he ever saw a possibility of his values and priorities being adopted as government policy. He has spent his entire adulthood in opposition.

I think it is this unique perspective which accounts for the difference that many voters seem to feel exists between Obama and Senator Clinton, whose views on policy are otherwise nearly interchangeable. In 1968, when Clinton was at the peak of her youthful idealism, it seemed that the momentum was on her side. Her public career since the 1980s has been an effort to resist an assault on her cherished values and principles carried out most forcefully by members of her own generation. It’s a conflict she takes personally because she has not only been intellectually at the center of the rancorous political and cultural debates of the past 20 years, but is personally at the center of them as well. She can’t change, or embody change, because she fundamentally symbolizes the very forces that Obama and the younger generations have defined themselves against. She owns them. She is them.

At this point in the Boomer lifecycle, it seems clear to many GenXers and Millennials across the political spectrum that the pet grievances of Boomer elites have become toxic to the discourse. Among the contenders for the presidential nomination this year, only two candidates stand outside the Boomer frame: Barack Obama and John McCain (who, at 71, would be our first and likely only Silent Generation president). It’s no surprise that they, and older fringe candidate Ron Paul (also a Silent), are generating the most excitement among younger voters this cycle.