120 million Americans didn't vote in 2002. According to Jack Beatty, writing in the Atlantic Monthly [link], this makes the non-voters the largest political block in the country, larger than either the Democrats or the Republicans. Beatty's point is that whichever party figures out how to mobilize this group will change the balance of power in American politics.

Beatty suggests that the Republicans have at least made an opening bid for this group (many of whom are young and working in low-paying service-sector jobs) with the "personal spending accounts" reform of Social Security. But Beatty notes that in order to close the deal with this group, the Republican party will have to deal with the fact that the disaffected cohort is generally more socially liberal than the Republican party as a whole. Something to think about.