Barack Obama and John McCain participated in a presidential forum on national service held to commemorate the seventh anniversary of 9/11. The forum—part of the Service Nation Summit convened in New York City—was a solemn, thoughtful reflection on how America has changed since 9/11. The focus was on ways that Americans can serve their communities and their country at a time of critical need, and the candidates had a chance to air their ideas on promoting civic engagement.

Much of the conversation revolved around national service among young people—and that’s only natural. Military service plays a big part in the public national service discussion, as do ideas linking help with college tuition and service.

Civic engagement also is a very hot topic among older Americans, especially baby boomers approaching retirement age. Obama and McCain both have acknowledged the importance of engaging older Americans; both candidates propose expanding the Senior Corps, which is part of CNCS and focuses on volunteering for Americans over age 55.

But I haven’t heard much yet from either candidate suggesting that either really gets it when it comes to the potential of unleashing millions of baby boomers on our country’s problems at a time when they have the time—and numbers—to make a difference.

Both candidates are sponsors in the Senate of the Serve America Act, bi-partisan legislation introduced today by Senators Ted Kennedy (D-Mass.) and Orrin Hatch, (R-Utah) that aims to attract 175,000 new volunteers in the next five years. The bill would provide $5 billion over five years to help nonprofits, community organizations and faith-based programs create volunteer opportunities to assist low-income Americans in areas such as education, health care and job training.

Obama’s position on national service is here. McCain’s can be found here.

I’ll have more on this in a coming Retire Smart column. Meanwhile, I’ve posted video of yesterday’s candidate interviews over at RetirementRevised.com.

This entry was posted on Friday, September 12th, 2008 at 3:49 pm and is filed under Careers, Culture, Federal policy, Non-profits, Retire Smart, RetirementRevised, Volunteering, Workforce. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.